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One Third of New PCs Downgraded To XP?

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the if-only-they-could-just-be-not-bought dept.

CWmike writes "More than one in every three new PCs is downgraded from Windows Vista to Windows XP, either at the factory or by the buyer, said performance and metrics researcher Devil Mountain Software, which operates a community-based testing network. 'The 35% is only an estimate, but it shows a trend within our own user base,' Craig Barth, the company's CTO, said. 'People are taking advantage of Vista's downgrade rights.' Last year, Devil Mountain benchmarked Vista and XP performance using other performance-testing tools and concluded that XP was much faster. Barth said things haven't changed since then. 'Everything I've seen clearly shows me that Vista is an OS that should never have left the barn.'"

39 of 617 comments (clear)

  1. Not exactly surprised... by smitingpurpleemu · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Ordinary users expect stuff to work easily. Vista has an awful reputation in this regard, and it chews up more processing power/RAM and is slower than XP.

    1. Re:Not exactly surprised... by peragrin · · Score: 4, Insightful

      that's because marketing keeps changing history to suit their needs.

      It is one thing about linux I like. you can see the progression of change in the software. everyone else tries to hide what horrible things and stupid ideas they tried in the past. In 6 years time people are going to go there was Vista?

      --
      i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
    2. Re:Not exactly surprised... by Ethanol-fueled · · Score: 4, Insightful

      They should have just slapped the Aero GUI on XP and called it Vista. It'd Just Work(tm) and it would still consume much less resources than Vista does now. Vista didn't even deliver most of the stuff like WinFS that was supposed to make the upgrade headache worthwhile. It did, however, include the latest and most virulent DRM as well as other non-critical crap.

      Again, Microsoft, just put Aero on Windows XP as service pack 4, and then you can pretend that your customers really, really do prefer Vista over XP.

    3. Re:Not exactly surprised... by PopeRatzo · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I think MS screwed up by launching vista so soon before the hardware was really ready for it.

      It's a canard to say that the problem with Vista is that "the hardware is not ready for it".

      If Saab made a car that could only run on some super high-test gasoline that is not sold in gas stations, would you say that "the gasoline was not ready for it" or that "it was a stupid design and poor business decision to release it"?

      --
      You are welcome on my lawn.
    4. Re:Not exactly surprised... by Hyppy · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I wouldn't go that far. Almost everyone has a friend who "knows computers." Many tech-oriented people hate Vista. When Joe Sixpack asks his tech friend for advice on purchasing a shiny new laptop, chances are the geek may say something akin to "Avoid Vista like the plague." And, if you've ever met Joe Sixpack while working a retail or support job, one-line quips from his geek friend are the infallible word of God.

    5. Re:Not exactly surprised... by slig · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Throwing more hardware at a problem is far from an elegant solution. For all the bloat, what exactly does it accomplish which warrants such a massive hardware investment?

    6. Re:Not exactly surprised... by Chyeld · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It's a canard to say that the problem with Vista is that "the hardware is not ready for it".

      If Saab made a car that could only run on some super high-test gasoline that is not sold in gas stations, would you say that "the gasoline was not ready for it" or that "it was a stupid design and poor business decision to release it"?

      If, for instance, Saab released a new hybrid car which ran on hydrogen, and there was no infrastructure in place to supply that. I would not call the car stupid design because there was no infrastructure in place. I could, if I believed (or in foresight knew) that someday there would be, call it "Ahead of it's time" or "We just weren't ready for it".

      However, that has nothing to do with Vista, because it was stupid design. And while the hardware still isn't ready for it, even if it were, it'd be a stupid design.

      I don't know if the people making decisions on Vista just weren't all on the same page or what, but Vista is a pile of poorly planned half implemented aborted attempts at doing what the marketers over sold it as being capable of doing.

      That has nothing to do with hardware other than the fact that having a beefier machine might, might, mitigate the issues the same way an elephant gun might do as a fly swatter.

    7. Re:Not exactly surprised... by negRo_slim · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Not that it matters anyway - PC Gamer does a low/medium/high end build spec and cost estimate in each issue, and until a few months ago, their "dream system" spec only had 2 GB of RAM.

      Yes because we all know, a magazine that makes its payroll off advertisements from the very companies its suppose to be reviewing, makes the best choices in hardware.

      Funny how with a little nudging I could have Vista rolling just fine in a VM on an old Sempron. It's all a matter of expectations. Vista is junk, I know this because I've ran it and I lose on average 10% +/- of my resources to Vista. I don't care if I have enough hardware to make it run well, the fact remains I know I'm losing out on my hardware resources while gaining nothing.

      --
      On the Oregon Cost born and raised, On the beach is where I spent most of my days
    8. Re:Not exactly surprised... by smittyoneeach · · Score: 3, Insightful

      More to the point, how much hardware would remain on the shelf without a little Redmond Driver Judo to throw the hardware into the shopping cart?

      --
      Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
    9. Re:Not exactly surprised... by dabooda · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Ubuntu using Compiz chews RAM and processing power too but I still use it.

      Oh wait I forgot where I am ... yeah M$ am teh fail lulz

      --
      "Yeah Tommy, before Zee Germans get here ..."
    10. Re:Not exactly surprised... by Allador · · Score: 2, Insightful

      You really should consider reading up a little bit on Aero and the compositing window manager in Vista.

      Just 'slapping' it on XP is not as simple as you seem to be suggesting.

      If nothing else, it would force a bunch of changes to the core, to pull out the video drivers to userspace (like it is in Vista).

      And then you're halfway to re-inventing Vista anyway.

    11. Re:Not exactly surprised... by Allador · · Score: 5, Insightful

      If Saab made a car that could only run on some super high-test gasoline that is not sold in gas stations, would you say that "the gasoline was not ready for it" or that "it was a stupid design and poor business decision to release it"?

      How could you possibly suggest that what you've written is a valid parallel.

      You're suggesting that hardware didnt exist that would run Vista decently. This is obviously and trivially not the case.

      A better analogy was to say that Saab release a vehicle that claimed it ran fine on 87 octane gas, but in actually, it ran like crap all the time, unless you used 92 octane gas. (ie, a parallel on the Vista Ready campaign).

    12. Re:Not exactly surprised... by Jafafa+Hots · · Score: 2, Insightful
      Well, in your analogy the new thing is more efficient and worth waiting for and upgrading to.

      Are you saying that Vista requires more memory and a faster processor because it's more efficient than XP? Because it's so muhc more useful and advanced? Here - let me fix the analogy for you.

      It's as if Saab released a new car that used standard gasoline, but needed so MUCH of that gasoline to run that your local gas station had trouble supplying your needs. But the new Saab is WORTH that much expense on gas, because it has comfier seats, cooler styling, and the radio's ergonomically designed to be easy to use.

      --
      This space available.
    13. Re:Not exactly surprised... by acecamaro666 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      The removal of remote desktop from the Home Premium version was the deal killer for me and Vista. I remote into my XP desktop machine ALL the time using my EEE pc....I use my EEE pc with XP for web surfing and such, but remote desktop into my desktop machine to run more demanding applications.

    14. Re:Not exactly surprised... by Z34107 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Yes because we all know, a magazine that makes its payroll off advertisements from the very companies its suppose to be reviewing, makes the best choices in hardware

      Sigh. Because, yes, every magazine with advertisements is completely untrustworthy. Like, not one would have separate marketing and editorial staffs. And you would never see an editorial absolutely slam a product, followed by an ad for said product...

      Actually, you would. And it's pretty funny when it happens. Besides, a magazine supposedly on the dole from advertisers would be recommending more hardware than you "need," would they not?

      But, as you say, it's all a matter of expectations. Knowing that that extra 10% goes towards things like superfetch (instantly launching applications is nice), or file indexing (I think it's pretty cool being able to instantly search music and photos by tag and queue up a playlist from within a naked explorer window), or shiny things like generating proper icons for video clips, or defragging my disk - and not gowing towards "nothing" - is pretty nifty. Also, little things like the new "background" task priority, or that "save" dialog boxes remember the original file name after typing in a path, are pretty cool.

      Now, if I wasn't gaming, and I already had XP, I probably wouldn't upgrade just for the UI and some niceties. But my original point is that 2 GB isn't "barely enough" to run Vista; it's enough for "serious" gaming.

      --
      DATABASE WOW WOW
    15. Re:Not exactly surprised... by mrraven · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Yeah except I don't remember all the driver problems with XP for example, nor it being basically non functional on XP labled hardware like Vista "basic" can be with low end systems. Then there is the DRM...

      In short I think vista is more like ME which I did suffer though on one notebook than XP which is crappy but functional esp with Firefox as a browser.

      --
      Tired of all the isms, don't exploit people as an employer, or a government, mmmmK?
    16. Re:Not exactly surprised... by symbolset · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Knowing that that extra 10% goes towards things like superfetch (instantly launching applications is nice), or file indexing (I think it's pretty cool being able to instantly search music and photos by tag and queue up a playlist from within a naked explorer window), or shiny things like generating proper icons for video clips, or defragging my disk - and not gowing towards "nothing" - is pretty nifty. Also, little things like the new "background" task priority, or that "save" dialog boxes remember the original file name after typing in a path, are pretty cool.

      You know, if it was just 10% I could get behind you here. Unfortunately it appears it's more like 98% and that's a different kettle of penguins entirely.

      The two purposes of an operating system are to manage system resources and to provide an abstraction for programs to access the hardware called an API. The purpose of an operating system is not to consume system resources. The purpose of an operating system's API is not to occult the functioning of the operating system in preference for one vendor's applications over another's. Since Vista fails two of two here, I'm giving it a "no go" in the "operating systems" category.

      /Rating OS's since SVR3

      //Stealing a Fark slashies meme

      --
      Help stamp out iliturcy.
    17. Re:Not exactly surprised... by ukemike · · Score: 2, Insightful

      There is even more to it than just having a unified environment. I challenge anyone to name one thing that Vista can do and XP can't that my small consulting company needs. Most of our PCs are at least 6 years old at this point and that's just fine. They run Word, Excel, Acrobat, Autocad, email, firefox, and the occasional data download software that comes with some measuring equipment. What more could we possibly need?

      --
      -- QED
    18. Re:Not exactly surprised... by arkhan_jg · · Score: 2, Insightful

      That's because vista business is the equivalent of XP professional. Vista home premium is a hybrid of XP home and MCE 2005. XP home doesn't have remote desktop either.

      The deliberately took the 'business' features like remote desktop out of the cheaper home versions, because otherwise why would you have a reason to buy the hugely overpriced vista ultimate?

      That home users probably use remote desktop rather than businesses (they have proper terminal servers and remote control solutions) just shows how braindead their reasoning is. They should have released two versions. vista ultimate and vista light. Make vista ultimate the same price as xp pro, and sell a really cheap vista light with most of the bells and whistles (but not aero) removed.

      It wouldn't solve the technical disasters, but at least it would have reduced the bloody confusion over the 40 odd different versions of vista. Is that OEM home premium, or academic upgrade home premium? Do I get the x64 disc wih that, or do I need to buy retail vista ultimate? Utterly braindead.

      --
      Remember kids, it's all fun and games until someone commits wholesale galactic genocide.
    19. Re:Not exactly surprised... by hairyfeet · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Not to mention the first thing that the few Vista users say when they come into my shop is "Can you make it act more like XP?" The average home user didn't give a diddly about flipping 3D window crap. They want fast and stable and easy to use like XP. So far every single Vista user I have had come in,when told I couldn't make Vista act like XP,the very next words out of their mouth was "Well,can you put XP on it?" Did they not do consumer testing? I can't picture little Sally home user going "What I really want is flipping 3D Windows." Yet another case of MSFT trying to fit the entire userbase into one badly designed box. Like the old saying goes,try to please everyone and you end up pleasing no one. But as always this is my 02c,YMMV

      --
      ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
  2. Downgraded? by Naughty+Bob · · Score: 3, Insightful

    That depends on your opinion/needs.

    --
    "Be light, stinging, insolent and melancholy"
  3. And the rest simply don't know how to. by KiloByte · · Score: 4, Insightful

    90% of users are Joe Sixpacks, and still 35% of them jump through the hurdles to drop Vista. It's hard to imagine what Microsoft would need to do to fare worse than this.

    --
    The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
    1. Re:And the rest simply don't know how to. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      90% of users are Joe Sixpacks, and still 35% of them jump through the hurdles to drop Vista. It's hard to imagine what Microsoft would need to do to fare worse than this.

      Think again. For microsoft, it's a positive. They get someone to use for XP and pay for Vista, which is more expensive. It's a win for them.

    2. Re:And the rest simply don't know how to. by eln · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Only in the short term. In the long term, it entrenches the idea in peoples' minds that newer is not necessarily better when it's coming from Microsoft, which is not a mindset MS wants people to have. The debacle of Vista makes people more wary of new offerings from MS, and will harm them in the long run.

  4. Re:laptops by Hyppy · · Score: 4, Insightful

    And apparently Toshiba's only honouring the warranty now if none of the original bundled software has been removed.

    Dear [deity], what?!? So, even if you remove the crapware trial software, upgrade to an open driver, remove crap Windows services, etc, you're screwed?

    If this is true, I think this point alone should be front page news.

  5. it's all a bit silly, really by unfunk · · Score: 5, Insightful

    God, this feels horrible, but I have to defend Microsoft/Windows here a bit
    Windows 98 was slower than Windows 95, running on the same hardware
    Windows XP was slower than Windows 98, running on the same hardware
    Windows Vista is slower than Windows XP, running on the same hardware.

    Does anybody see a pattern here? Most people thought XP was rubbish for the first couple of years that it was out for, and now those same people are proclaiming it to be Microsoft's best OS to date.
    Vista does a lot of things right, and improves on XP in many, many areas, it's just dogged by this idea that it's crap because you can't run it on your P3-800 and it won't work with your dot-matrix printer from 1977.

    Ugh, that felt terrible, I need to go play with Ubuntu for a few hours now....

    1. Re:it's all a bit silly, really by night_flyer · · Score: 3, Insightful

      there is a trend, except XP and 98 were both improvements over their predecessors (real and perceived).

      --


      Thanks to file sharing, I purchase more CDs
      Thanks to the RIAA, I buy them used...
    2. Re:it's all a bit silly, really by duckInferno · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Win 95 -> Win 98: Slightly slower, but also slightly less painful experience for the end user

      Win 98 -> Win XP: A fair bit slower, but holy crap it doesn't crash any more!

      Win XP -> Vista: Extreme slowdown and you don't get a lot out of it beyond viral DRM and all your shoddily-written software causing that annoying permissions box to pop up.

      Every iteration of windows has been slightly slower but also better than the previous version... until Vista.

      --
      Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, watch it -- I'm huge!
    3. Re:it's all a bit silly, really by fishbowl · · Score: 2, Insightful

      >By "many, many" do you mean "more than none"?

      I hate to admit this but there is *one* genuine benefit that I know of, which applies to
      Digital Audio Workstations: WaveRT and devices that support it, are a big step forward from ASIO or WDM audio.

      It's unfortunate that there's a shallow pool of WaveRT-supporting devices so far. This ends up being a liability for
      Vista and one very good reason to crossgrade to XP. ASIO drivers are a userland affair on Vista. It's FUD, however,
      to say they don't work well.

      --
      -fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
  6. Re:Non-Compatible Laptops by sortia · · Score: 4, Insightful

    You sure its not a sata driver problem? XP doesn't have sata drivers by default, try slipstreaming the sata drivers in to your XP disk.

  7. BULLshit by unity100 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    ALL of those oses prior to Vista have brought something to the table that wasnt there before themselves.

    vista, brings NOTHING, except drm. therefore people are not tolerating the slowness.

    --
    Read radical news here
  8. Re:laptops by Zymergy · · Score: 3, Insightful

    That is not enforceable...

    1) Buy laptop with smallest and cheapest HDD possible.
    2) Remove said HDD and image it.
    3) Put in static bag in Original Laptop box and store it.
    4) Purchase superior drive: Quiet and Large 5400RPM drive, or Superior and Fast 7200RPM drive, or Uber Everything SSD.
    5) Apply your original image and install the drive.
    6) Modify to your heart's content (PC Decrapifier , etc... or better yet... cleanly install XP (or OS of choice) with no Toshiba crapware or 'utility partition', etc..)

    7) When something "breaks" Install original drive... Volia!

    NOTE: Some users just use the same drive and keep an image of the original partition.... but imaging the wanted partition first and then reimaging the drive to the original one is too much of a pain.... (especially when the lap is dead and it better protects your data, pics, MP3s, etc..)
    Just get a faster/better/more expensive superior HDD for your laptop and use that one.

  9. Re:Non-Compatible Laptops by fishbowl · · Score: 2, Insightful

    >I went online and downloaded XP.

    I'll assume you downloaded it from say, a properly licensed MSDN source...

    --
    -fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
  10. Re:Voiding the warranty not legal, is it? by lgw · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Back up your system, "recover" all the crapware from the recover DVDs, send in for warrentee repairs. You have to plan on your hard drive being wiped any time you send you machine for repairs anyway, so it's not really even extra work.

    --
    Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
  11. It has less to do with Vista for us by east+coast · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Where I work XP is simply the current standard and even if Vista existed beyond the 2010 release date slated for Vienna we may never consider it. We get in a few hundred PCs annually at my site and it's a small site amongst several and that's not counting our retail outlet stores which number a few thousand.

    It's not that we're thumbing our noses at Vista but rather that XP is what works for us and is stable.

    --
    Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
  12. Catching up by SuperKendall · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Try shutdown /a (run shutdown /? to see all options available) from command prompt. Not tried on vista, but at least on 2003, that's the command to abort a system shutdown.

    On Linux, you need to know advanced terminal commands to do things like force the system to shut down.

    On Windows, you need to know advanced terminal commands to stop the system from doing things to you...

    Sounds like Linux is finally catching up by having Windows drop down to its level and heading the wrong way past!

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  13. If XP was easier to install... by flyingfsck · · Score: 3, Insightful

    then 66% of Vista PCs would be downgraded.

    --
    Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
  14. Re:Me too! by Coopjust · · Score: 2, Insightful

    There is a very valid reason- you know that all of the hardware in the PCs will have XP compatible drivers.

    Also, it shows that they are listening to their customers.

  15. Re:It's not a hardware problem. by neithernet · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Just curious...which CAD? Could it be some license management running in the background?