$50 to Get XP On a New Dell

CWmike writes "Dell will charge customers up to $50 for factory-installed Windows XP on some PCs after Wednesday, according to the company's Web site. Buyers of the low-priced Vostro line of desktops and notebooks will pay $20 to $50 more for Windows XP Professional installed as a 'downgrade' from Windows Vista Business or Vista Ultimate than they would for Vista only."

Comments

It's like divorce

[Trigun]

it's expensive, but it's worth it.

Re:It's like divorce

[memojuez]

It's a pretty sad statement about a product when people are willing to pay MORE not to use it.

Forget about Apple Mr. Gates, you're doing a good job of self-destructing.

Re:It's like divorce

[Vectronic]

Yeah, and the reason for the divorce?

She's gaining weight and trying to control you.

Re:It's like divorce

[GreyWolf3000]

I want the Operating System I married 5-7 years ago!

Re:It's like divorce

[frosty_tsm]

Or she's cheating on you.

Re:It's like divorce

[CastrTroy]

It's only sad because MS spent 5+ years working on Vista, and now people want to pay not to use it. It's not sad in the more general sense, that people want to pay more to use a better product.

Re:It's like divorce

[192939495969798999]

And just like divorce, the one you switch to is lighter weight, less nag-y, and easier to use. In this case it is older but it also has more experience.

Re:It's like divorce

[Trigun]

Plus it doesn't bitch at you every time that you want to do something even remotely dangerous.

It's not a wife, it's a Jewish mother.

Re:It's like divorce

[Jhon]

I would have paid $50 to have Win98 installed over ME a number of years ago. It's somehow comforting to know that the more things change, the more they stay the same.

Re:It's like divorce

[g0bshiTe]

MS business model

1. Write software that works 90% of the time and crashes randomly 10% of the time (who cares the 10% is during critical computing)
2. Wait, release patches.
3. Release new version of OS so crappy the public will be happy to use the 90% ware and pay to downgrade
4. Profit

Re:It's like divorce

[hkgroove]

XP is officially a cougar.

Re:It's like divorce

[BigJClark]

This is because of the requirement of having a fscking graphics card to run an OS.

Historically, its been the other way around :/

Re:It's like divorce

[V_Pundit]

Absolutely right. $50 is a small price to pay to upgrade back to XP.

Re:It's like divorce

[ohcrapitssteve]

That is pretty funny, but interestingly enough, the original XBOX360 dev kits were Apple G5s (IBM PPC 970) running some kind of NT kernel. At some video game industry shows, playable game demos were actually running on Apple G5 workstations.

Re:It's like divorce

[Peet42]

It's not sad in the more general sense, that people want to pay more to use a better product.

Indeed, but for my $50 I would rather have a properly supported version of Windows 2000. It's all been downhill since there.

Re:It's like divorce

[TeamSPAM]

I guess Apple will have to avoid using cougar as a code name for OS X. Don't want MS suing you for creating confusion in the marketplace.

Re:It's like divorce

[smitty97]

Doesnt surprise me, Halo was originally demoed at MacWorld- it was supposed to be a Mac game.

Re:It's like divorce

[morgan_greywolf]

Nice the generic windows diss... My only question is, What of us gamers running win boxes that are rock solid? And have never had anything but a rock solid box? Aside from the odd hardware failures that is... ;)

DirectX is a fantastic API that allows developers to effectively bypass some pretty piss-poor Win32 APIs. Games are written for DirectX, not for Windows. The fact is that DirectX runs in other environments, like Xbox and Xbox360. If all you're doing is gaming, then you shouldn't be surprised if your box is 'rock solid.'

Re:It's like divorce

[guruevi]

Still got a copy of your wedding picture? http://www.ctrlaltdel-online.com/wallpapers/wedding_1024.jpg

Re:It's like divorce

[kyz]

It'd probably be more solid if you filled it with cement... Microsoft already offer that:
http://www.geocities.com/rcwoolley/

Re:It's like divorce

[bigstrat2003]

It's a pretty sad statement about a product when people are willing to pay MORE not to use it. More like a pretty sad statement about people's susceptibility to FUD about a product. The vast majority of Vista hate I hear is FUD.

Re:It's like divorce

[Phroggy]

The difference is, nobody was offering Win98 for $50 more back then.

Re:It's like divorce

[mrchaotica]

"Activation." (I.e., having to beg somebody for permission to use your own property.)

Re:It's like divorce

[Peet42]

It may just be me, but *every* Micro$oft default in XP needs to be reversed before I can live with it. And, while it's not as bad as Vista, it still has the occasional habit of asking "Are you sure you want to do that?" and when you say "Yes" it'll do something, but quietly revert to its previous default after a reboot. It was the first generation of "Micro$oft Knows Best".

And it's a fallacy that XP runs significantly more packages than 2000 does. It's just that Micro$oft rewrote their installers to check and exit if they were run under 2000. I have successfully installed and used several "XP Only" packages under 2000 by using a hacked set of installer DLLs.

Re:It's like divorce

[Dekortage]

That's because Bungie was originally a Mac-only game developer. Then MS bought 'em for Halo, and nixed all their Mac development.

Re:It's like divorce

[mrchaotica]

A piece of software is in no way "your own property", just like every other piece of Imaginary Property.

I think you're confused; My copy is my property, and the claims that it isn't because it's Imaginary are just that: imaginary themselves!

Re:It's like divorce

[ckaminski]

Sorry, I used it, on brand new hardware with shit-gobs of memory. Vista is a dog. I like what they were trying to do with it, and liked a lot of the UI enhancements, but I bought a fast laptop to get work done, not wait for windows to pop open.

Re:It's like divorce

[Kjella]

WinME is just the wierdest release Microsoft ever did, only one year after 98SE and a year before XP Home, both technically and marketwise. In retrospect I think it was the Golgafrincham B Ark of Microsoft developers, where all the good brainpower was transferred to the 2k/XP line while those too incompetent to bring on and yet not incompetent enough to outright fire were left on the 98/ME line. The bean counters wanted some ROI so instead of releasing a service pack to 98 and so WinME came to be. I don't think Vista can be described in much the same way.

That said, many people would use XP because it's XP and for no other reason. It has all the buttons in the right places and works exactly the same as it's "supposed to" work. Let others figure out the funny stuff for you, then you migrate when you need to. I migrated from 2000 SP4 to XP SP2, now I run XP in a virtualbox under Linux but maybe someday I'll upgrade to a Vista version too. Not today though, not tomorrow either.

Re:It's like divorce

[tattood]

Of course DirectX runs on XBOXes... They're made by Microsoft! Do you see DirectX running on OSX or Playstation or Wii?

Re:It's like divorce

[jobsagoodun]

>In retrospect I think it was the Golgafrincham B Ark of Microsoft developers,

Thank-you. I just laughed maltesers all over my monitor.

Re:It's like divorce

[IllForgetMyNickSoonA]

Why not? It's running on Linux (wine resp. cedega).

At least it's sort of running, but it's better than nothing! :-)

Re:It's like divorce

[DrVomact]

I'm curious: what makes XP "downhill" from 2000? Because I used both, and XP feels like a cleaner version of 2000 (once you turn off theming, anyway).

So you judge an OS by the quality of its GUI? By that measure, I'd say Win 2000 wins (the two OSs pretty well come out even on every other measure). XP definitely had a far more irritating GUI than Win 2000. I don't remember what "theming" is, but I remember having to:

• Turn off balloon "help"
• Turn off "notifications" (balloons that nag you from the task bar (I think that required a reg edit)
• Reverting to Windows "classic"
  • folders
  • windows
  • menus
• Turning off the wonderful "firewall"
• Telling XP not to hide "inactive" icons in the tool bar.
• Generally finding every option that tells XP to STFU

Only time I ever found a reason to prefer XP over 2000 was when I was messing with wireless, and learned that it was a pain to support anything better than WEP encryption on 2000 (something MS could have easily done in a patch). Only reason I've been paying for XP these days is that it will be supported with fixes for all those security holes longer than 2000.

Re:It's like divorce

[TheNetAvenger]

The fact is that DirectX runs in other environments, like Xbox and Xbox360. If all you're doing is gaming, then you shouldn't be surprised if your box is 'rock solid.'


1) Environments would not be the correct term.
2) XBox and XBox360 both run Windows- XBox is Win2K, XBox360 is XP x64.

This whole thread is based on the premise that Windows crashes, and reliability studies continue to show that since Win2k and XP, crashes are as rare on Windows as they are on any other OS. Vista so far is reporting to be even more stable than any OS, which is a bit surprising.

Windows stability issues is an old tale that needs to finally stop. People stopped bitching about Apple OS 9 when it was replaced with OS X, yet people still make fun of Windows based on the Win9x era.

Windows users don't see crashes, this is not the Win9x kernel era, the 'Windows crashes all the time' myth crap needs to stop once and for all...

Re:It's like divorce

[mrchaotica]

Right. And my point was the contrapositive: since it is really my property, then I shouldn't have to beg someone else's permission to use! That's why XP is intolerable compared to 2000.

Re:It's like divorce

[erroneus]

I would love to hear about gamers running a rock-solid gaming session for a week.

Gamers run their games for somewhere between 12 and 18 hours at a time. That's a SINGLE application most of that time.

If desktop PC Windows users only ran a single application all day long, they would probably ALSO have rock-solid results. Unfortunately, that's not the case. Instead, they usually run a dozen different apps no including the multitude of other programs that run in the background from start-up to make things easier or appear faster in some way. This is not to mention the programs that are put there unintentionally by drive-by installations via hijacked web sites.

Much of this, they can claim, is not Microsoft's fault, but then again, most of the problem with Windows is that Microsoft has bloated their operating system to maintain backward compatibility with broken apps... that, however, is Microsoft's fault because the apps are broken, not Windows even if Windows is the enabler to allow that to persist. (Microsoft would be far better off keeping an archive of patches for the apps, but that brings other legal issues into the picture.)

Gamers are the LEAST likely to suffer from software problems because of the way they run and use their machines. They are the most 'disciplined' users of all, in actuality, because not only is their software and application selection very limited, they are also highly conscious of performance and are therefore much more careful about their software upgrade/update and installation practices.

In short: Gamers are better users. You are summarily disqualified from using yourself or your systems as examples of "average" or "ordinary" computer users or usage.

It's an upgrade,

[El_Muerte_TDS]

why else would you pay more.

Downgrade?

[sconeu]

If it's a "Downgrade", shouldn't it be *CHEAPER*?????

Re:Downgrade?

[indifferent children]

XP is smaller, faster, less buggy, and doesn't come encumbered with a ton of DRM crap. How is that a "downgrade"?

Re:Downgrade?

[tambo]

If it's a "Downgrade", shouldn't it be *CHEAPER*?????

It's a "downgrade" only because Microsoft wants to preserve the illusion that Vista is better, and the pricing is set to discourage people from buying it.

But, yes... a significant share of the consumer market, and practically *all* of the informed market, consider XP a vastly improved upgrade over Vista.

I've been using Microsoft OSes since MS-DOS 3.2 (circa 1988), and I've never been nearly as frustrated, disappointed, and often outraged by an OS as I am with Vista. I've been using it for two months, and it's horrid in many, many aspects.

I have been making a list of irritations that are novel to Vista. Every time I run across some new irritant, I pop open this text file and add a line to it. I am also making a list of Vista features that I have turned off because they are buggy, poorly implemented, resource hogs, unsecure, frustrating to use, etc., etc. They are both very long lists, and they continue to grow.

Re:Downgrade?

[Anonymous Coward]

XP is smaller, faster, less buggy, and doesn't come encumbered with a ton of DRM crap. How is that a "downgrade"? The box art isn't as nice.

Re:Downgrade?

[TheGratefulNet]

and doesn't come encumbered with a ton of DRM crap

its all relative, isn't it?

compare win2k that had NO activation and you could copy the system disk from one box to another and it would work fine (if the hardware/kernel were compatible).

I am forced to use an acronis (or similar) tool to dupe my system disk. that hurdle should NOT exist but XP sure does like to stop you doing things you need to, at the system level.

not to mention activation, which kept a lot of people OFF xp and made win2k the last 'great' os from MS.

the only useful xp is a corp edition (non activation), sp2, pre-WGA. all others are bolloxed-up. (fwiw, at least SP3 on xp didn't turn on WGA on the corp version I tested it with. so a corp SP2 with SP3 update still seems 'mostly safe' to use).

Re:Downgrade?

[Stormwatch]

I've been using Microsoft OSes since MS-DOS 3.2 (circa 1988), and I've never been nearly as frustrated, disappointed, and often outraged by an OS as I am with Vista.

I assume you have skipped WindowsMe.

Re:Downgrade?

[sm62704]

have been making a list of irritations that are novel to Vista.

Please post it in your as-yet nonexistant slashdot journal!

Re:$50 for assurance of less headache ?

[tepples]

Then how much would you pay for Ubuntu, which causes even fewer headaches than Windows XP as long as GNU/Linux supports your hardware?

Or...

[oodaloop]

you could just get Ubuntu from Dell. Hell, I'd take one of their DOS machines before buying Vista.

Re:$50 for assurance of less headache ?

[KiltedKnight]

Then how much would you pay for Ubuntu, which causes even fewer headaches than Windows XP as long as GNU/Linux supports your hardware?

Why, nothing of course. :)

other side of the coin

[night_flyer]

As opposed to buying a copy of XP from someone else for $150?

Re:other side of the coin

[merreborn]

As opposed to buying a copy of XP from someone else for $150?

It's $99 if you buy OEM.

What about refunds?

[MarcoG42]

So, when I get the PC home do I get to not accept the EULA, and call for a rebate of the cost of Vista + the $20-$50 more I payed for my "downgrade?"

Re:Depends on what you do with that computer

[Anonymous Coward]

Didn't you hear? There are now 42 games for Linux.

Better idea:

[Penguinisto]

How much would they add as a surcharge to ship any model I choose WITHOUT a Microsoft operating system on it?

As in: "...can you just send me the laptop with nothing at all installed on the hard disk? I intend to install (Ubuntu/Fedora/OpenSuSE) on it. No, I really don't want anything in the way of tech support outside of parts and labor."

/P

It's Twitter, Slashdot Duped Again!

[Anonymous Coward]

This story is a cut and paste job from Twitter's journal, made within two hours of the twitter post. CWMike must be another Twitter sock puppet and this story is just more hysterical FUD about Vista.

Re:It's Twitter, Slashdot Duped Again!

[eln]

Who cares who posted it, it's a legitimate news story from a fairly reliable source (computer world). This story is of interest to the tech world in general.

And no, I'm not a twitter sock puppet, and I generally think he's kind of over the top, but this article looks like a pretty straightforward summary of the article it links to. This particular piece is not in any way "hysterical FUD." Do you add anyone who responds to twitter's posts or reads his journal to his list of sock puppets?

Labor ain't free

[RingDev]

The HD's are likely all imaged with a single Vista image. In order to mass market XP, they will likely have to re-tool slightly to continue producing XP imaged drives in addition to Vista imaged drives. It's not much, but it does add to the labor, and while $50 is a bit steep, I wouldn't be at all surprised if the combination of tooling, labor, and licensing adds up to close to that amount.

-Rick

Re:Labor ain't free

[zappepcs]

The costs that you spoke of have already been paid for. It's part of the taking Vista on as a new product process. The hardware/factory space etc. required is the same for both Vista and XP. Since OEMs are not producing imaged HDs 24/7, building 2 different but equally supported (in the factory) systems is neither more difficult or more expensive than doing just one. They have to support how many versions of Vista? They supported all those versions of Vista while they were still supporting versions of XP but now the price is increased?

There is far more to this than manufacturing costs.

Re:no problem

[loafula]

$500 - $1500 is the price you pay for a PC that actually runs. An additional $20 on top of that is BS.

Re:$50 for assurance of less headache ?

[Penguinisto]

Then how much would you pay for Ubuntu, which causes even fewer headaches than Windows XP as long as GNU/Linux supports your hardware?

...as much free tech support for it (Ubuntu, or any Linux distro, really) as my friends and relatives can stand.

...time and effort in teaching others (including random strangers) how to use it if they ask.

...time and effort in explaining in detail how I manage to get neat stuff to happen on it (e.g. getting the Windows version of the 3D app Poser to work in OpenSuSE).

...any and all code modifications that I make to customize and/or bugfix any open-source component of it - even if I don't distribute the binaries or project source code myself.

(there are many more ways, but yeah - it's worth paying-back that way, if not in other ways as well).

/P

Re:Wasting money

[Anonymous Coward]

Respectfully, you speak like someone who isn't in business and doesn't have to worry about budgets, productivity, downtime, etc. I've only started my career and my charge-out rate is $125/hr. After paying my salary, my employer makes nearly $90/hr from an hour of my productive time.

Whether you look at from the point of view of clients having to pay us to fix their constant vista related bugs or the productivity my boss would lose if I was offline for even a half hour on a vista related issue, $50 is a bargain.

I've spent 4 hours in the last 3 months fixing issues on my parents computer, including a complete reinstall because the damn thing would not boot up anymore. That's too much. The value of time is something that people vastly underestimate. $50 XP downgrades will pay for itself ten times over.

A respectable number

[tepples]

Didn't you hear? There are now 42 games for Linux. And once you include all the free-and-Free games in Ubuntu's repository, you have more games than were released for the Atari 7800 (60 titles) and Virtual Boy (22) put together. And no, not all of them are just Tetris clones either.

Re:A respectable number

[Jasonjk74]

And most of those games are still on an Atari 7800 level in 2008. And before I'm told that I don't understand Linux/FOSS; I use Linux every day, but the Linux gaming situation is pitiful. Now, I'll expect one of the following responses from someone here: 1. "But it runs World of Warcraft (in Wine)!" 2. "Linux users aren't worried about games, buy an XBox 360. Lack of games is a feature of Linux!"

Re:A respectable number

[Hatta]

An Atari 7800 still provides some of the best home arcade experiences short of a MAME cabinet.

If you focus on how much fun you can have, instead of whether you're pushing the most polygons through your video card, then linux is a nice option for gaming. No matter what genre of game you like most, there's something for you on linux.

Microsoft Monopoly

[mlwmohawk]

Yet again we see proof that Microsoft has a monopoly. If there were real competition in the market, people would not be forced to bend over and pay more. There would be competition, Dell would have to offer it at the same price or another operating system would win.

Also, if there were competition, Microsoft would not have the economic ability to decide to drop a product that people wanted and force them into something they didn't. If I was a share holder and there was actual competition in the market place, I'd have the board and CEO fired for failing their fiduciary responsibilities.

But since they have a monopoly, there is no economic feedback.

Re:Wasting money

[LWATCDR]

How bad is Vista? Well that depends. The UAC does break a good amount of software that works just fine on XP.
Also the journal playback doesn't work with the UAC turned on. It was a security issue but it is also how some programs did simple macros and allowed you to create applications that pushed text into other windows apps.
Also the USB system seems to have some bugs in it.
Also the sound system can be really odd at times. Some computers produce really crappy sound if you record at less than 16 bit 22 khz stereo. That shouldn't be an issue for just recording voice.
It does use more disk space and memory than XP.
It is also different and often it seems like it is different not to be better but to just be different.
So as you have put it if you turn off all the extras then it isn't that bad.
But if you turn off all the extras is it any better than XP?
That is what makes Vista so bad. It really is a lot to some pain for little to no gain.
XP works as well as Vista, uses less resources, and everybody knows most of it's quirks and problems. I feel that Vista is a case of not worth it. And what I find shocking is that most of the normal users out there feel the same way.

Re:Wasting money

[TheGratefulNet]

its supported until 2011 or something really crazy like that.

by then, if the world is STILL on MS platforms, well, we have worse things to worry about than xp running out of support..

there's no compelling reason at all to embrace vista. none. xp won't stop working all of a sudden (well, not any more than usual) and its supported via patches for quite a while to go.

after that, its linux, freebsd, mac. MS is losing share every month. I know NO ONE in the corp world who wants vista and even home users are rejecting it.

MS is on borrowed time, at least in terms of their OS.

Re:Wasting money

[The Warlock]

Vista is not nearly as bad (and for that matter XP is not nearly as good) as the Slashdot echo chamber makes it out to be. We had the same type and level of whining when switching from 2000 to XP, or from 98SE to 2000. Anyone here want to go back to either of those two?

Re:Wasting money

[Rary]

So the question is, from what I understand, if you turn off all the extras, Vista is not that bad. I don't suppose I can get an unbiased assessment on slashdot, though. Is it really that buggy? More than XP?

There are a handful of people here on Slashdot who actually like Vista and admit it. I'm one of them.

I haven't turned off any of the extras. Regarding the eye candy, they did an awesome job. It's a slick looking user interface. Regarding performance, it runs beautifully on my Acer laptop (1.6 GHz dual core, 2 GB RAM, GeForce Go7300).

The biggest annoyance for me is the automatic horizontal scrolling in the folder pane of Windows Explorer. I absolutely hate it and want to turn it off, but there is no option.

I've only encountered two actual bugs, and they were both extremely minor. One of them I only encountered once, and can't actually remember what it is right now. The other is just a small bug that occurs when you create a new folder and then try to rename it too quickly.

Overall, I'm happy with it.

Re:$50 for assurance of less headache ?

[Score Whore]

Many people also pay (nothing, of course) for Windows XP, but I was one of those suckers who paid extra for a dell laptop with a legit installation of XP pro because it was a bitch to find ANY laptop which wasn't already loaded with Vista!

You are a sucker. I've purchased two copies of Vista. One retail and one with a new laptop. In the license agreement that came with both of them, there is a clause that allows you to use Windows XP instead of Vista. No need to pay extra.

bargain

[ihatethetv]

After going through a nightmare trying--"how hard can it be?"--to find XP drivers for an HP F763NR a few weeks ago this looks like a bargain. Amazing, they've made it as hard to find win xp drivers for some devices as it is to find linux drivers. Nice work folks! -G

Or free on the Latitudes, Optiplex, Precision

[lazy-ninja]

Yes, on the Vostros it costs money. If you are buying the (far better) latitudes it is a free upgrade/downgrade.

Staying with Windows 2000

[Animats]

I'm still running Windows 2000 on the last Windows machine. It's so drama-free. No pushed updates, no annoying popups from Microsoft, no crashes in years.

You run Windows 2000. XP is tied to the mothership in Redmond. With Vista, Microsoft runs you.

Re:Staying with Windows 2000

[Creepy Crawler]

The only problem to run Win2k is on a laptop with Wifi. There's no coherent Wifi subsystem to do what one can do in WinXP. XP's system pales in comparison to Ubuntu though. Nothing can beat iwconfig/ifconfig/iptables combo... except for pf.

If one has a Linux-liked wifi card, switch to Ubuntu. Its worth the trouble.

Re:XP crashes apps minutes after installing

[furrydave]

If it was an HP, then it's not XP's fault. HP, especially their 2000 series laptops, do not have any drivers for XP. Or rather, they don't work. I have Vista on my HP 2000 laptop, and Ubuntu 8.04. Both work great. XP just isn't worth the hassle to try to install because the drivers aren't there. Now on my desktop, I have all 3 installed, and I've never run into a situation where my PC ran better in Vista then it did in XP. XP is just faster and more solid then Vista. Ubuntu cleans house over both MS products...

5+ Years

[Kozar_The_Malignant]

I think this is a big part of the problem. When you have that kind of time line, the project loses focus. Remember all of the things that were supposed to be in Vista but were dropped along the way? There never seemed to be a clear vision of what it was supposed to be. It doesn't have to be that way. NASA certainly has shown that long term projects can have spectacular results.

Re:5+ Years

[timeOday]

It doesn't have to be that way. NASA certainly has shown that long term projects can have spectacular results.

Linux has shown that OS development doesn't have to be phased in huge long-term projects in the first place. The kernel changes continuously, often supporting both the current "best" way of doing something as well as the previous "deprecated" interface that will disappear after a few years.

Now, you could say "you can't leap a chasm two inches at a time," but where is the great leap forward with Vista?

Re:5+ Years

[TimothyDavis]

Do you also remember Microsoft dropping work on Vista to heavily invest in XP.SP2? Do you remember the significant changes that went into security training and code analysis to finally work on securing Windows?

The ship took a massive course change during the product cycle for Vista - which changed what the priorities were for the final release. This should not be overlooked.

Don't get me wrong, the Vista that did ship was a huge piece of junk - but SP1 has fixed many of the significant problems people faced. Now if they would just work on the fit and finish, and the bloat, it would be a good OS.

As for Dell charging more for XP, you *do* realize that it costs Dell money to test and support this OS on their hardware, right? Many of the device driver models changed between XP and Vista - much of this was to sandbox drivers or move them out of the kernel. This is a good thing.

At this point the demand for XP has dropped to a minority share - so why *not* pass the cost to the folks who are generating it? Do you think that you can reasonably request Dell put Win98SE on your machine for no extra charge?

Re:Wasting money

[Rogerborg]

We had the same type and level of whining when switching from 2000 to XP, or from 98SE to 2000. Anyone here want to go back to either of those two?

"go back"? I'm still waiting for a compelling reason to upgrade from 2K to XP. Seriously.

I'm in the minority

[bondjamesbond]

In that my wife gets better with every "apt-get update && apt-get upgrade". Now if I could only do an "apt-get install tightass bigger-boobs".

Re:I'm in the minority

[Trigun]

It's time to change distro's. It hurts at first, but just looking a the new OS will increase your uptime.

Re:I'm in the minority

[Anonymous Coward]

I rooted her box.

Re:So, That's how Vista got to be #1...

[FriendComputer]

I actually spoke with my company's Dell sales rep just a few days ago about this, since we have software that just doesn't run under Vista and we haven't been able to figure out why.

As I understand it, Dell's agreement with MS says that after June 30 they are no longer allowed to ship versions of Windows other than Vista. When you buy a new Dell you'll get a Vista license regardless, but if you pay the extra $50 Dell will sell you and pre-install an XP license onto the PC and just stuff Vista into the box.

The real villain here is MS, not Dell. They're actually being pretty reasonable considering the extra process they're having to maintain.

Hello! You get both operating systems.

[Anonymous Coward]

Look folks, the reason for the extra $50 is simple. You get both Vista AND XP.

I know it's a lot more fun to misinterpret the summary, then comment on your misinterpretation. But if you actually RTFA, it's not so sensational.

Re:Hello! You get both operating systems.

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey look, this is the HOLY CRAP MS IS TEH SUCK party. You take your logic elsewhere.

Re:Hello! You get both operating systems.

[Just Some Guy]

Look folks, the reason for the extra $50 is simple. You get both Vista AND XP.

For probably 90% of the people paying extra to get XP, that's functionally identical to getting only XP.

Re:Hello! You get both operating systems.

[MrMacman2u]

Soooo... two pieces of crap for the price of one?

Re:Hello! You get both operating systems.

[the_B0fh]

I don't know what kind of morons are moderating, but how in the hell did this get modded informative?

Microsoft licenses have always been downgradable. And nothing stops you from installing the un-downgraded OS once you decide not to use the downgrade anymore. This has always been the case.

So now, they're making you pay more, and *YOU* are misinterpreting it. You do not get both vista and XP. Go ahead and install that copy of vista on another system, why don't you, and then go talk to Microsoft's licensing department and see what they tell you.

Re:Hello! You get both operating systems.

[mezron]

No you don't. You get disks for both, but you can still only use one or the other. Can't use both at the same time.

Re:Hello! You get both operating systems.

[NiceGeek]

If you refuse to take Vista do you get the $50 back? No? Then people are still paying $50 to avoid using Vista.

Re:Hello! You get both operating systems.

[CastrTroy]

I don't think it's MS that is charging you more. I think it's Dell, who is charging you for the work involved in doing the downgrade. You could do it at home by yourself, without incurring any extra cost.

Re:Hello! You get both operating systems.

[sm62704]

Look folks, the reason for the extra $50 is simple. You get both a rabid dog, AND dogshit.

I know it's a lot more fun to make fun of the summary, than to commit Microsoft executives to an insane asylum. But if you actually use Windows, it's not so pathetic.

Re:Hello! You get both operating systems.

[hansamurai]

Yes, but Microsoft gets to say they sold a copy of Vista too, padding their sales charts.

Re:Hello! You get both operating systems.

[Jason Earl]

These people are paying an extra $50 off of the most expensive versions of Vista so that they can run Windows XP. People that are willing to pay a premium to run XP are not excited about the fact that they get Vista as well.

Seriously, if these thought that Vista was worth running, they'd save their $50 and run Vista. There is essentially no way to spin this that is good for Microsoft or Vista. Heck, downgrading to Windows XP on most computers of the Vostro line (which ship with Vista Home Basic by default) adds $150 to the price tag.

Re:Hello! You get both operating systems.

[Just Some Guy]

Yes, but you can't really market that as a benefit to Dell's customers. "Buy XP! Help MS cook the books for only $50!"

Re:Hello! You get both operating systems.

[SPickett]

Look folks, the reason for the extra $50 is simple. You get both Vista AND XP. I think you're wrong.

I'm trying to buy a Dell laptop today. Here are my operating system options:
Genuine Windows® XP Professional, SP2 with Media add $0
Genuine Windows Vista® Business Bonus-Windows® XP Professional loaded [Included in Price]
Genuine Windows Vista® Ultimate Bonus-Windows® XP Professional loaded [add $50]
Genuine Windows Vista® Business Service Pack 1, With media add $0 (Dell Recommended)
Genuine Windows Vista® Ultimate Service Pack 1, With media [add $50]

You'll notice that (1) XP loaded, (2) Vista Business loaded, and (3) XP loaded plus Vista Business on media are all the same price. It sounds like beginning tomorrow either of the XP options will carry an additional charge.

Re:Hello! You get both operating systems.

[Jason Earl]

You really are a clueless idiot.

I'm crushed. Here's what I said.

These people are paying an extra $50 off of the most expensive versions of Vista so that they can run Windows XP

What I meant to say was that these people are paying an extra $50 "on top of" the most expensive version of Vista. It's possible that this mistake is why you got so worked up. The basic idea is that it doesn't make sense to pay an extra $50 to have Windows XP installed if what you really want to do is run Windows Vista. Especially considering the fact that Dell probably doesn't include Windows Vista installation media with these computers.

Here's your response:

WRONG! When you buy Vista Business or Ultimate (note: Business costs the same as XP Pro), you are entitled to downgrade the system yourself. Dell are offering their "downgrade services" for $50. This is not M$ ripping you off, it's Dell offering you to downgrade for an extra fee. Dell offer to re-configure your computer's Boot Sequence for $5, they offer to remove unwanted applications for a few bucks, and there are probably more customisation things which i cant remember. Dell is probably being forced down the Vista road, but while the downgrade loophole exists, they are cashing in. You can downgrade yourself & save $50.

This has essentially nothing to do with anything I wrote. Sure, it's nice to know that you can purchase Vista Ultimate or Vista Business and downgrade yourself to Windows XP. Of course, you'd have to have a copy of the installation materials (which you wouldn't get from Dell), and you would also be on your own for support.

Please note I never said that Dell was not "ripping you off." Dell is just trying to cover the cost of supporting yet another Microsoft operating system on its hardware. Once again, my point is that if these people wanted Vista they wouldn't be paying extra to have it removed and have Windows XP installed. So the fact that they also have the right to install Vista on the machine can hardly be considered a bonus.

Heck, they have the right to put FreeDOS on the machine as well. Not that anyone cares.

I continued with:

downgrading to Windows XP on most computers of the Vostro line (which ship with Vista Home Basic by default) adds $150 to the price tag.

WRONG AGAIN. "Most computers of the Vostro line" ship with Vista Business. Although there are exceptions, the Vostro line is built for Small Business. And, you can't "downgrade" from Home Basic. Vista Home Basic = XP Home. XP Home != XP Pro. Hence the price of upgrading to XP/Vista Business.

Actually, you are wrong. I checked Dell's website and of the 6 laptops in the Vostro line and the first 4 include either Vista Home Basic or XP Home in the base price. I didn't check the last two because I started to realize that I was reliving an XKCD.com cartoon.

In short, you are a moron. Buy a copy of Vista Business. It costs the same as XP Pro, and it entitles you to a downgrade to XP Pro. To me, thats 1 copy of XP Pro, until Vista becomes good enough, when I can upgrade to Vista Business for free.

If you honestly think that people are going to pay Dell $50 plus an upgrade to Vista Business from Vista Home Basic (which is what these machines generally ship with by default) so that they can later install Vista Business themselves (probably losing any software support on the computer in the process) then you are clearly delusional. I'm glad you think I am a moron. If someone with your lack of mental capacity agreed with me I would be concerned.

Re:$50 for assurance of less headache ?

[flappinbooger]

So it's $50 for labor?

Is this for real? Any copy of vista you pay for you can take an OEM CD of XP and install it and you're legal?

What code do you enter when it asks? The one for the vista install? Does it activate? Who has done this?

Most people will have a copy of XP around, probably OEM. I have a CD for pro and home, so this may just make the vista thing a non-issue. You're still buying a copy of AN operating system, there's just an extra step of the format/reinstall to fix it.

tooling/labor/licensing costs... what???

[JonTurner]

I wouldn't be at all surprised if the combination of tooling, labor, and licensing adds up to close to that amount. Because, as we all know, this is the first time they have ever sold Windows XP and they have to create the entire install and assembly process from scratch and re-engineer their business process to support this extremely rare special case...

Yes, that was sarcasm.

Re:tooling/labor/licensing costs... what???

[RingDev]

I appreciate your sarcasm, but have you ever run a low overhead high efficiency production line?

If you have exactly the right amount of resources to distribute Vista as per your current plan, where are you going to get the resources to distribute XP? Sure, maybe it's 1 extra man-hour a day to get the installs done, or to swap bins and output trays for pre-loaded XP hard drives. But that's 1 hour of labor that you have to pay for only because you are offering XP. 1 hour could be $20 payment for a union factory worker with seniority. Figure another $10 in taxes, SS, UE, etc on top of that, $4 to the health care plan, and another $1 to the retirement plan. You've just paid an extra $35 for 1 hour of labor.

Now you also need to update your sales catalog to reflect the new availability and pricing.

Update you web site to include the configuration option.

Update your marketing material to let consumers know they have the choice.

Update your support documentation so that your Tier 1 script readers know to ask "Do you have Windows XP or Vista?"

Duplicate your warehouse and distribution organization to handle identical models of PCs and laptops with both OS's.

Continuously review production and sales data to determine if you need to increase, decrease, or suspend production of XP PC/Laptops.

etc...

And, if what another commenter has mentioned is true, about Dell no longer having distribution rights to XP to allow them to use pre-loaded HD's, you are looking at having to pay the labor to have each and every laptop loaded manually.

So yeah, it costs a bit extra for them to offer it. Could part of the $50 be due to MS trying to push them away from the selling it? Likely. Could some of the $50 be due to Dell trying to dissuade people from buying it? Also likely. But to claim that running extra product varieties on an existing production line will not increase production costs is just short sighted.

-Rick

Re:Wasting money

[Rogerborg]

So, the advice from Microsoft is to allow Vista to just automatically escalate your privileges?

Sigh.

I actually like UAC, and I'd recommend that most users just leave it on and suck up the increasingly infrequent nags. Perhaps it's a motorcycling thing; you give a final look over your shoulder before every maneuver, even though 99% of the time there's nothing there. It's the 1% that's going to kill you.

Re:Wasting money

[Koiu Lpoi]

Sure we did, but there were people on both sides of the fence, and the other side always had at least some reasons to switch. All I ever hear about Vista is "it's not as bad as people say", never "it's good because of X Y Z". Maybe I'm just getting old, but I remember people talking about 2k and saying how it never bluescreened and drivers were more compatible, but others said 98se was faster and better. Today, I hear that XP is faster, better, more usable, and easier, while vista is "not that bad". Seems a little different to me.

And just for the record, I use Vista on a daily basis on my computer, and have no problems. It is "not that bad", but it certainly is "not that good" either.

Re:$50 for assurance of less headache ?

[cjb658]

According to this, business and ultimate are eligable for a free downgrade to XP Professional:

Rights to OEM versions of systems software are granted in the OEM License Terms. The OEM License Terms for most OEM versions of systems software do not grant downgrade rights. The exception is the OEM License Terms for the Windows® XP Professional operating system and the Windows Vistaâ Business and Windows Vista Ultimate operating systems, which grant downgrade rights. See the full text of the OEM License Terms for the specific downgrade rights.

I want to see how they plan on downgrading...

[Khyber]

Considering NVIDIA is too lazy to put in a simple entry in their driver's .INF file so their newer mobile cards would work in XP I want to see how many of the newer model laptops could POSSIBLY downgrade without doing what I had to do - hack the .INF and get the deviceid in there so XP would see the hardware (8600M GS).

Seriously, people at NVIDIA must be REALLY LAZY to not include one line of code into an .INF file so their card would work under XP (since they ARE using a unified driver architecture and all for the very purpose of keeping things compatible across the board)

linux

[the brown guy]

How much is this Linux that I keep hearing so much about. And yes, I am new here....

Would I want to play them?

[Moraelin]

And once you include all the free-and-Free games in Ubuntu's repository, you have more games than were released for the Atari 7800 (60 titles) and Virtual Boy (22) put together. And no, not all of them are just Tetris clones either.

Look, I'm not trying to dis Linux or anything. It's great for work or casual browsing any email.

But for games, umm, how do I say this tactfully?

1. the "you have more games than were released for the Atari 7800 (60 titles) and Virtual Boy (22) put together" doesn't say much. Both were flops and had pitiful numbers of games release, compared to any other platform. And even less original games. So it's a bit like saying that a drink tastes better than diarrhea. Or that a movie was more entertaining than root canal and a kick in the nuts put together. They comparison point is so low, that it doesn't really say much.

Now if you could compare it to the Atari 2600, or NES, that would be something.

2. I've seen the list of those 42 top commercial games, and I even commented on that story. I'll even raise you about a dozen more Loki ports, and a few commercial adventures that work well in ScummVM.

Nothing against them as such, kudos for porting them, but some are as much as 10 years old. My idea of having a gaming rig is more along the lines of, dunno, "I wanna play Age Of Conan which just got released", than like "I wanna play Knights And Merchants which I've already played in the 90's. And thought it sucked." Or much as Quake 3 Arena was a fine game for 2000, let's face it, there's a very limited number of people who still play _that_ online. You get the idea.

3. The free games... well, I've _tried_ a bunch of them. Yes, not all are Tetris clones. Pingus is a clone of Lemmings (an 1991 game) and the copy I tried, never had more than the tutorial levels. Some are clones of Missile Command (from 1980), the most notable of which being probably Penguin Command. Some are clones of Arkanoid (1986), and no matter what twists you give them (e.g., Briquolo), it's still f-ing Arkanoid, you know? Ditto, replacing the cute little dinosaur with a penguin doesn't make, say, Frozen Bubble be anything else than a clone of Puzzle Bobble / Bust-A-Move from 1994. I can even think of a moderately passable clone of 2D Mario games from the 80's, namely SuperTux. Etc.

I've seen very little in the way of original games there, and even fewer that don't look like old ass. Sorry, _classic_ ass.

Now I can't have any demands there given that they're free. I can see they couldn't afford an army of graphics artists or a celebrity game designer. I know that. Thanks for the intention, guys, and all that. But being that I'm not exactly below poverty line either, I'd really rather pay for a commercial-grade game.

Look, again, I'm not trying to put down Linux across the board. But for the narrow domain called "video games", it wouldn't really be my first choice. Sorry.

Re:Wasting money

[andrewd18]

Of course not. He'd never make it that far. The automated turrets are set to kill Microsoft employees on sight.

Sometimes

[InvisiBill]

http://download.microsoft.com/download/d/2/3/d23b9533-169d-4996-b198-7b9d3fe15611/downgrade_chart.doc

Rights to OEM versions of systems software are granted in the OEM License Terms. The OEM License Terms for most OEM versions of systems software do not grant downgrade rights. The exception is the OEM License Terms for the Windows® XP Professional operating system and the Windows Vistaâ Business and Windows Vista Ultimate operating systems, which grant downgrade rights. See the full text of the OEM License Terms for the specific downgrade rights.

Got charged by Lenovo too.

[AEC216]

My father is sitting in a chair for the next two months due to a broken heel. I bought him a laptop directly from Lenovo. They had a great sale for Fathers Day (25% off). Their standard install was Vista Business. The downgrade for XP Pro was $22.

Two for the Price of Two

[TheNinjaroach]

It's actually two pieces of crap for the price of two. The Vista OEM license is bundled in with the price of the hardware, and you pay extra for the backwards-compatible XP license.

How about a better deal?

[cayenne8]

How about an even better deal.

Dell sells you the box without any software or OS installed, and takes $50 off the price?

Dell are gutless

[pandrijeczko]

Last year, I tried to buy an XPS 1710 from Dell at the price of £1400 but they wouldn't sell it with XP, only Vista. Despite reminding them that I am the customer, they refused to back down so I told them to stuff it.

In actual fact, it worked out really well because I found a seller on eBay who resold new Dells that were cancelled orders from their customers - I got a brand new XPS 1710 from him, precisely the same spec as I'd asked Dell for, with XP on it and for £999.

The point I'm getting to is that Dell is taking the "easy" way out by doing this - they're still buying Vista licenses which keeps Microsoft happy but giving customers who want XP the chance to have it. Presumably the additional $50 covers the cost of installing it and/or the additional XP license.

In actuality, they're gutless, just like other PC hardware vendors. The fact is that Microsoft needs PCs as much as PCs need Windows, then the same vendors should stand up to Microsoft's bullying tactics and demand that MS supplies them with XP to meet the customer demand - it is NOT up to Microsoft to dictate what PCs are installed with.

So, yes, what Dell is doing does meet customer demand but it's a gutless, cowardly tactic because they're afraid to stand up to MS.