Windows XP SP3 Release Candidate 2 (RC2)

“Windows XP Service Pack 3 Release Candidate 2 is available to the public. Specific registry settings will allow you to be offered SP3 via Windows Update,” Microsoft revealed. And the Windows XP SP3 Release Candidate 2.exe is nothing more than the registry scrip that will permit end users to tweak their copies of XP in order to identify the XP SP3 bits on the Windows Update servers. “Microsoft is allowing Windows XP Service Pack 2 machines to be offered Windows XP Service Pack 3 Release Candidate 2 via Windows Update. Windows XP Service Pack 3 will be offered on Windows Update when Service Pack 3 releases in the first half of 2008,” reads the Overview section of the documentation accompanying the XP SP3 download.

That’s right! Windows XP Service Pack 3 Release Candidate 2 is available for download and you can grab it right here. Initially, Microsoft released XP SP3 RC2 on the heels of Windows Vista Service Pack 1 RTM and Windows Server 2008 Service Pack 1 RTM on February 7, 2008. At that time, it became clear that although the development
milestones of XP SP3, Vista SP1 and Windows Server 2008, were joined at the hip, the third and final service pack for XP was not part of the intimate synchronization between the latest Windows client and server platforms