Question RE: End-of-Life Announcement for v22.14.x and Earlier Products

Norton Security | Norton Internet Security
1

What is the difference between Norton LifeLock employee Gayathri_R's 08-Mar-2020 announcement Active customers in legacy versions are being upgraded and today's 13-May-2020 Announcing end of life for old product versions on Windows? The only difference I can see is that the March 2020 announcement was about a silent (forced) upgrade, while today's end-of-life (EOL) announcement asks users to manually initiate the upgrade by selecting the "Check For a New Version" option from the system tray icon.

Does use of the term "end-of-life" in today's announcement now mean that all v22.14.x and earlier products (including the v21.7.0.11 products that must be used by Win XP SP3 users with older CPUs that do not support SSE2) will no longer receive regular protection updates like SDS (virus) definitions, IPS definitions, etc.?

2

I actually think Norton LifeLock's decision to discontinue older product lines for these users is long overdue and might even speed up bug fixes if software developers are concentrating their efforts on supporting a single v22.15.x legacy product version.

I hate to admit it, only because it condones forsaking older versions of product, but, that is some pretty sound logic that cannot be argued with.

As such, I have conceded to stay with v22.15 (now that it has been fixed of al lthe Application Error problems, save for the one that happens to Norton itself at system shutdown), and I hope that will be enough for NLL to "leave me the hell alone" for another decade or two before shoving another piece of modern software down my throat that does not play nice wit hmy XP system. 

Hey, I may not even have 10-20 years left in me anyway, so, I hope Norton will see fit to SLOW DOWN a bit and allow me to live out my days free of worry over the next bit of sabotage coming from a company who is supposed to PROTECT my computer, not find new ways to screw with it. 

3
lmacri:

What is the difference between Norton LifeLock employee Gayathri_R's 08-Mar-2020 announcement Active customers in legacy versions are being upgraded and today's 13-May-2020 Announcing end of life for old product versions on Windows? The only difference I can see is that the March 2020 announcement was about a silent (forced) upgrade, while today's end-of-life (EOL) announcement asks users to manually initiate the upgrade by selecting the "Check For a New Version" option from the system tray icon...

 As the OP of this thread, I'd simply like someone employed by Norton LifeLock to clarify if there's been a policy change regarding support of v22.14.x and older products since the previous March 2020 announcement.  Specifically, I'd like to know if Win XP SP3 machines with older CPUs that do not support SSE2 will still be able to install v21.7.0.11 products and receive ongoing protection updates for virus definitions, IPS definitions, etc., since it's relevant to comments I might post in other threads if I'm trying to help someone troubleshoot a problem with their Win XP or Vista machine.

anon743:
@lmacri
I'm disturbed by the notification too.  I don't think the NLL side has done a decent job too address(and cater) legacy customers in need...

I am not disturbed by the latest May 2020 announcement.  If I understood correctly, Win XP/Vista users that have CPUs that support SSE2 can still use legacy v22.15.x Norton products and will continue to receive ongoing protection updates. I actually think Norton LifeLock's decision to discontinue older product lines for these users is long overdue and might even speed up bug fixes if software developers are concentrating their efforts on supporting a single v22.15.x legacy product version.
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32-bit Vista Home Premium SP2 * Firefox ESR v52.9.0 * Norton Security Deluxe v22.15.2.22

4

"Unfortunately, nothing lasts forever."

Yeah, well, the way the technology industry (including but not limited to Micorsuck and Norton) constantly develops new crap (before anyone has had a chance to get familiar with the previous) and skipping a lot of vitally-thorough testing for compatibility & reliability with both modern and older devices/systems, no one ever gets the CHANCE to find out if something might actually "last forever" or not!

Or at least find out if it might last longer than the proverbial "5 minutes" they allow you with the new products before they're rolling out the next pile of "re-inventing the wheel" crap and shoving it down our throats. 

When they say "offering best protection", that's just code for "perfecting the art of total control via invasive snooping, infiltration, and hijacking". 

I'm not too bothered by this EOL announcement, since I've conceded to v22.15 and essentially "gotten used to it". The bugs it was exhibiting have been fixed, so I am too busy being relieved and happy with that 5-years-overdue-correction finally being done to worry about much else. 

However, if Norton could just fix the "MINOR" issues with my OS getting a (guaranteed) "Application Popup" error message box pertaining to the Norton product at every system shutdown/restart, and maybe also get the product itself to NOT lock up/freeze/hang when manually prompting a Subscription Status refresh, or executing any other "connect to server" processes of Norton, that would be GREAT. 

I will panic when they decide to be total tyrants and announce they will no longer support any machines before Windblows 10. 
At that time I will write my suicide note and place all the motive for ending MY life with Norton's idiotic decision to end my computer's life via discontinued protection. I simply cannot afford new computers, nor do I wish to rebuild my life's work from scratch (as it is completely 32-bit platform dependent"), and even if I could afford them, I frankly hate, loathe, and despise everything after XP anyway (nothing but dumbed-down, end-user-unfriendly, allow-corporations-and-other-authoritarian-entities-to-spy-on-you piles of junk that I will NEVER trust, let alone understand or get used to), and without a protected computer to safely navigate the internet, which I must do to shop, PAY BILLS/RENT, etc, then my life is as good as over. 

Are you LISTENING, Norton? 
Stop screwing with people's LIVES.

Let's hope that such a mind-numbingly stupid decision of forsaking legacy systems NEVER comes to pass. 

 

5

My $0.02.

Unfortunately, nothing lasts forever.  This is especially true when it comes to PC hardware and software.  While I feel for those stuck with older hardware / Operating Systems, for whatever reason/s, I can see possible reasons that an AV company may end support for them.

  • The AV can't offer the full protection to older hardware that it can on newer hardware / Operating Systems.
  • It must be expensive to maintain servers catering to those older machines.  The AV company must also test compatibility with older, outdated machines.  That's probably why Microsoft ended support too.
  • This particular AV company has had a major downturn in the staff so they have far fewer resources to put into the above.
  • Maybe they have to become leaner to remain viable into the future.

Maybe it's time these machines found a new lease of life by installing a Linux distros.  No need to wipe Windows out when you can dual-boot.  That way if there is certain programs on the Windows partition that can't be installed or replaced on Linux, can still be used, but general browsing can be done (for free), safely with no need for any AV on Linux.

He ducks and runs for cover.

6

@lmacri
I'm disturbed by the notification too.  I don't think the NLL side has done a decent job too address(and cater) legacy customers in need, but instead to find an opportunity or excuse to force-upgrade (force-migrate) those affected ones into the new (SaaS) ecosystem, which (according to current user feedback) is an outright disaster.

For me I've been running Intelligent Update for my v21.7.0.11 knowing that I may not receive certain definitions updates.  But I have no other choice, and I'm accustomed to downloading those patches.  (I just hope, that NLL would fix the LU mechanism and make 100% sure that mechanism is not overstepping its authority, ie. force upgrade hijacks, such that concerned legacy customers won't get affected...)

The other problem with this EOL is that it may be indication that they may be shutting down any Live Update service (ie. when it's still running properly for its intended tasks, without the forced upgrade hijack) and/or provition of manual Intelligent Update virus definition update files to these older versions.  It that's true then it will be a disaster!!

I've said many times before that as long as an older AV/firewall software  can maintain the basic AV capabilities, people in need will still be willing to use it.  That's something shared amongst others in other computer forums (when they mention Kaspersky), as well as what MBAM has been doing since having released MBAM v3.xx while letting customers stick with the v2.xx with definitions updates

G_R keeps saying this:

With the 21.x and prior versions being over 5 years old, we have determined that users will need to migrate to the newer generation product versions in order to receive sufficient protection.

The cache is that , the core v22.x architecture (deployed since 2014) is also FIVE PLUS years old.  But NLL somehow turns it into some sort-of SaaS with newer builds such that they can call it the "current" version.  In reality, every build version is just fix-ups for certain bugs but may also introduce newer bugs.  Just like Winblows10.

Also this

If you have a Windows PC running version 22.14 or older then we suggest that you right click on the Norton icon in the system tray and select the "Check for a new version" option.

Does that mean NLL has finally cleaned up its Live Update mechanism?  "Check for New Version" should be a more proper way of  initiating an actual software upgrade -- but NOT within the LU mechanism (ie. not via "Run Live Update" command).

My view is that, even though v21.7.0.11 is the final v21 version, it should be regarded as the pinnacle of the Symantec/Norton software development when older (but true) Windows systems (XP/7/8.x) were still in place (ie. in active status), and thus should remain in place as an alternative.  And for those running on even earlier versions (18.x, 19.x up to 20.x), v21.7.0.11 should have been regarded as the choice upgrade -- NOT the buggy v22.x -- and that LU services (definitions updates etc.) should still be made available to v21.7.xx.