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The End is Nigh for XP
SlinkySausage writes "Computer makers have been told they'll no longer be able to get Windows XP OEM by the end of this year, despite strong ongoing demand for the OS. Analysts and computer makers are wondering if the move is premature given Vista's ongoing performance and compatibility issues. Dell recently said it would reintroduce XP on a range of machines due to customer demand but Microsoft will only allow this until the end of the year."
Is it just me or does this move from Microsoft seem rather desperate?
Was Microsofts older versions of Windows phased out this fast too?
I guess the people at Microsoft have a really hard time accepting that many people (and companies!) have gotten comfortable with XP and does not want to get something different. Maybe Microsoft have been taking to long to come with a "new OS" this time?
I think this will definitely be a good thing for those who wish more people would use Linux on the desktop and possible also laptop market. People like Mark Shuttleworth and his fanboys can start cheering already.
I myself am no longer so certain that getting everyone to use Linux is what is best for Linux as a whole right now.
My main reason for thinking this is seeing how little Ubuntu contributes to the rest of the "open-source community".
Maybe I am wrong, in that case I would love to hear why.
I gladly leave the picking up of unsatisfied Windows users to other flavors of Linux, I myself prefer to stick with Gentoo and wish that all the developers at Gentoo would realize that Gentoo just isn't and is not supposed to become an "click and go" OS.
Others who will cheer at this news will probably be those trying to earn some money by selling cracked software, only this time people are not going to come to them to get the newest software but will want the "good old XP". I don't think they care much though, as long as they can make money.
Maybe there will even become a real market for buying and selling those XP-licenses that people have lying around?
Despite the many hours of frustration it's caused me, it remains the best OS they've made so far.
They could keep selling XP.
But what are they to tell their share holders?
Sorry guys, we sunk 5 billion developing Vista. But nobody wants it.
Better luck next time.
Guess not...
This is a good move on Microsoft's part only if they enjoy annoying their customers.
I think this is a great description of the situation..
The thing is, I imagine that only the Windows "power users" really care and/or know the reasons behind wanting to stick with XP (at least until a service pack or two is released for Vista). Most average users just see Vista as the new Windows. Pretty much everything they do--Office, web browsing, email, Solitaire--still works and it's shiny and bouncy and see-through...wow! Most probably won't even notice a slowdown because they get Vista with new hardware and it offsets the new performance requirements.
Microsoft is probably just trying to give people they see as just not liking change a push to move to the new OS. I'm not too concerned because I've got a couple XP Pro licenses hanging around, a few OEMs and one from MSDNAA, so I'll "upgrade" when I'm good and ready.
"What do you despise? By this are you truly known." --Princess Irulan, Manual of Muad'Dib
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Don't forget that these are only the OEM copies which are going to be phased out by the end of the year. You can't just go out and buy 4 or 5 OEM copies of windows, and its (as far as I know) illegal to sell them on eBay, as you aren't selling them with hardware.
I think people that want to do the right thing would probably but a retail version anyhow, and everyone else will just pirate it. The biggest demand is going to come from people building their own computers, and by that time I think even that group will have moved onto Vista. They are mostly gamers, and gamers sort of are tied to Vista whether they like it or not...
Eventually, as it always happens, there will be bug releases and new drivers for Windows Vista. Upgrading to them is as easily as doing "Windows Update." Linux (and BSD) distros will never be this easily patched due to the very nature of being open source. I only have to go to 1 web site to update my PC's - Windows Update - and it's incredibly simple - just click on Update and voila, it's done and everything works.
.msi installation. And with the great new way that Vista works, the .msi files that require admin rights with custom actions may not run like they did in XP or older systems. (no more "and"s!)
Really? Try doing that with non-MS software or you do not use any?
AutoDesk or Maya or OpenOffice or Turbo Tax or any other application you can think of that is not MS. Can you use Windows Update and it is incredibly simple?
Linux distros are MUCH easier to patch because they are open source and because they are distributions not just bare-bone OS. Last I checked, I could update my Debian boxes with just aptitude or apt-get. And any non-Debian software usually has their own archive or provides a deb file. And installing a deb file is usually easier than installing a
Yes, I'm speaking from experience in all of these areas.
Eventually, as it always happens, there will be bug releases and new drivers for Windows Vista. Upgrading to them is as easily as doing "Windows Update." Linux (and BSD) distros will never be this easily patched due to the very nature of being open source. I only have to go to 1 web site to update my PC's - Windows Update - and it's incredibly simple - just click on Update and voila, it's done and everything works.
Again, wrong, Ubuntu has software update service siting in their version of the systray where windows has theirs.
And Microsofts turn around on patches have been worse then mac and Linux's track record in the past. Despite what you may think, Linux and MacOS foundation and design is better equipped to deal with legacy issues and the implementation patches. Microsoft has struggled continuously with this issue and if im correct recently struggled releasing a set of patches just the other day, I think this is the 3rd day in a row Microsoft had to do an update on my PC, the 2nd update left my pc with a memory violation which the next update had to fix.
My advise is really see the new and upcoming, linux developers arnet really that short sighted to allow the same issues that has always been an issue get in the way this time.
And the vast majority of forced Windows users are corporations. They have Windows Server 2003, Outlook, NetMeeting, etc. all integrated into their back office systems. They are not going to switch out their entire infrastructure to Linux due to some OEM issues.
They will if their IT officers actually took the time to see what the rest of the market offered. You'll find most of these "specific" solutions are not that specific to Microsoft branded software anymore. And if you can show the cost of migrating their systems to the new Microsoft software (all new vista etc) against other alternate solutions and show the definite cost advantage then businesses will defiantly change over.
The fear that you have as an sysadmin is (well founded however) the reason why your infrastructure wont change. Consider, You move over to open source and you fail doing so then yes you'll loose your job and look bad to your bosses. Pick a Microsoft solution to do the job and it fails, you'll keep your job and simply blame Microsoft for your failure.
AND THAT MY FRIEND! is a true tech admins duty these days :)
Well this is something I was regretting.
I have been a long time user of Windows (since the 3.1 days) and have tried every OS they released (except for ME) since then.
I must say I liked Win 98SE a lot. And then I discovered Win2k. But to me Xp was the amalgamation of both.
It runs smoothly and doing what I do on the PC (web browsing, Winamp listening, Battlefield 2 (and other games) and VLC movie watching) it works perfectly. Nearly 100% of the time without an issue.
I have tried Ubuntu (and I did actually like it a lot) and also FreeBSD back in the day (was impossible for a high school teenager with other things on my mind to try to comprehend it).
I am currently a help desk technician. I help people (regular Joes) with their problems. Problems with printing or email archiving etc.
I must say XP is very easy to navigate and do things from simple commands to powerful policy lock downs.
Now I did experiment with Vista (No I didn't buy it and I wasn't one of the beta testers) and the first thing I encountered was my dislike for it.
Microsoft has changed the way that their OS looks (well minor/major improvements are good but....) to the point of making the functionality of it severely hindered.
So I installed Vista Ultimate on my machine. The very first thing I noticed was that navigating my folders was quite a lot more difficult than in XP (or any other MS OS. Why I ask?? I mean its not like navigating folders is something that people don't regularly want to do!!). Now with the default interface I found it almost impossible (it literally took me an hours worth of forum reading etc.) to work out how to turn on hidden files and how to get the familiar File, Edit, View menu up the top of explorer (WTF? Removing that as a Window's default isn't an improvement!!).
Eventually the company I work for (a government health provider) will go over to Vista. This will make help desk support and general troubleshooting a problem. Instead of being able to say (over the phone) "Click Start and then My Computer. Click on File and then Open and then browse to D drive and select the template folder there" I will now have to say something like "Now click the colourful icon in the bottom left corner. Go to Computer then click the icon of a little man running. Now click the brown box that looks like a little house. Now type in "D" and then hit enter. Now select the little flashing house icon again and then type in "Templates". Now eventually you should see a listing of flashing grey and black text on a transparent background. Click the third option which should read "Show in Explorer""!!
Why did they change the appearance of a perfectly viable and working, efficient interface (XP I am refering to here) and replace it with colourful meaningless icons and pictures.
My opinion if Vista is that I will never use it again. I will not be buying it. If I am forced to use it (which is what the article seems to allude to. That MS will eventually (and quickly I might add) drop their support for XP and push everyone to Vista) I will give up using MS products and move to Linux to get the things done I want to get done (I have used Firefox for a long time and i know of the XMMS(??) player for music. I like what WINE and Cedega are doing with games).
XP is the last MS operating system I think I will use. By dropping support for it so quickly (granted this is just Dell not supporting it anymore but I do hope that Microsoft keeps up their support for many years to come as they did with 98 and 2000) they are forcing me, a loyal paying customer of all of their OS range (not inclusing ME. God... WhY?!@) and a supporter of their environment through my work for many years as a help desk technician, to be forced to use an alternative OS. I'm not a big fan of Macs just as I am not a big fan of Linux yet. For one reason, theres not really many native, fun gaming environments (like the BF franchise or SWAT/Rainbow Six tactical shooters) available. Also the things I do like and am grateful for within a Windows OS (m
Let us also not forget the bane of windows program updates: Every app wants to update itself with a separate updater that is started at boot time. So now you have Windows Update, Adobe Update, Java Update, Quicktime update, Corel update and whatnot starting with the desktop slowing your computer and eating up bandwidth while also annoying you... Also restarts are big PITA. I update some non-kernel component like paint and it needs a reboot. Linux distros at least use one app for updates. On the other hand most updates for linux aren't patches but new versions of programs. So downloads are HUGE compared to MS ones. Actually the winner of the update debate will be who can hide the updates being done form Joe User. Windows does a very poor job at that (every program wants to update itself and jumps into the face of the user, and I'm not even mentioning the 'restart needed' nagware) while some distros are better off but not truly automatic.
I think, therefore you are.
Horns are really just a broken halo.
That's about all one could ever say in favor of a Microsoft product. They will always asymptotically approach useability.
That's true if you consider "dumb" usable. The trend I've noticed is less control, less flexibility, fewer 3rd party vendors (aka choice) and more annoyance and auto-wrong features. Security and stability have remained poor and have trended down.
They have pulled out the stops in their breakage of XP though. Today I watched someone try to rebuild an XP laptop. He'd done it manytimes before because someone stuck him with admin responsibility for 15 of them. The process had changed on him this time and it failed. The usual tedious process of manually downloading "updates" fell apart and the automatic process took over and could not be stopped. A couple hours later, I stuck my head in to see how it was going and he was reading a M$ support page about "silent failures". Better him than me.
This "upgrade" cycle has the feeling 95 to 98 did but worse. Eerything fell apart at once and the answer was to buy a new one. This time the "new one" is a computer with about 4 times the hardware. BadVista's got the scoop on this one, Vista - Arrogance & Stupidity, "No sane person wants Vista, so Microsoft is making sure they have no choice."
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
Of course MS is pulling XP. Anyone surprised? They need Vista to be a success, even a moderate one. They can't allow Vista to fail like ME did.
While they still dominate the market, it's not an unchallenged dominance anymore. A failure the size of Vista would mean considerable market share gains for Linux, OSX and maybe even other/new competitors over the next 3-5 years while they struggle to get a new windos out. By the time they're ready to release it, the market could've moved elsewhere.
So they're going to force Vista on us, figuring that like all windos versions prior, once we have no other choice, we'll accept it and consider all its shortcomings and problems as a "that's just how computers are" thing.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
Lots of comments here so I'll make 1 big reply.
I'm speaking from experience - over 10 years in I.T. This is how real world works. More examples:
Part of the regulations in the financial sector is to secure all data, including laptops. That means Whole Disk Encryption. To manage an entire corporate structure requires an enterprise solution. Utimaco and PGP provide such a solution - for Windows XP & soon Vista. It's certified, tested, and secure. In fact, the US gov has an RFP out to various vendors for WDE - all for Windows solutions.
All the big financial trading software runs on Windows: Schwab's CyberTrader, TradeStation, Townsend Analytics, E-Signal, etc., etc., etc. Traders are not going to risk their $$$ trying to use Windows emulators under Linux "just because they like Linux." No, they like $$$, are practical, and use the best tool for the job. Further, all of the helpdesks at the firms know that 99.9% of their customers use Microsoft. Even if they got off of Windows, they would still need to support their customer base. That is, the mass of people who buy Dells which have Winfows pre-installed.
Ubuntu has been out for how long? 5 years? A CEO of an S&P 500, S&P MidCap, S&P SmallCap, etc. corporation is not going to risk his publicly traded corporation's entire infrastructure (the "heart" of the communications between all co-workers) to a 5 year old company (is Ubuntu even a corporation?) that also has many, many competitors. There is only 1 vendor for Windows: Microsoft. There are a ton of vendors for Linux.
Further, do you know the nightmare it will take to switch over thousands of employees? Employees aren't just sitting around - they are working a minimum 40 hours a week. There would be productivity loss, lots of retraining, lots of hardware expenses (have to duplicate workstations so users can migrate from their Windows PC to their Linux PC), etc. No VP or Product Manager or shareholders will endure that kind of disruption. And for what? To move from an established DOW 30 corporation to a 5 year old one-of-many Linux distros?
As you mature in your career job, you realize that there is so much more to life than your PC. You have a girlfriend, wife, baby, young children, overtime, etc. that now take up a significant (and nearly all) of your time. Even if you were a geek growing up (I was), there is no time to dork around with Linux trying to get this new piece of hardware/software to work with this kernel and this distro. My friends only have a couple of hours on a Friday to spend for themselves. The rest of the time is with the kids (helping w/ homework, etc.) or the wife (going out to dinner, married life). With Windows, it truly is Plug-And-Play. Every piece of hardware that I've bought from Bluetooth devices to HDTV video cards to a bunch of different USB devices (GPS, storage, etc.) just works. I plug it in, install the Windows drivers that came on the CD, and I'm done. At the bare minimum for Linux, I'd have to hope there was a Linux driver, find it, install it, etc. That takes precious time which a lot of people don't have.
I think those that modded me down as Troll/Flamebait are high school / college kids or young adults barely into the workforce. Sorry, but this is the real world. You have to think like a CEO. You have to think like those above you if you want to learn from them and advance up the corporate ladder. Starting out at a job and telling everyone that you like Linux so much and want your company to move to Linux will only show how green and inexperienced you are. Once you move up to department manager you can start seeing the bigger picture. Once you move up to regional manager and oversee at least a few hundred employees you will see the big picture.
The only force that can bring down Microsoft from desktop domination is a combination of Microsoft screwing up horribly AND a truly viable alternate solution being available to take advantage. The only one I can think of is Apple - another big, established publicly traded corporation.
I don't reboot into Windows often now. But when I do, I really need to get some work done. I always end up installing all the critical MSFT patches (except IE7 (my work site requires an activeX component that is incompatible with IE7) & that program that wants to see if I'm a thief).
The problem is the pestering for a reboot and the automatic reboot if I don't press a button within 2 minutes (or is it one minute?).
I leave my windows software doing a nice simple task (that usually takes ~15 minutes), walk off to take a break, and come back to my Ubuntu login screen. The first couple times did this I really thought I either had a hardware error or my rendering software had actually forced a reboot somehow.
I can't freakin' believe that an OS can force a mandatory reboot unless I answer a prompt within a set time period. Second of all, I can't believe that they haven't gotten enough complaints to patch it as of yet.
Why? If they really need a reboot to install their software, why can't they just download it when we tell them it's okay, and then just do the install at the next reboot? Do they really think there are windows desktops that don't get rebooted for 6 months or longer?
Help! I'm a slashdot refugee.
Which is easier to get a working system? I can boot to Knoppix in a couple of minutes. With the Knoppix DVD I have not only OpenOffice, but LaTeX editors and other resources. I can boot to DSL or Puppy Linux even faster. Even with a HD install, Ubuntu still installs faster than any Windows version I've installed. Installing Ubuntu, Automatix, and a couple of Latex editors, and I'm largely done.
How many hours of searching the web for the freeware programs I want will it take to get Windows usable for my needs? Yes, Openoffice, Texmaker, Abiword, Google Earth, Adobe Reader, and media codecs/players are all available for Windows, but I have to go to those webpages, download the programs to a folder, and then install. I can install most of them via one apt-get line in Linux, or use Automatix for one-stop shopping. How is Windows easier?
People have very selective perception on this issue. Yes, Linux has stumped me. I had the bright idea of installing TrueCrypt and VMPlayer on Damn Small Linux, and could get neither to work at all. Fine. But they both work on Fedora, Suse, Debian, and Ubuntu, so I'll live with it. Windows often leaves people stuck as well, but no one considers that a show-stopper. I've even read hardware reviews in Maximum PC where they couldn't get a particular something or other to work at all, due to bad drivers or whatever, but no one said "Well, Windows just isn't ready for prime time!" People take the flaws of Windows with a grain of salt and move on, but if they have to type one command into a terminal, then Linux is "impossible for normal people." Spare me. Use it or don't, as you like, but the idea that Windows is easier than Linux is a very arbitrary and misleading statement.
Bill Gates is software's Dr. Death. It doesn't matter what the customer wants; Bill Gates, the richest man in the world, wants more money, and will drag everyone through his neurosis.
I agree with most of the rest of your post, but I do think this line is unfair. It's easier (and probably more correct) to attribute Microsoft missteps to incompetence rather than malice on the part of Bill Gates.
Through the Gates foundation, Bill Gates has donated billions of dollars to worthy charities around the world. It provides 17% of the world's polio eradication budget, as well as other monies for vaccines and HIV research. On the education front, the foundation has donated over a billion dollars to various scholarship programs to help needy students. The Wikipedia has a list of its other activities.
With its current assets, the Gates foundation will be donating at least $1.5 billion per year for the forseeable future. The doesn't mesh with the greed so often ascribed to Gates.
There is a common thread in modern human life. During the early years, in college and for a few years after, people change their living space every single year - sometimes more often. But as you get on in years, this slows down. First you might only move every few years. Then you buy a house. Then you want to stay in a house for a long time.
Generally, in the material world, this is because you have too much stuff to make moving an inexpensive and hassle-free proposition. But is it really any different in the digital world?
What about these operating systems is changing *so* fundamentally that it requires a major system overhaul every few years? How long do we have to wait for a stable kernel upon which we can build the rest of our systems? The fact of the matter is that in a few short years, all of our systems will be distributed anyway. Already our applications live on servers in an environment whose hardware and underlying software can change instantly - without the end user noticing so much as a hiccup. Why is it that our desktop and laptop machines suffer from such a stuttering inability to avoid a major disruption all the freaking time?
I heartily applaud anyone who loves to get into the nitty gritty of how to put a computer together, or install an os, or fix a car, or brew their own beer. I've even had excellent, informative forays into those areas. But, frankly, they don't hold my interest. I'm paying cash on the barrelhead. I want an os that works. That is not a megalomaniacal freak that insists I tinker with it every few weeks, just so it doesn't start spewing "Squeegee The Pickle Wallaby!" whenever I try to boot it up. How is that so wrong? How is that Microsoft hasn't caught on yet?
[Ego]out