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Windows 8 Killing PC Sales
yl-roller writes "IDC says Windows 8 is partly to blame for PC sales suffering the largest percentage drop ever. 'As if that news wasn't' troubling enough, it appears that a pivotal makeover of Microsoft's ubiquitous Windows operating system seems to have done more harm than good since the software was released last October.' According to a ZDNet article, IDC originally expected a drop, but only half the size."
According to the original data, Apple sales dropped 7.5% as well. 's good to see that Windows 8 is killing Apple as well!
If Windows isn't working, how about trying something else guys?
The answer is staring them in the face: Set up a foundation, share the expenses of development of a Linux desktop (Ubuntu or Mint).
Ubuntu/Mint is fine, it's just making sure the manufacturers are using all compatible hardware (or writing a driver for the odd device).
Prerelease only to consortium members.
It's either that, or sink on the M$ ship.
I'm not a lawyer, but I play one on the Internet. Blog
The things that are good about windows 8 (modularity of features and some options for speedy lightweight installs, for example) are not at all apparent to most end users.
The things that are absolute fails about windows 8 are the things that are completely in your face for most users.
Features from the first group won't successfully justify the antifeatures in the second group.
All M$ has to do is fix their UI and sales will go back up.
Windows is bad enough, but Windows + Ballmer is a disaster. MS could save itself with some new management.
Organization? You must be joking..
Only thing I would suggest as an upgrade to that computer is an SSD. But that's about it. It really is amazing what an SSD can do to an older computer.
It depends on the spinning disk I suppose. I upgraded from striped 15K RPM SCSI drives. The SSD was noticeably faster, but not anything on the scale I was hearing.
I have had Windosws 8 since before it came out (somehow my school got it a couple days before release...) and I can honestly say that I wouldn't recommend this to anybody. The new start menu, without a touch screen computer, is absolutely ridiculous. I found that I would go to my desktop as soon as I started my computer, and never use the start menu, ever. Sure, startup is fractionally faster, but the interface I would give a score of 2/10. I had to make desktop shortcuts just so I don't have to navigate through the cryptic menus just to shut down or restart. Speaking of the interface, Microsoft should seriously fire the people who are responsible for this garbage. Windows 7 was amazing. It was fast, sharp, and easy to use. Now Microsoft is going in a different direction, trying to make Windows 8 too easy. Like seriously, how the fuck am I supposed to use these native apps on a day-to-day basis? The interface is obnoxiously minimalist and is WAY too much hassle for the everyday user. I have a nice chuckle every time I see the Windows 8 commercials on tv about using their Surface Pro's in a work environment. No person in the technology industry in their right fucking mind would buy one of those to use for work. Soon, I'm gonna downgrade to Win7, and I recommend everyone else to do the same. Not surprised at all that Win8 pc sales are down, it only makes sense. Shitty product = shitty sales.
I was waiting for laptops with a decent screen resolution.
Why own a large device pretending to be a smartphone, when you can just use a smart phone?
I mean, if it were set up out of the box to be used for business and, well, PC gaming out of the box, then I'd be interested in a system with Windows 8... but instead, it's an OS that is very ashamed of being a PC, and every time I access it's configuration, I'm going to see whole-screen interfaces, and other throwbacks to pre-3.1 Windows concepts that phones need to use, and for some reason are pushed everywhere in Windows 8.
Why would I use a system that is reluctant at best, to serve as an OS the way I'd like to use it? I'll stick to Windows 7 for my PC games, and I can't imaging any of the businesses I've ever worked at wanting to switch to 8 either.
But I'm sure there's some folks that like Metro. I mean, Microsoft had to be focus testing with someone - I just can't imagine who'd select that interface as the better to use.
Ryan Fenton
MIcrosoft doesn't want to fix their UI. They want to train users in their touch UI.
The tablet space is an attractive market, and Microsoft wants to use their power on the desktop to win the tablet war.
This won't win them any friends in corporate IT, but corporate IT is so tied to Microsoft that they could release the next version with MS Bob as the interface, and businesses would still be forced to buy it when they upgrade. The only reason corporate IT is slow to upgrade now is that XP (and now Windows 7) is good enough, and corporate upgrade cycles are slow. Businesses skipped Vista, and went with 7. They'll skip 8 no matter what. When they are ready to upgrade again, Microsoft can just release a "Pro" version which enables a "classic" interface, and leave regular consumers with an interface that trains them to use MS tablets.
I haven't run Win 8 and lots of folksI know haven't either. We aren't MS haters - we're pragmatists and pretty much comprise a group of users who have used every MS OS (OK Nobody ran ME) since DOS. If a company can produce a product so crappy that it does that it really makes you wonder what the hell is wrong with management.
The $64000 question is what does MS do now? The best I can think of is make the Win 8 'Aqua' style interface better - hell throw the Windows 7 UI in there. That way they could keep working on the tile based stuff but not alienate everyone.
Unfortunately they've pretty much managed to alienate a huge number of users.
I use Linux entirely for work, and Win 7 on my machines at home when I'm not running Linux. I'm thinking about a new laptop for home but don't want Windows 8. I think I'm actually going to just do Linux on that laptop now steam is available for Linux. If I need Windows I'll run it in a VM. I'm curious who else has come to the same conclusion. Windows in a VM and Linux as your main OS because Win 8 seems so crappy.
There hasn't been a damn thing in the last several years worth upgrading for. Gamers and developers aside, there has been nothing at all interesting happening in the PC world.
I'm still on a 2.0ghz C2D laptop and had no intention of upgrading anytime soon.
Except memory.
I settled on Win 7 Pro so I could cram 32GB of RAM onto my mother board. Life with Photoshop and some other hungry apps is quite a lot easier when you aren't paging like a paging fiend on national paging day.
As for the interface, I wanted to stick with familiar, not revolutionary. Win 8 reviews worried me. Generally Windows releases have departed from the previous one with less emphasis on keeping the system familiar. First things I do is turn off the Mac imitation peek, which I find extremely irritating. Gone also is the Aero/Glass look for the Classic look. I bought this to do work on, not bother me and try to look futuristic.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
You had 15k rpm scsi striped drives in a laptop? Even if you did, you should have noticed these benefits: - much faster random access - improved battery life - zero noise - no mechanical failure
No, not in a laptop. Video editing is mostly why I like having the speed. So there's not a lot of random access. I'm working with 12 GB files. Noise is definitely better. Not that I found them too loud. I used to have some Micropolis Tomahawk drives years ago. Those sounded like jet engines spinning up. You still have flash wear out on SSD drives. Most spinning disks can last a very long time too. I have a few older drives that have been spinning for close to 15 years now.
I upgraded my MacBook Pro from 4 to 8GB RAM and from a 500GB HDD to a 128SSD and it is like a new comp. It boots in 7seconds rather than 40 seconds. The SSD is what made it all the new.
I then built two desktops with the same SSD drive. All the same parts except one AMD and the other Intel. They are wicked fast because of SSD.
I used to tell folks that adding RAM would be their best speed upgrade, but now I tell them that an SSD is the best speed upgrade.
"That's right...I said it."
I have friends that ask me if I can put window XP on their new windows 8 computers. No one seems to really like it.
PCs are now like refrigerators. They are not obsolete, they are (for most people) essential household appliances. Just like your refrigerator, you don't need to replace your PC every year. Your PC may not last 10-15 years like your 'fridge, but 5 years is perfectly reasonable. Just like your 'fridge, you only need to replace your PC if it breaks, or goes out of style.
The "death of the PC" has been overhyped. The PC isn't dead, it's just mature. Sales will stabilize at a sustainable level, barring some radical innovation. I'm a little afraid that people are really going to screw up the refrigerator trying to make it into something it isn't, trying to solve a problem that is unsolvable.
OBTW, this will happen with mobile devices also. Mobile devices get beat up a little more, so they will tend not to last as long, but in the not two distant future the only legit reason to upgrade your phone/tablet will because the old one broke. I know several people still using the iPhone 3GS (4 years old).
I find that most people I switch to Linux love it. I do make sure before I switch them that they don't have any windows specific programs that they need or play games. If people just web browse and facebook then really they hardly notice anything except that the computer runs much better and faster and it doesn't require a re-install every couple of months. I'm talking computer illiterates here too. I have advised some to stay on windows though, mostly gamers.
I can't say I'm surprised. XP (or possibly Windows 7) is about as grown-up as Microsoft have succeeded in making their interface, though they're not alone. Both Microsoft and Apple have gone down the path of attempting to make their desktop UI look like a smartphone's, and all they succeed in is making it look dumb.
I often wonder what will happen first: Microsoft/Apple realising the error of their ways and making a useful UI, or users collectively sighing and sucking up the crap they are given.
Fortunately, in the *nix world, we have a choice.
People do not want or need a new OS. That's pretty much it. Hell, Win7 wasn't that big a step up, there wasn't even any compelling "must have" thing in 7 that justified going out and tossing the old crate.
You'll notice that Windows (and also the entailing hardware) sales numbers are a matter of necessity. Nobody really upgrades just 'cause MS creates a new OS. But sometimes, the new OS comes along with critical support that makes the change viable, if not necessary.
Win95 was just the big leap from CLI to GUI. Yeah, there was Win3.11 before, but it was little more than a frontend. Win95 was the big step ahead and people went and bought it because it really WAS a big step up.
Win98 was pretty much Win95 "done right". It had everything you wanted, like a working Winsock implementation. The internet became a big thing and 98 made TCP/IP connections easy.
Win2k was a bit of a hybrid of NT and 98, bringing the compatibility of 98 and the stability of NT together, so it was another big seller. And yes, I'm deliberately omitting ME. Notice how it didn't sell? Not just 'cause it was crap, but even if it had been halfway as good as 98, it didn't bring anything new that you needed. 2k also brought USB support (or at least, usable USB support...), so even if people didn't care about stability wanted to get it.
XP was a "what for?" for long for me, but it does have its advantages over 2k. Better WiFi support was one thing. A lot of other goodies, not only the improved DirectX support, was certainly part of its appeal. Security became an issue eventually, and XP saw the beginning of an attempt to secure Windows.
Vista and 7... well, they don't really bring any "must have" things to the user. Yes, the security is way superior to XP, but users don't care about such petty crap. It's not a selling point. Everything you'd want to plug into your computer already works with XP. Why upgrade?
8 has even worse problems in this area. There is no really compelling reason to step up, get a new system and a new computer (since the average user gets both at the same time). There is no "must have" feature that users want in those systems, nothing they need or at least want.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
is now the vast majority of non-business computing users.
They want:
(1) Web (95% of needs)
(2) Office (5% of needs, and even then, only at a very rudimentary level)
Didn't you notice when all of the big-box stores shut down and the software aisles at the Wal-Marts and Costcos got emptied out? Yes, there was a time when people had a shelf full of CDs and DVDs that they wanted to install on their "next computer."
Those days are long gone.
The baby boomers in my extended family are happy to be free of the complexity. They tell "remember when" stories about how hard computing used to be, and how confusing computers were before you could just do everything that you needed to do online, in Firefox (most of them switched to Firefox during its heyday and are now solidly married to it, even if other options have become competitive). Most of the things that used to be standalone applications they now do online:
- Email (Google replaces Outlook)
- To-do (Todoist, Toodledo, etc. replace Outlook)
- Calendaring (Google replaces Outlook)
- Contacts management (Google replaces Outlook)
- Personal data management (Evernote replaces the file system)
- Reference (Wikipedia replaces endless varieties of CD-ROM encyclopedias)
- Entertainment (Social Gaming and YouTube replace CD-ROM gaming and multimedia)
- Document editing (Google replaces Office)
- Digital photos (Flickr/Facebook+Smartphone replace assorted "old" consumer digital photo apps+USB digital camera)
- Music (Pandora replaces MP3 collections on hard drives)
I teach a bunch of college kids at local U, and have done now in two states over the better part of a decade. In 2006, kids showed up with Thinkpads. Now they show up with iPads.
In 2006, departmental policies often still required hardcopies of submitted work and installs of university-site-licensed educational software. These days, assignments are required to be submitted through online portals (Blackboard, Canvas, etc.) in digital form and devices like iPads are the *suggested* college study equipment. The Real Serious students get a bluetooth keyboard and the Pages app, but most of them type onscreen into Google Drive to do their work.
Seriously, the applications argument is dead—just like the PC. Specialized fields and roles will still require it, but I suspect that over time even those will go the way of the dodo as mobile devices get more and more processing power and more and more users move to them—which will tend to produce as web apps or mobile apps those things that used to be PC apps.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
They should not make MSBob the interface. They should make OneNote the interface. Have a few special tabs for IE and applications, etc. Make a USEFUL UI, instead of all this icon candy.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
People keep claiming the tablet market is drying up but every where I go they're becoming more common. I was at an annual job fair last week and I was amazed to see most of the people at the booths had tablets. Maybe one in four had a notebook. The penetration in the business world is picking up pace so far as I can tell. Touch may suck, but then again so does the QWERTY keyboard.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Corporate IT is happy with ThinPC, aka Windows Embedded Standard.
Almost.
In reality, the elephant in the room is not much bigger than your thumb.
MK809 II Android 4.1 Mini PC HDMI Dual core 1GB RAM 8GB Bluetooth MK809II 3D + Fly air mouse RC11, US$34.47 / piece
Plenty of SMEs in Asia are replacing their Windows desktops with these little gadgets plugged into a screen and USB hub with mouse and keyboard attached. They do the same job as a Windows box for a little over $35, and with far less fuss and effort to maintain.
Microsoft isn't dumb - they have more than enough clever people to see the writing on the wall for their 85% OS profit margins, in fact I doubt MS could even afford to support Windows on their share of a $35 computer. W8 is indeed a lame duck product, intended for a market that's in a race to the bottom, as will be their next PC Office product.
Microsoft HAS to migrate their customers away from Windows to survive.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
The government is deeply into free software. NSA developed Security Enhanced Linux in 2003. NASA pretty much invented cloud, with Linux. Open-source recently got recognized as "commercial product" for procurement. Of course no government supercomputer runs Windows.
Yeah, you can brag that Microsoft's plants have put in procurement provisions for Office, but the government is quickly slipping off your chains.
Help stamp out iliturcy.