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Solve : Hulu blocks 250 million Windows XP PCs?

Answer»

As of now, about 250 million PCs can not watch Hulu movies.
Why? Because somebody at Hulu does not get it. About 16 % of Windows PCs still use Windows XP, not Windows 7.

This chart shows XP is still ahead of the Apple OS for number of users. Now can you imagine anybody refusing to let Apple users watch?

The real issue is that Adobe is pushing the new version of Flash that does not work with XP. This has been documented elsewhere. Apparently Adobe does not care. They claim it works. But it does not.

What I don't understand is how Hulu, or anybody, ignores this.
Based on what I'm able to find, the chart is sourced from Data from "Net Applications" (An analytics firm) for Feb 2015. Even for the time frame, it's MEASUREMENT of XP systems was well outside the standard deviation compared to all the other analytics firms, which suggests that Net Applications data was affected by confounding factors or sample bias, which would mean that generalizing the results to a larger sample (eg 250 million of an assumed 1.5 Billion PCs) isn't valid.

One big difference between Windows XP and Mac OS would be that OSX is still supported, regardless of it's usage share.

However, this is all rather moot, isn't it? Considering Hulu still supports running on Windows XP.Thank you for the comeback.
Granted, 250 million sounds like a lot. So I will yield on that.

But what if it was only 10 per cent of the windows users? Why ignore a large segment of total users? Are they outcasts?

But the problem with Adobe is not new. Why Adobe can no get a SAFE and stable version of Flash to work on XP is a mystery. You would think they would at least offer some kin of explanation. Or else let users take a risk with an older version.

Funny thing is that you can get a version of Silverlight to work on XP. But the movie service people have dropped Silverlight because Microsoft no longer supports it.

Think about it. How many unsupported software is out there being used every day in spite of the no support concern.

I think there is a work-around, but neither Adobe or anybody wants to publish it.
So it becomes yet another 'hack' to keep old stuff running.

Quote from: BC_Programmer on September 27, 2015, 04:09:15 AM

Hulu still supports running on Windows XP.

I have no idea what you are talking about at this point. Hulu has not "blocked" any PCs. Windows XP SP2 is still listed as supported.

Quote
How many unsupported software is out there being used every day in spite of the no support concern.
Quite a bit, I imagine. However I do not think that is entirely relevant. I'm sure there are people using VisiCalc, doesn't mean that modern software has to support people using it in any capacity. People continuing to use outdated software doesn't mean new software or new versions of software should cater to that minority. The only time that happens is when those considerations are determined as having a highly detrimental effect on the company.

For example- Let's presume for a moment that Hulu was to drop Windows XP. They haven't, despite your protestations otherwise, but let's just go ahead with that assertion anyway.

so now you may follow with your ask, "Why ignore a large segment of total users?"

The answer? Because they can. Once use of an older product drops off such that support can be dropped, any company not managed POORLY is going to drop it like a stone. Supporting an additional Operating System means more money invested in engineering and testing the product on that system. This is particularly true for Windows XP since a lot of UI-related things need to be completely from scratch or completely different because Windows XP uses a different Display model.

The decision is made because the company determines it would cost more money in terms of engineering and testing time to continue supporting XP than those XP customers will be bringing in to the company to begin with. If you want to stick with software released over a decade ago, that is of course you're right. Just don't be surprised or indignant when you are left behind.

My daughters Windows XP Home SP3 Celeron D 335 2.8Ghz with 1GB 400Mhz DDR RAM and GeForce 6200 AGP 8x video card Dell that was upgraded from a Pentium 4 2.4Ghz runs Hulu and Netflix just fine. She watches those sites as well as youtube from her bedroom on 17" flatscreen and while the computer is a dinosaur, It plays them just fine on 1024 x768 res.

So not sure who is getting blocked since last I knew she was still able to access Hulu to watch cartoons and movies. And whenever anything is wrong she is fast to ask me to fix it etc.

The Celeron D 335 2.8Ghz has SSE3 instructions which might be helping it support the media playing etc. The prior Pentium 4 2.4Ghz lacked SSE3 as well as had fewer transistors on the single core.

Pentium 4 2.4Ghz 512k L2 cache = 55 million transistors and no SSE3
Celeron D 2.8Ghz 256k L2 cache = 125 million transistors and SSE3 Support

I was almost hesitant to go through the upgrade for loss of L2 cache, but the Celeron D 335 runs way better than the Pentium 4 2.4Ghz that the Dell once had in it. I just needed to flash BIOS to support the newer CPU as for the A02 bios version I think it was was way out of date to support the Celeron D 335. Impressed with Dells CPU support lists and Bios Flash options to stretch life of older computers.The CH News EDITOR POSITION is still accepting applications...Solution Found!
Now Hulu lets me watch without the "install new Flash" yap.

Conclusion: They read CH every day and saw this post.
They know who I am.
After all, they use Flash!

Thank you Hulu!


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