Now, with the official support for XP gone, I’m searching a branch still available for Windows XP.
Is there any?
Hi, this is not possible, I fear.
Blender has change to Python 3.5 for 2.77 and this does not support XP.
Cheers, mib
Moved from “General Forums > Blender and CG Discussions” to “Support > Technical Support”
what specific features in py 3.5 is used in blender?
It’s why I’m learning Linux Mint right now. Was some hurdles as I don’t have a working DVD drive and managed to borrow a USB stick with just enough RAM to do the install. (Luckily my BIOS supported booting from USB as a drive.) Also having some hurdles with wireless. (Biggest headache, wireless drops off and requires restart all the time. May be different for you, as that is a hardware driver thing. Other computers may work flawlessly.) Graphics drivers is the other thing to watch out for.
Other than that, I suspect Mint Cinnamon is probably the most Windows-like of the 'nixs. For all the conventions you’re used to in XP, so much of the UI is sooo much the same. (I suspect there may even be a theme out there that would leave a casual user none the wiser.) Everything else is good too, almost all the FOSS you’re used to has a 'nix version.
And no problems between 32-bit and 64-bit on dual boot. So you can open up your CPU and let it breathe if the architecture supports it. I noticed it in CPU rendering.
Of course it’s a 'nix. So if you have to troubleshoot you have to dive into the CLI (terminal), and that’s where I’m in over my head and treading water at times. On the upside right clicking works in Terminal, so you can copy and paste all the particular code right from your browser. Some risk in that (person helping has to be honest/knowledgable - there is potential for damage), but it saves typing and typos.
I’m also willing to bet I’m not the only one that’s trying this OS transition. Blender devs :no: 
are going to love all the 'nix questions and stuff from former XP users. :spin: :evilgrin: 
:eek:
I am running Blender ver. 2.71 on a 12 year old low-end Celeron based, XP, Toshiba laptop with 1gb ram. It ran out of the box after install without any changes to the OS or GPU settings. however it is Very Sloowwww rendering anything. I only recently start using it for blender again after I had problems getting my new i5 64bit laptop to run blender. Initially I was using ver. 2.66 which ran fine. I just recently tried upgrading to 2.71. I might switch back to 2.66 cause it seemed to run a bit faster and there is not a significant difference that I can see between 2.66 and 2.71. It may run even newer version but I haven’t tried. jrt
Blender 2.75, commit date ‘2015-06-14’, hash ‘7f3dcbe’,build date: b’2015-06-15’, running on as Wiki says, 20 years old Toshiba laptop, XP 32 bit. I have memory upgraded to 2Gb. I haven’t tried current Blender’s versions - couple i have tried after above mentioned had some rendering issues. Since i was using development builds from builder this might be just a coincidence and even latest version would work ok, idk.
Except slow Cycles rendering and non-existent support for OGL screen candies on Intel 945 Mobile video (Matcaps, SSAO etc) Blender runs just fine.
Besides python coming in Blender packs i have python 2.7 and 3.2 installations system-wide. Also, as i read there is a Python 3.5 installers for 32 bit Windows, nothing i read prevents running 3.5 on XP.
Edit: Except one will be presented either with no “Install” button on installation’s opening screen or some sentences sending back to 3.4, if in luck… Either my eyes are bad or there really are no asterisks saying *) “32 bit (XP - not supported)” on Python’s download page.
Blender’s Archive has all major previous versions available including 2.75a for win32, anyways.
I’m running Windows Xp home Edition, and using version 2.75.
I have noticed it close a few times, notsure if that was a glitch or the RAM being used so much that the system closed it. But that would be a bit odd.
I’m using the program for 3D modelling, some animation and the Blender game engine rolled all in one.
it is way past time to upgrade the operating system
if the machine is so low spec that 7 ,8,or 10 will not install
there are many long term support Linux OS’s that can be installed on 10 to 16 year old hardware
i have Scientific linux 6.7 running on a near antique DELL from 2000 / 2001
a nvidia gforce2 card and 1 gig ram and a 1.9 Ghz pentium4 CPU
the computer came ( in 2001) with 256 meg of ram