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Do You Have the Latest Service Pack for Your Operating System?
By Joy Stapleton    Printer-friendly version

As of July 13, 2010 Microsoft is no longer supporting the 32-bit version of Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2), and in order to continue receiving support for Windows XP you have to be using Service Pack 3 (SP3). Support for the 64-bit version of Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2) will continue until April of 2014.

Support for Windows Vista without any service packs ended as of April 13, 2010. If you haven’t already done so, you’ll have to install Windows Vista Service Pack 2 in order to continue receiving critical updates for Vista.

You can check what Service Pack is installed on your system by going to the Start menu, right-clicking on My Computer (in Windows XP) or Computer (in Windows Vista), and selecting Properties. It will be listed under the System properties.

If you continue to run an unsupported version of Windows you will no longer be able to receive the security updates from Windows Update that can help protect you from malicious software such as viruses, spyware, and malware. For your computer’s protection you should always install the latest available service pack for any Windows operating system.

To install the latest Service Packs for your operating system go to Get Windows Service Packs and you’ll see a list of links on the right side just under where it says Featured Downloads. Click on the appropriate link for Windows XP SP3, or Windows Vista SP2.


Joy Stapleton started out as a mainframe Programmer/Analyst in 1985. In 1992 she became a PC software developer and PC technician. As a private consultant, Joy provides PC technical services and develops Web sites.