Firefox is about to take a break from playing with Windows XP

Mozilla said Firefox 12 will be the last version to run on Windows XP and Windows 2000.

Mozilla also reiterated that it will stop providing security updates for the 2-year-old version of Firefox 3.6 in April 2012.

From Firefox 13, Mozilla's web browser requires a minimum of Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2). Firefox 13 does not support Windows 2000, Windows XP RTM (release to manufacturing, mid-2001 build) or Windows XP Service Pack 1.

Firefox 12 will be released on April 24, 2012, and the next version will be released on June 4, 2012. Mozilla said the change will help it further improve Firefox's performance on Windows, making the most of the new Windows system.

Analysts are not surprised by this decision by Mozilla, because three years ago Mozilla mentioned it. Asa Dotzler, Director of Firefox, said the company reached the final decision on this support a few months ago. Mozilla is currently switching to Visual Studio 2010 so it cannot build Firefox for previous operating systems.

Microsoft gave three " retired" versions of Windows operating systems a few years ago. Microsoft stopped supporting Windows 2000 in mid-2010, XP and XP SP1 in 2004 and 2006. Microsoft also no longer supports Windows XP SP2. Microsoft now only supports the provision of security patches for Windows XP SP3.

Mozilla recommends that Windows XP RTM or XP SP1 users upgrade to Windows XP SP3.