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Windows XP SP2 Penetration Hits 60 Percent

The percentage of the Windows XP installed base protected by the firewall, Automatic Updates, virus subscription warnings, rewritten code and other baseline security measures in Service Pack 2 keeps inching up.

Earlier this month, Microsoft reported distributing more than 218 million copies of SP2 since releasing the service pack nearly a year ago. While Microsoft doesn't publicly disclose figures, they frequently refer reporters to the data collected by analysts at IDC.

"As of the middle of 2005, IDC estimates the installed base of Windows XP Professional and Windows XP Home to be 371 million operating systems installations," IDC analyst Al Gillen said. That means Microsoft distributed 58.8 percent as many copies of SP2 as of Windows XP.

However, the penetration of the service pack is likely higher than 60 percent because many of the downloads went to corporate sites, where they would be distributed to tens, hundreds or thousands of machines.

About the Author

Scott Bekker is editor in chief of Redmond Channel Partner magazine.

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