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Microsoft Develops XP 'Light' for Thailand
GoatJuggler writes with this Bangkok Post report that "Microsoft announced plans to develop a discounted, slightly crippled version of Windows XP for Thailand."
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What this article is leaving out because it wasn't writen for a USA audience is that 1500 baht is roughly equal to US$35-40 depending on where exchange rates are.
Thailand's People PC project is a government effort to try to get the price of a PC to be affordable for the average person there. Microsoft's contribution to the project is its willingness to sell both Windows XP Home and Microsoft Office for 1500 baht... US$35-40. Uh oh, that's a drastically lower price then MS is charging the rest of the world, and MS doesn't like to have that kind of inconsistency.
So, that's why they're working on this "light" edition that will have a few things less than XP Home, and therefore be a different product that MS can price seperately.
Of course, the OSS folks can hop in here and point out that going with Linux would cost them 0 baht which converts to US$0... and that's what Microsoft's worried about. Better to get a little money than to risk getting none at all and letting Linux become the standard operating system in Thailand.
I can't speak for Thailand specifically, but I know it's the same as Bangladesh, when I was over there you could get the Longhorn betas pre-burned and with covers and the whole deal. And they cost next to nothing to boost. You could get them at malls, street vendors, Internet cafes. About the only draw back was that the CDs were so cheap they stop working in a few month or so, but that's plenty of time to use it.
Why would the average Thai pay for crippleware when they can already get XP for next to nothing?
"There is no time, sir, at which ties do not matter," Jeeves, (Jeeves and the Impending Doom)
the MS shrink-wrap licenses restrict the number of connections you are supposed to be allowed to have to the PC running the OS
they want you to buy XP Server edition to run real servers
-- laws are the opinions of politicians --
Im talking about the limitations of how many computers you can use in a peer to peer in Windows. How it doesn't allow you connect more. You get to buy Windows Server instead. You can't connect 10 computers running XP home in a peer to peer using Windows networking, they won't see each other. Even XP Pro has peer to peer limitations that prevent it from doing so, but a higher threshold. Windows 9x you could raise the limit in the Netbeui portion of the protocol's properties from the default setting of 10 "maximum connections". XP doesn't have that option.
They could make this crippled version connect to an NT server only, with no peer to peer support. This is one way to cripple Windows so it won't get used in businss, but is ok for home use.
Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
What do normal users need with a compiler? If you want one you can get one here.
2) It had no INTENDED remote access services such as FTPD or SSHD.
of course it didn't, that's what Windows Server 2003 is for.
3) I was unable to manipulate graphics.
*gasp* welcome to the world of closed source! Companies actually make MONEY here. You can do basic graphics manipulation using Paint, or you can download The Gimp of course, otherwise you should spring for a copy of Paint Shop Pro or Adobe Photoshop
4) I was unable to use my Network Card.
5) I was unable to optimally use my graphics card.
6) I was unable to optimally use any piece of hardware that didn't have Microsoft written on it.
What kind of bizarre obscure hardware where you using? Windows XP properly detects alot more hardware then linux does currently.
It takes for ever to do anything in Notepad as compared to Vi.
Then by all means, download vi and use it. Some people like working with this little thing called a Graphical User Interface.
8) I had practically no system logging to speak of.
Windows XP is a desktop OS, you can find all the logging you should ever care for at Start->Control Panel->Administrative Tools->Event viewer.
9) I was unable to use multiple desktops.
10) I was unable to entirely change the appearance of the GUI.
most display drivers come with desktop management software, or you can use Windows XP's quicklogin features to have multiple login sessions. Part of the reason Windows is so successful is that you CAN'T entirely change the GUI. Windows, at it's core, always looks like Windows, even with a skin applied.
11) I was unable to simply download much of the software needed to render Windows somewhat useful. Even though Gimp and OpenOffice run on Windows and GVIM, refer to number 4.
See my answer to number 4.
12) I kept getting "Access Denied" or something along the lines of insufficient permissions even though I believe I gave myself full rights over the system. On Windows 2000 this can be seen even if you are logged in as Administrator.
Wow, Microsoft prevents you from killing critical system processes! What a shock! Oh no! what ever shall we do?!? Seriously though, the only time i've ever gotten access denied is when a file is in use, or you try to kill a critical system process (except XP, which lets you)
13) I had to reboot fifteen times, and four hours later while windowsupdate.microsoft.com told me I needed nearly a GB of updates. Many of which could only be installed one at a time. 14) Then another two hours and multiple reboots becuase of installing device drivers (refer to number 6) and then updating those from the old drivers that were on old disgarded discs in the closet.
with the default install of XP, there are 50 mb worth of updates + sp1, which is another 30 or so, a far cry from the 1 gb you speak of.
15) I had next to nothing in regards to software and production....
Compared to what you get with the average Linux ISO image.... Windows, out of the box, is a pathetic quadriplegic whose wheel chair is missing a wheel.
Then, Microsoft goes and strips so much "functionality" from Windows XP to publicly admit it's "crippled"? What more can you take from it?
They never stripped functionality, it was never there to begin with. Windows XP is a desktop OS for every day users, not for supergeeks.
Disclaimer: I am not pro microsoft nor am i in any way being paid by microsoft for this comment. (On the contrary, i'm working on an open source Microsoft Windows NT Compatible Operating System called ReactOS The parent was a blatant troll and i was simply shedding some light on the truths.
Unfortunately, you left out the explanation of the economics. I've been curious about this for some time. Let me give it a shot, and tell me if I'm wrong.
Basically, there are two ways to make profit. If you price your product cheap (small profit margin), you don't make as much per unit but you'll probably get more sales. If you price it expensive (large profit margin) you make more per unit but don't likely sell as many. The "crippled version" approach takes advantage of both by using two markets: inexpensive vs better quality/features.
The unintuitive part is how can they sell the same product, with extra work put in to cripple it, at a lower price. Why not just leave it uncrippled and sell for the low price? The answer is that the crippled version is partially subsidized by the expensive version. You'd lose all of the bigger profit from the expensive version (since there wouldn't be one), so you'd have to sell a lot more at the cheaper price to make up for it. Having high quality at a low price will probably give you more sales, but perhaps not enough to make up the difference, especially because they are two different markets with different customers.
Looking at it another way, it makes sense to have products for both markets (cheap vs quality). If you didn't use the "cripple" approach, you'd actually have to design and build two different products. Using the "cripple" approach, you only have to design and build one system. The extra cost to cripple it is far lower than the cost of designing and building a second product. This reasoning makes more sense when the design and labour costs are high relative to the cost of components (raw materials). Software is certainly a case where raw materials are cheap, most of the expense is in the development.
Is this generally correct? Or am I missing something?
The "extra cost" actually becomes a slight savings, if the product is designed correctly. Consider: in the instance of two separate products, designed separately, with higher and lower functionality respectively, you require two different assembly lines, with two different approaches to creating two different products.
With the crippled version and the non-cripple version, you still require two assembly lines, but they are duplicates for most of the line, and perhaps require only removal of one or two positions to create the cripple versions of your hardware. You save time and money by creating one assembly line and effectively duplicating it for the lesser (or perhaps the greater) version.
You can even do it with one assembly line and some sort of selector programming where every fifth product is the higher level product (assuming it has one-fifth of the sales).
So you save some money on the manufacturing side. You also save money on the R&D side by creating two cards with only minor differences vs. creating two completely different cards.
It's pretty much the same as producing a car with a tape deck vs. cd player. The research is much the same, but the tape deck fits in the same slot as the CD player, and any room you would have used for the automatic changer is just extra space.
To celebrate the occasion of my 1000th post, I will post no more forever on Slashdot. Goodbye.