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XP's End Will Do More For PC Sales Than Win 8, Says HP Exec
dcblogs writes "Hewlett-Packard executives say that the coming demise of Windows XP next year may do what Windows 8 could not, and that's boost PC sales significantly. 'We think this will bring a big opportunity for HP,' said Enrique Lore, senior vice president and general manager of HP's business PCs. Lore was asked, in a later interview, whether the demand for XP replacement systems could help sales more than Windows 8. His response was unequivocal: 'Yes, significantly more, especially on the commercial side,' he said. Lore said 40% to 50% of business users remain on XP systems."
For the business users still running XP, I don't see them flocking to buy new Windows 8 hardware. They are still on XP because either the software they run won't run on anything else, or they are small businesses that don't have an IT budget. As long as the hardware and software works, they aren't going to go out and buy new systems.
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Hippie Logger Jock
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"Pulling the rug out from under 40-50% of our clients should really shake things up and boost sales"
This signature is false.
There is some credibility to that theory. After all, if you have to install an entirely new system anyway, it makes it easier to jump to a different OS family. especially if it has a similar UI. I hardly think the majority of businesses switching will do this, but I'm sure at least some of them will, and Linux numbers will reflect it. Hell, if you're so focusesd on saving money or maintaining stability that you've used XP for this long, something like Debian GNU/Linux might be perfect for you.
Just because XP reaches its official "end of life" doesn't mean that people will throw out their computer and go buy a new one. For most people- and businesses too - as long as existing units still get the job done there is no compelling reason to buy a new computer. The fact that Win 8 is crap is also a factor.
Win7 is the new XP.
The better question is how many people did not buy a new PC precisely because Windows 8?
Do you really think the average MS Word user is going to deal with markup to create documents in LaTeX?
Apparently wizard is not a legitimate career path, so I chose programmer instead.
I'd rather guess it will work miracles in Apple sales.
Take my dad. He's ... well, let's say not too tech savvy. But then again, all he wants is some email, some web research for his hobbies, organize his pictures and writing documents.
Ubuntu Linux is a cheaper alternative to Apple OS/X covering every use-case you've stated as relevant to your father. Then again maybe a Google ChromeBook would be the ideal solution for him if he prefers "the cloud".
Maybe it's time to buy Software Suits that are Cross-Platform eh. It's a Company's own fault for locking themselves in to one OS.
If a big virus hits that exploits a security hole that's unpatched, SOMEONE will offer a patch. I'm 99.999% certain. Why? Because regardless of Microsoft's wishes for XP to just go away, there are still too many people using it every single day (many of whom aren't even computer savvy enough to be able to tell you for sure which version of Windows they're actually using). A serious virus infection would #1, make Microsoft look really bad if they take a stance of "Too bad... we can't fix it.", and #2 would likely put entire networks at risk with the infected files getting copied onto shared drives on servers, uploaded to cloud shared storage locations, and more. It's quite possible such an infection would need an unpatched XP machine to secretly get installed in the first place, but newer OS's would have problems too if the users open attached files sent from the originally infected XP boxes.
If Microsoft stubbornly refused, some 3rd. party computer security firm would seize on the opportunity to get 15 minutes of fame with a free patch they'd circulate.
Because there are actually things that Word / Excel / Powerpoint are better at than Libre office, and few examples of the reverse.
Also, because there is still some degree of continuity within Office 2000-2013 whereby you can move between versions with substantially less headache than moving from Office 2003 to LibreOffice-- even with the Ribbon to deal with.
After writing a single term paper and trying to unravel the thought process behind footnotes / endnotes in LibreOffice, I found myself pining for Word.
Whatever you call it, people were excited about Windows XP because of what it brought to the consumer desktop, and people actually upgraded to it on purpose. Same for Win2k vs. Windows NT on the corporate side. Which upgrades since have not been dreaded? Windows 7, which is just Windows Vista Unfucked Edition. How about on the server side? I haven't had to go there in a while, thankfully. Regardless, only a few delusional cases clung to Windows 3.1, or Windows 95, but Windows XP is fairly compelling even today with its low resource requirements and unparalleled compatibility.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Long-time Linux user here. I gotta disagree. MS Office is tangibly better in a lot of ways (mostly the ones that the GP posted as a sibling to this post) than LibreOffice.
You would do the free software community a service by not trumping up free software and simply describing it as it is. LibreOffice has a lot of use cases, but Office is still a very well put together set of productivity apps.
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
- E. Debs