support for NT 5.1

[andika207]

is it possible to get this browser working on 32-bit WinXP ?

(without using buggy patches like OCAPI)

[win32ss]

Yes. I am fixing the 32 bit sandbox now, and I will then re-add GDI rendering, link the browser against my custom function implementation DLL, etc.

[andika207]

the chinese got stucked on chrome 86/87 which is nearly 3 years old now (this is a huge leap of time for a modern browser) and I do wonder why if it's very possible to go further away
https://retrosystemsrevival.blogspot.com/2023/06/the-impossible-has-been-achieved.html

[andika207]

I know other members from MSNF forum that attempted in the past to backport a modern chromium to XP with no luck, maybe they were not skilled enough LOL
https://www.reddit.com/r/windows7/comments/13m1nxt/comment/jkw4dc4/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3

[win32ss]

It is a very difficult undertaking, as I discovered fixing the 32 bit sandbox. The issue there is that child processes would crash almost right away, before crashpad could be initialized on these processes; I had to find a random function in the child process implementation API to break on, BrowserChildProcessHostImpl::LaunchWithoutExtraCommandLineSwitches, where sometimes a GPU process would be suspended. And then I found that the patched syscalls did not work properly (syscall numbers were wrong, so for example NtOpenProcessToken calls were going to NtMapViewOfSection), so I reversed a commit that removed older syscall handling code for Windows 7 and below.

Maybe something similar happened there causing the developers to give up in frustration?

The earlier attempt was back in the 7x era and I think got to the home page before crashing. This predates code like this and I think was mostly hobbled by DirectWrite, although I'm sure DirectWrite is easier to work with than syscall hooking.

[andika207]

Maybe something similar happened there causing the developers to give up in frustration?

@win32ss maybe it's just easier to create an extended kernel for XP than messing around with the browser issues

[win32ss]

That's what I thought about Vista. But I couldn't go past Chromium 111 and indeed many of the changes made since then would have required backporting the whole shared memory API from Windows 10 1803/1809, or implementing really nasty hacks on the extended kernel side to replicate the changes done in Supermium.

[andika207]

@win32ss what are you using on a daily basis Vista or W7 ?

[win32ss]

Vista.

[andika207]

my best score on speedometer 2.0 and WiFi USB dongle. (intel i5 4xxx)

W7 = chrome 109 = 106 points

W7 = supermium 117 = 143 points

XP = unknown yet

[FlorianisonGitHub]

What about supporting Supermium for Windows XP (NT 5.1) and Windows Server 2003 (NT 5.2) with or without extended kernel someday? Will it also be possible to have Supermium support for Windows 2000 (NT 5.0) with Extended Kernel someday?

[andika207]

@CRUProductions what if you get a life and move on ?
stop requesting too many things without contributing to anything Feodor2/Mypal68#222

[MWF2]

and, how long for add supermium to support xp nt 5.1 and vista nt 6.0 without extended kernel for next upcoming release

[Smu1zel]

and, how long for add supermium to support xp nt 5.1 and vista nt 6.0 without extended kernel for next upcoming release

No idea what happened to the old verbose readme (was something lost in a git push?), but NT 5.1 is lower priority than vanilla Vista. Likely due to XP needing an entire renderer (GDI) brought back, along with the not good sign of all the Chinese forks giving up after Chromium 8x. Probably safe to assume OCAPI XP will be supported first if anything, as I do believe it provides some 7 functions as well, and it seems to work with the DirectWrite renderer. Maybe look at Edge and whatever happened during Chromium 103 if anyone plans to look into that, as Edge apparently works until the very end with some hack and Chromium 103 was the first release that stopped working.

[MWF2]

OCAPI Is so buggy, i don't need to use one core api, i saw issues happen one core api on github, nobody will use OCAPI, including me

[Smu1zel]

OCAPI Is so buggy, i don't need to use one core api, i saw issues happen one core api on github, nobody will use OCAPI, including me

I know it can be buggy, I'm just saying I'd logically expect OCAPI XP to be supported first since it provides some more modern functions. I'll say 2.10 is a lot more stable if you don't give your VM/system more than 2GB of RAM (I think there's some PAE patch included but I think it's causing a boatload of issues such as pagefaults). Not sure if MyPal works though.

[Stepman123]

I think that even for Ocapi it will not work. For example, what will happen when a password manager is called when the system should require entering the account password? Surely it will be a failure.

[MWF2]

OCAPI Is so buggy, i don't need to use one core api, i saw issues happen one core api on github, nobody will use OCAPI, including me

I know it can be buggy, I'm just saying I'd logically expect OCAPI XP to be supported first since it provides some more modern functions. I'll say 2.10 is a lot more stable if you don't give your VM/system more than 2GB of RAM (I think there's some PAE patch included but I think it's causing a boatload of issues such as pagefaults). Not sure if MyPal works though.

but for dual boot that i have for use xp for fun, yea it will cause to lost dual boot that i have and usb issues, and that's right, it will not work like stepman123 says, so i think it's best to wait for win32 about add renderer gdi back, then it can run supermium native without have to install OCAPI

[andika207]

@win32ss another browser with support for XP has just emerged https://github.com/Alex313031/chromium-xp

but I'm not sure why it's based on chrome 49 only

[andika207]

btw, apparently the troll above @FlorianisonGitHub changed his username (@CRUProductions before)

maybe he had something to hide so I just wanted to let everyone know :)

[JoachimHenze]

@win32ss another browser with support for XP has just emerged https://github.com/Alex313031/chromium-xp

but I'm not sure why it's based on chrome 49 only

Because Chromium v49.0.2623.112 is the last official Chromium version which natively supported Windows XP.
So it is a good base for someone to start such a project for XP compatiblity and then see what can be placed on top of that.
Thank you for that link though to that FOSS project, I try to make it a bit more popular by reactos/rapps-db#202
Maybe we can attract more developers / contributors like that.

[andika207]

So it is a good base for someone to start such a project for XP compatiblity and then see what can be placed on top of that.

I think @Alex313031 is unable to fork a more modern chrome version and back port it to WinXP hence his Thorium got stuck on version 109 whereas Supermium is already on 118.

[win32ss]

Chromium starting in the 5x-7x range uses implicit TLS in its DLLs. Windows XP does not recognize implicit TLS when DLLs are loaded dynamically, which means that the DLLs will read from/write to the TLS data area intended for the process' EXE instead of the DLL's own TLS area. This obviously can result in corruption of the executable's TLS data, unintended results for the DLL when reading TLS data, and segfaults if the executable's TLS data area is smaller than the DLL's.

There are a few ways to resolve this, but they are not simple in any way. I'm resolving it by working around LoadLibrary*.

[andika207]

360chrome (chrome 86) is already 3 years old and still works flawlessly on probably 90% of websites therefore this makes me think the original chrome 109 should in theory last up until 2026

We are few months away from the crap MV3 so I'm not sure what will actually happen with my browser extensions and who is going to make a backup of the MV2 ones available on the chrome store that can't be found elsewhere :(

[Stepman123]

OCAPI Is so buggy, i don't need to use one core api, i saw issues happen one core api on github, nobody will use OCAPI, including me

I am currently using OCA 3.0.3 Canary and am writing this post from a Supermium 118.
I also have regular XP, but I don't use it anymore because it doesn't support a lot of things, and OCA works well.

Now the main problem is incompatibility with explorer. To get around this I use IDM to download files plus the IDM extension. And for importing bookmarks I use the xbrowsersync extension.

Also there is a problem with the need to use --single-process, this key restricts extensions even on windows 7 x32.

If sound doesn't work in the browser, you need to add --enable-exclusive-audio --audio-buffer-size=2048

I use X-Launcher to launch the browser.

[MWF2]

i think that still i won't install oca, cuz of stability will so bad, at least on real hardware, vm might be fine, even paint.net 3.5.11 still broken

[Zero3K]

I wonder if fixing the sandbox will get it to run on ReactOS without having to fix anything in it and/or use a command line parameter.

[NS-Clone]

i think that still i won't install oca, cuz of stability will so bad

ocapi is better installing/works on original XP distributive
(i'm updating one XP from ~2.3 (on virtualbox) and it still works)
in same time i lost several XP/2003 instalations with pirаtе distributives like "super zver mega cd platinum"...

[andika207]

i lost several XP/2003 instalations with pirаtе distributives like "super zver mega cd platinum"

@NS-Clone this one ? https://www.reddit.com/r/FrutigerAero/comments/179z0q0/iconic_russian_custom_windows_xp_iso_zverdvd_in/

[mina354]

Any progress on this yet?

[win32ss]

Supermium is working on Vista without extended kernel now:

There's still some work to be done for XP however (I did make working TLS reallocation code though).

[FlorianisonGitHub]

The results of running Chromium 115 on Windows 2000 with Extended Kernel:

This browser requires an SSE3 CPU, obviously running it on Win2k and WinXP is a bit ridiculous.

I am running on SSE3 and processor modern instructions on Windows 2000 with Extended Kernel but for Chromium 115, it opens and closes.

[FlorianisonGitHub]

@talvisota, The fact that the processor is too slow does not mean that it should be used with an outdated OS. The choice of OS depends on the RAM size. Choosing win2k makes sense for a system with 256 MB or less.

It has 8GB of RAM, 2 processor cores, and uses 3D acceleration on my Win2K VM.

[win32ss]

32 bit Supermium does support SSE2-only CPUs.

There are still many valid reasons to use Windows 2000 over XP, not only if you have 512 MB or less RAM, but also if you have more than 4 GB of RAM. I may have a system with 2x Xeon E5-2667 v2s and 96 GB of RAM, but it still runs Windows 2000 and I will make sure Supermium works there someday.

[mina354]

I may have a system with 2x Xeon E5-2667 v2s and 96 GB of RAM, but it still runs Windows 2000 and I will make sure Supermium works there someday.

Yes, this will be very great!

[weolar]

Hello everyone, I am the author of xpchrome. Now xpchrome (with Chromium 115 engine) can run on Windows XP SP3. However, I haven't tested it on even older versions of Windows. I will put it up for everyone to try once I fix a few more bugs.

[Zero3K]

Hello everyone, I am the author of xpchrome. Now xpchrome (with Chromium 115 engine) can run on Windows XP SP3. However, I haven't tested it on even older versions of Windows. I will put it up for everyone to try once I fix a few more bugs.

I tested the link provided earlier under Windows Server 2003 and ReactOS. It worked fine under Windows Server 2003 when I played a YouTube video that had audio with a static image being shown. Under ReactOS, it keeps running itself and mentions that Chromium is unresponsive. Maybe you could make an issue on its bug tracker once more bugs are fixed (unless that issue is one that you can fix).

[weolar]

https://github.com/weolar/xpchrome/releases/tag/20231116 this is a test version

[JoachimHenze]

@weolar that is technically very impressive. I will still wait for the version from @win32ss which will hopefully not spy on me and will share its source-code, unlike "yours".

[jonm58]

https://github.com/weolar/xpchrome/releases/tag/20231116 this is a test version

I don't want Google to spy on me :(

[Zero3K]

@weolar that is technically very impressive. I will still wait for the version from @win32ss which will hopefully not spy on me and will share its source-code, unlike "yours".

He can still share it's source code. I am attaching a CSV made by saving the network events that were shown by Process Monitor while running it.

chromexp.csv

[andika207]

I downloaded the mini_installer.exe that is being offered there.

[jonm58]

I downloaded the mini_installer.exe that is being offered there.

I don't like Google spying on my downloads
No certificate (open source or free) software,be like:

[idontyboi]

Two options exist for absolute latest Chrome on XP:

1- For standard XP, win32ss has a estimate of when that is stable: #96 in roughly two months.
2- If you don't want to wait One-Core-API supports latest Chrome already: https://github.com/shorthorn-project/One-Core-API-Binaries-Canary/releases/tag/3.0.4-20231118-experimental... the chance of this working on non-VM is slim.

Namecalling Skulltrail? Might go too far.

[Zero3K]

XPChrome has no additional spying according to https://tria.ge/231120-x6z7xaaf8v/behavioral1.

[JoachimHenze]

@Zero3K on the VM I tested weolars XPChrome with it talked to chinese servers although i didn't display any chinese website. It could be inbuilt ads just, but I do highly doubt that. It is from the same makers as all other chinese spying Chromes were from.
And it doesn't share its source code which is highly suspicious.
Therefore I would highly disrecommend anyone to use it with any sensitive data or entering any of your private passwords. Personally I won't use it at all, and will wait for win32ss to succeed. (Although I do appreciate that the Chinese spyware Chromes recently got a bit better with english localiization and being less agressively at pushing chinese search engines on the user).

[Zero3K]

What servers does it connect to?

[jonm58]

@Zero3K on the VM I tested weolars XPChrome with it talked to chinese servers although i didn't display any chinese website. It could be inbuilt ads just, but I do highly doubt that. It is from the same makers as all other chinese spying Chromes were from. And it doesn't share its source code which is highly suspicious. Therefore I would highly disrecommend anyone to use it with any sensitive data or entering any of your private passwords. Personally I won't use it at all, and will wait for win32ss to succeed. (Although I do appreciate that the Chinese spyware Chromes recently got a bit better with english localiization and being less agressively at pushing chinese search engines on the user).

Google China?

[Zero3K]

That seems really likely.

[weolar]

I would like to explain: Letting Chromium run on XP is a technical solution that I have been researching for several years. Recently, I plan to develop a commercial browser, XPChrome, which was originally intended to be distributed only in China and not intended for overseas distribution. However, I saw that many friends overseas were discussing running Chrome on XP, so I removed some code related to user permission verification and update detection, and allowed everyone to try it out. As a solo developer, your privacy data is of no use to me. Occasionally, XPChrome still has data connections to Chinese servers because some code may not have been completely removed. If you like this product, I will also create a version of XPChrome that supports XP running with only local verification and no network verification, and has two-core (IE,chromium) support.

[Zero3K]

weolar/xpchrome#1 (comment)

[Win-DVD]

i think that still i won't install oca, cuz of stability will so bad, at least on real hardware, vm might be fine, even paint.net 3.5.11 still broken

For the record I would say it's mainly the installation process that is the worst part.
I have OCAPI installed on my real machine with not many bugs to note and no bsods yet.
Works great on my setup, But the pre updated XP iso caused problems with it so i just manually updated a SP2 iso.

[andika207]

haters and gentle men, Supermium for XP is done.

I will remove the chinese M115 crap that broke several things on my XP partition anyway I believe that paid project is dead in the water.

[weolar]

haters and gentle men, Supermium for XP is done.

I will remove the chinese M115 crap that broke several things on my XP partition anyway I believe that paid project is dead in the water.

I would like to make a statement. My paid browser has always been targeted towards enterprise customers. I haven't really maintained the personal version of the XP browser.