Microsoft Ending Mainstream Support For XP

Slatterz writes "Come next week, Microsoft will be in the unusual position of no longer offering mainstream support for its most widely used product. Windows XP will pass another milestone next week on the road to retirement when mainstream support ends on 14 April 2009, over seven years after the OS originally shipped. While the company said that it will continue to provide free security fixes for XP until 2014, any future bugs found in the platform will not be fixed unless customers pay. Windows XP accounts for about 63 percent of all Internet-connected computers, according to March 2009 statistics from Hitslink, while Windows Vista makes up about 24 percent."

Comments

Re:XP Sucks, Vista is Better

[noundi]

Because people are generally not satisfied with Vista. The parent is right, Vista is the current Windows version whether you like it or not and since you don't like it retailers keep selling PCs with XP installed. The important thing here is that while Microsoft has an agenda for future revenue, retailers on the other hand are on their own. Profit for them is profit, no matter the product, but for Microsoft it's a step back if it's XP. The majority of revenue generated through XP has already been collected, thus Microsoft needs a new platform to sell to all of it's customer base. This is how business works.

Re:Why not open it up

[QuincyDurant]

No, the policy is not unreasonable in general. However, XP is the OS that works, and they have nothing that is better to replace it. And doesn't it take less money to support a solid, familiar OS than it does to support a new, flaky one?

I don't get it. Isn't XP a cash cow?

Does this mean MSFT engineers will no longer "talk users through" the downgrade process.

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9040318