Windows 2000 SP1 Ships

Microsoft lists its newly released Windows 2000 Service Pack 1 (SP1) as a recommended, but not critical update. SP1 includes no new features, other than features it introduces to simplify service pack installation (see “Windows 2000 SP1—Microsoft’s First Truly ‘Safe’ Service Pack?” on page 3 of the Aug. 2000 Update). SP1 does fix 270 bugs, including minor security holes, hardware compatibility problems, performance issues, and a grab bag of obscure system crashes and resource leaks.

SP1 is the first product from the new Windows Sustained Engineering group, whose mission is to deliver thoroughly tested service packs that aren’t loaded with new features. Despite the group’s vigilance and three months of beta testing, SP1 does create a few bugs. Most notably, it interferes with personal firewall software (such as ZoneAlarm), a problem that will affect mainly home and small office users who have bought personal firewalls to protect a broadband Internet connection. SP1 can also disable some Access database queries, specifically multilevel select queries that use the “%” wildcard character and the Access ODBC driver.