Something seems a bit fishy in Redmond Land.... As many people who know me know, I don't use Windows that often but I do mostly for my work and I'm typically using Visual Studio C++. Only yesterday, I fired up Windows XP and after a couple of hours of use, up popped up the dialog for installing updates. I simply closed what I was doing and let the updates occur.
Windows XP rebooted and I began to use it but when I copied files over the network, I had a nagging feeling that the performance wasn't quite up to par.
Today, I have tried transferring larger files and I notice that it appears to stall frequently while performing the file transfer. So I started "ping -t" ... and wouldn't you know, this machine which used to have no problems is now dropping about 1 in 10 packets over my fully switched network. Just in case it was a faulty port on the switch, I changed the port and ethernet cable. No change.
Is this some sinister plot to make Vista "better" by crippling older XP installations?
In any case, it is stupid - and dropping that many packets causes a lot of problems. I cannot believe that everyone are experiencing this or else there would be a worldwide outcry - a revolt. Perhaps its just a coincidence that the network card is now faulty but it's a bit awkward to resolve as the NIC is the on-board integrated port on a laptop. I guess I will have to try with a PC Card device and see if that rectifies it.