Windows XP SP2 upgrade to SP3 Problems

1. your data will NOT be destroyed when you upgrade from SP2 to SP3. However, just like any major system update, you should always backup your data first before doing such big action.

2. SP3 mainly consists of security update since the introduction of SP2. For end users, there should not be any obvious difference between SP2 and SP3 in terms of feature, usage and performance.

In the other hand, SP3 has a new feature called "Network Access Control" (NAC). It can restrict a machine's access to Local Area Network if certain security criteria have not been met, for example: Anti-virus is outdated, Firewall is not properly configured. However, this feature is only available within a Network, and when used with Windows Server 2003 or above. For home users or small business, this is irrelevant because they simply cannot make use of this function at all.

More information (official site):
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/bb794714.aspx

Official Download link (free, even pirate copy can download and install):
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=68c48dad-bc34-40be-8d85-6bb4f56f5110&displaylang=en



2008-08-18 15:20:32 補充：
as long as you keep your SP2 updated (with Windows update or Auto Update), there is no immediate need to upgrade it into SP3.

Certainly, you will need to do this sooner or later. But again, no need to hurry if you are worry. You can wait a wait and see other people's feedback first.

2008-08-18 15:20:37 補充：
For myself, I have upgraded to SP3 already and it runs fine. But I have heard some people have trouble installing it.

sp2 upgrade 去sp3 唔會destroy你的harddisk，不同之處是sp3包含了所有sp2推出後的安全漏洞補丁(hotfix)，所以建議更新到sp3，你可以到下面的網址下載sp3的更新包：
http://*****/6odm3c

圖片參考：http://tw.yimg.com/i/tw/ugc/rte/smiley_33.gif