Windows XP Tour (Professional) Walkthrough

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   • Windows XP Tour (Professional) Walkth...  

A walkthrough of the Windows XP Tour. Windows XP is the only operating system which includes a flash animated tour. I liked the tour a lot as a kid. I was about three years old when I had my first Windows XP Home Edition PC, which was an HP Pavilion 710 CTO (which had an 1.53 GHz AMD Athlon XP 1800+ DDR processor) made by HP since 2002, then I got another model in 2004, which was an HP Pavilion a700n (with the same edition as on my old model). If you own Windows XP Home Edition, there are 4 tabs, and if you own Windows XP Professional, there are 5 tabs.

This tour dates back to late 2001 when Windows XP was newly released. I used Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 for this and used Camtasia Studio 7 to record it. I had to use Windows XP Professional because the tab "Best for Business" is exclusive to this tour on the same edition, and also because I have to make sure all features of this tour are fully shown in this single-part walkthrough. You might notice that there are some popping sounds every time I use any virtual machine in VPC 2007. If anyone knows a solution, please post a video response. Here are the level-by-level comments:

Windows XP Basics: My all-time favorite section in this tour. For starters, this has very basic and simple features for the entire operating system, like the desktop, the taskbar, the start menu, etc. It also shows you about other things like storing files in some folders (like the ones entitled "My Documents," "My Pictures" and "My Music," which are mentioned in this section's tour clip "Files and Folders"), shutting your computer down and/or logging off and on, and even using the control panel.
I had to start with this section because that's where I always start, the same as you would on Windows XP Home Edition. The difference is if you own Windows XP Home Edition, the tab's icon color is yellow, and if you own Windows XP Professional, the tab's icon color is grey instead of yellow, though the color of the icon on the tab "Best for Business" is also yellow. The tour restarts in the Professional version of the tour after the last tour clip "Ending Your Session" is played, and it leads to the section "Safe and Easy Personal Computing" in the Home Edition version of the tour. This section is the only one to have a large screen for the animated images to be shown and more than 4 tour clips in the other sections (though the icons here are round and small). It is absolutely cool.

Best for Business: This section is exclusive to this version of this tour on Windows XP Professional (as I said previously). You will probably always start with this section because that's how the Professional version of the tour application is designed. I like the music; it is relaxing. This section actually shows how much more reliable and compatible this OS is than earlier operating systems (like Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows 2000, and others), and other things like using Remote Desktop to look at a screen of another computer running Windows XP, using voice video and instant messaging, how easy it is to manage your files on a backup drive, etc. Nothing too special in this section, but there is some advanced stuff.

Safe and Easy Personal Computing: I liked this section very much in my childhood. This shows you about safe and better elements of the OS, like making sure that this OS is very latest by installing automatic updates, better designs for some screens (like the logon screen), an easier way to tidy your desktop up, and better help via the Help and Support window. The music here is highly relaxing. Everything seen in this section is very well presented and interesting.

Unlock the World of Digital Media: Lots of media involved here. This shows you about sharing photos, playing media content in Windows Media Player, etc. For Flight Simulator fans, the page for the game "Combat Microsoft Flight Simulator 2" is seen in the "Optimized for Games and DVDs" tour clip because Microsoft was trying to promote games like that in the first image. If anyone knows the name of the online game in the second image, please let me know. I really think this section is awesome.

The Connected Home and Office: The final section in the tour, and the only section to include 4 tour clips instead of 3. It shows you about switching user accounts, powerful networks, letting wizards do the work for you, answering questions about which computers you want to link to, and even protecting data from hackers and viruses. I don't have much else to say about this section because it speaks for itself. Although it is the final section in this tour, it actually leads to the Windows XP Basics section in this version of this tour after the last tour clip is played.

With that being said, enjoy the walkthrough of this tour! :)