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Windows XP Still Outselling Windows Vista
nandemoari writes with an excerpt from an InfoPackets article that says "While Microsoft excitedly tries to sway public opinion by touting that Windows Vista License sales top 180 Million units, Hewlett-Packard (HP) was busy smacking Microsoft down — reportedly shipping PCs with a Vista Business license but with Windows XP pre-loaded in the majority of business computers sold since the June 30 Windows XP execution date established by Microsoft — casting a lot of doubt over how many copies of Vista have actually been sold."
It matters because MS spent alot of time and money developing Vista. If customers continue to demand XP and refuse to upgrade to Vista then that time and money was a waste.
While I'm certainly no MS fan I gotta admit that its sort of a compliment that people like XP so much they refuse to upgrade to Vista. Granted some of that is because of possible problems with Vista, but alot of it is that many people do not see the need to upgrade XP.
I work for a computer consulting firm, and we've known about this for months now. In fact, we've switched from selling almost all Dell systems to almost all HP systems because of it; our clients just don't want Vista, and this is a really convenient way to satisfy them. I actually thought HP was doing us a favor shipping the XP systems because we do so much business with them, but I guess it's standard policy!
I hope HP continues to offer this option, because if we're any indication, the OEMs and resellers *really* appreciate it.
Home customers feel like they just can't do anything about it. A lot of them hate Vista, I have heard people tell me that they got a new computer, and I asked them how it was and they said that it was good except it had Vista on it. And no, these weren't the people who know much about computers. They see that Vista is pathetically slow and they don't want it.
A lot would downgrade to XP if they had either A) the right drivers B) an XP CD and C) the knowledge to downgrade.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
the second link: http://apcmag.com/xp_still_killing_vista_in_sales_volume_hp.htm
the third link: http://www.infopackets.com/news/business/microsoft/2008/20080801_windows_xp_still_outselling_windows_vista.htm
these two stories are word for word, character for character, 50-70% identical. Yet authorship is claimed by two completely different sources.
This would suggest to me that _somebody_ is a shitty squat blog, plagiarising for page hits.
Vista comes with huge security implications (it that it has some), IE7 as mandatory, and therefore has large compatibility implications for large companies especially.
I know of several huge Microsoft customers that, despite being 100% MS based, still are in the testing/tweaking/certification stage of all their apps before they begin global roll-out. It's in the pipelines, but no one standardises on new workstation OS's until they can guarantee 100% compatibility - which can take a long time.
There's a scarily amount of enterprise-based IE6 only apps out there which alone makes Vista a difficult upgrade (IE6 not being an option on Vista). It's worth it in the end, as frankly, it's a better OS in the long-run IMO.
Gone are the days of writing to c:\windows without repercussion. Gone are the days of dropping kernel hooks in to get better app performance. Thank god.
throw new NoSignatureException();
> Gamers stuck it out with Windows 98
Boy, that's sure not my recollection. I remember gamers coming over fast, way ahead of both corporations and casual users. XP was such a win in gaming: more stable, better task switching, great backwards compat. Sure there were driver problems, but not so bad, nor for so long. I don't suppose there's any data to really show how it went, prove either of us right.
Team Fortress 2 crashes on exit for me, every single time. Happened on XP, then on Vista 32, now on Vista 64. Meh, could be worse.
Rabid
The mininote has opened up a whole new front in the OS Wars.
Great point! I have noticed the Asus Eee and the Acer AspireOne are attracting a lot of attention. At the local Staples (the only electronics store of any note in my town) people are fascinated with them. They're small, quiet, powerful enough to play music and videos, have wireless access to the Internet and do basic office suite work for under $400. The ones on display are running Linux.
Granted, they also have the option of running a stripped-down (???) version of XP, but people I've seen playing with them seem to like the Linux interface and have no problem figuring it out.
Maybe the desktop is no longer the crucial front in the struggle to dominate home computing.
the deadline for switching is 2014
Interestingly, XP will be as old then as Windows 95 is now.
So let me get this straight... the fact that there are people out their that perceive Linux and Ubuntu as different brands has nothing to do with whether or not they are perceived as different brands, computer OSes are easy for non-technical users to use unless they do something which is not easy and don't expect any old sound card to work. How does that have anything to do with my attitude and how does my attitude have anything to do with the product development of windows.
If you are drunk or stoned, that's cool, just try re-reading my post when you aren't. If you're one of those knee jerk reactionary open source zealots, don't bother re-reading the post and also please avoid user forums frequented by noobs and also avoid technical positions where your clients are non technical unless they are insulated by an experienced business analyst. You re-enforce a couple of negative perceptions of the Linux brand.
My post was purely looking at things from a branding point of view. I am one of those technical users who switched to Ubuntu because it has great hardware support and defaults to something closer to what I want than others I have tried including several years of Debian unstable. I still go in and change things because I know how, I build some of my own drivers and I help friends who are less technically savvy. I enjoy that I can install a powerful system with defaults I mostly like and then customise it in a matter of hours instead of the days it used to take me which is of course all down to personal preference.
So My attitude is not about shielding users from the system completely, but about providing a friendly experience to those who are not confident with a powerful back end system. Ubuntu has that BRAND PERCEPTION amongst a load of people I know while Linux has the BRAND PERCEPTION of being difficult. Understand?
Next time you have a build up of energy, try wanking in private. You'll enjoy it more, and you won't annoy others.
I don't therefore I'm not.