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Windows 7's Virtual XP Mode a Support Nightmare?

Posted by kdawson on from the twice-as-many-windows-to-wash dept.

CWmike writes "Microsoft's decision to let Windows 7 users run Windows XP applications in a virtual machine may have been necessary to convince people to upgrade, but it could also create support nightmares, analysts said today. Gartner analyst Michael Silver outlines the downsides. 'You'll have to support two versions of Windows,' he said. 'Each needs to be secured, antivirused, firewalled and patched. If a company has 10,000 PCs, that's 20,000 instances of Windows.' The other big problem Silver foresees: Making sure the software they run is compatible with Windows 7. 'This is a great Band-Aid, but companies need to heal their applications,' Silver said. 'They'll be doing themselves a disservice if, because of XPM, they're not making sure that all their apps support Windows 7.'"

7 of 413 comments (clear)

  1. Won't this largely depend on how well it works? by DoninIN · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The better it works the easier it will be to support. Also why does the XP instance have to have its own antivirus and firewall? I don't understand why the windows 7 (Magnificent 7? Windows Magnifica!) firewall and antivirus won't be sufficient for the virtual XP machine inside.

  2. On the contrary... by casings · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This could be very good for support people. Since Microsoft would have to keep supplying patches to XP, there will be no reason to even think about installing Windows 7. Thus allowing support people to the confidence of continued patches.

    1. Re:On the contrary... by jmorris42 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      > Since Microsoft would have to keep supplying patches to XP, there will be no reason
      > to even think about installing Windows 7.

      It gets even better. If they ship an XP compatibility layer in 7 it tells everyone that XP apps will be a supported option for the lifetime of Windows 7. And if XP is kept alive in this way, ya you are probably right that patches for XP itself will probably be continued for quite some time, especially since they are going to be selling newly licensed copies at least as late as this Xmas.

      However it is the follow on effects of a promise that XP will be a viable platform to run applications in for at least the next 5-7 years. It makes XP the safe choice of API to write new code to. An XP compatible application will run on XP, Windows 7 and via CodeWeavers increasingly effective efforts (as the XP target has remainied basically stable for years) it means an XP application can run at native speed on Mac and Linux. And it doesn't take that much effort to write XP apps that will run on 7 anyway without needing the emulation layer so 7 compatible XP code is going to be a more universal binary than Java ever achieved in the real world.

      If Microsoft isn't careful with this XP on 7 plan they could Warp themselves.

      --
      Democrat delenda est
  3. Re:Pardon me... by Bill_the_Engineer · · Score: 5, Interesting

    In the Windows market, reality has a way of kicking you in the balls.

    Actually, Windows has a way of kicking you in the balls. How would running XP in a virtual machine be any different from the usual windows experience?

    I think this is the smartest move Microsoft has done in a long time. They need to relegate the backwards compatibility to a virtual machine, and make the next Windows OS much leaner and secure.

    I agree with the GP that Apple had little problems with this and their market is of sufficient size to assume that Microsoft would fare just as well.

    --
    These comments are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of my employer or colleagues...
  4. Let me fix that for you: by pseudonomous · · Score: 5, Interesting

    From TFA:

    "Windows XP Mode is specifically designed to help small businesses move to Windows 7," Scott Woodgate, director of Windows enterprise and virtualization strategy, said in a blog entry last Friday.

    Corrected:

    "Windows XP Mode is specifically designed to help us move copies of Windows 7 proffessional and ultimate, as opposed to the cheaper home addition,"S cott Woodgate, director of Windows enterprise and virtualization strategy, meant in a blog entry last Friday.

  5. Drivers? by tepples · · Score: 5, Interesting

    How would running XP in a virtual machine be any different from the usual windows experience?

    It depends on whether Windows 7 can pass-through USB devices and PCI cards to Windows XP. Otherwise, people will try and fail to use hardware with XP drivers on the virtual XP. (Windows 7 uses Vista drivers.)

  6. crash and burn by NicknamesAreStupid · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This is sad, just another example of how the wheels are coming off the cart while careening down another blind alley. I was at a trade show last month, and the visit to the Microsoft booth was surreal. The first kiosk was for Windows 7 and a smiling young man touting the virtues of this beta software. When I mentioned that I was having trouble running Vista on a 3.2GHz P4 with 4GB RAM, a 512MB ATI video card with DX10.1, and a terabyte HDD, he scoffed and said that nobody at Microsoft was running Vista, not even the developers. He gave me a DVD of beta 7 and told me that even as a beta, Windows 7 was "so much better than Vista." I accepted his disc (which expires on August 1), and went to the Windows Mobile (WM).

    This kiosk had a good looking young man who was part of the product management group for WM 6.5 and very knowledgeable about the product. When I told him that I was a WM developer, he listened attentively as I explained my frustration in trying to program the WM6 smartphone camera to work. His smile faded as he explained that Microsoft had failed to thoroughly test the OEMs for WM5, WM6 and WM6.1. As a result, the DirectShow APIs for many phones were not fully/correctly implemented. He showed me a web page - http://studierstube.icg.tu-graz.ac.at/handheld_ar/camera_phones.php - that explained the problem phones. Then I asked, "will this be fixed in the coming 6.5 release?" He shook his head and replied, "no, not until WM7." I thanked him for his candor and moved onto Live Search.

    At Live Search, a bright young man was touting the performance of their latest version and let me test it against Google, where it seemed to respond comparably. He talked about how his group was trying to get other parts of Microsoft to use their Live Search instead of their own, "an uphill battle." At that moment, another person walked up and asked a question, prompting him to pull out his iPhone. I reached out with my WM phone and joked, "wouldn't it be more politically correct to show this?" He responded, "oh, no. Most of my friends at work have iPhones. It's OK."

    The problems documented by Daniel Wagner's web page (above) and unmentioned on microsoft.com or msdn.com cost us three months of development time. I should have suspected; mea culpa. Our application now runs on iPhone, and we are not looking back.

    BTW, the Microsoft coffee table looks like a giant iPhone.