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."

Comments

You can pry XP from my cold, dead hands

[Atomic Fro]

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.

Re:You can pry XP from my cold, dead hands

[Tharkkun]

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.

Until the first big virus hits that exploits a security hole that won't be fixed. When you realize you machines that can't be patched and will continuously be infected you may think differently about corporate security.

Re:You can pry XP from my cold, dead hands

[gulikoza]

So what? I still have SP2 machines working just fine. It prints receipts to the customers the same as the first day it was installed. Never patched it. The users working on it are limited and IE is prohibited with the GPO (employees have better work than surf on Facebook). LAN obviously is firewalled, not that this machine (and others similar) need to access the 'net. The only problem would be, if there was a domain wide virus that somebody would bring in with a laptop. However, that hasn't happened in the past 10 year. In my experience 95% of the "viruses" are crap people install themselves ("DHL sent me this packet, but I can't open the confirmation on my e-mail" "Are you expecting to receive something?" "No...why?"). No patches help that, unless it would patch the user, but then I'd be out of work... I have Win 98 as a retro machine here...connected to the Internet, running latest w9x supported firefox (3.6 I belive?), no AV (it's just p3-600). It won't get automagically infected as soon as it's turned on...why would it be?

Wishful Thinking

[rudy_wayne]

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.

Re:Wishful Thinking

[Anonymous Coward]

Many large institutions cannot legally continue using an out of support operating system.

#define Win7 XP

[Anonymous Coward]

Win7 is the new XP.

Wrong question

[Jawnn]

The better question is how many people did not buy a new PC precisely because Windows 8?

Re:It'll do a lot for pre-installed Linux too...

[fredprado]

Considering MS Office versions have been increasingly different from each other, I don't think it is easier anymore, from a training perspective to keep using MS programs. I mean, if you will have to train all your employees to use Office 2010, 2012, Blue or whatever, why not train them to use Libreoffice and get done with it?

MS "relents" on the corporate side

[davidwr]

So unless MS relents and lets people get some boxes with Win7

"Pro" versions of Windows 8 come with downgrade rights. Many businesses have been "buying" Windows 8 Pro but installing Windows 7.

Re:Well, I guess that's one way ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Would you use a circa 2001 ver of linux or macos?

I run debian stable you insensitive clod!

Re:It'll do a lot for pre-installed Linux too...

[Mike Frett]

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.

Re:It'll do a lot for pre-installed Linux too...

[LordLimecat]

Unfortunately for you that is not true. There are very few features that are better in MS suits, and the vast majority of people does not use them.

Footnotes. Endnotes. Pagination. Cell merge. Conditional formatting. Macros. Anything at all related to powerpoint. Mail merge.

I could go on, but these arent niche features.

Re:It'll do a lot for pre-installed Linux too...

[mcrbids]

As a programmer I rarely have to deal with the types of document scenarios you paint.

However, my wife (who is NOT a technocrat) is an honors grad student at a California State University and has been using OpenOffice for the entirety of her educational journey. She has had to give many presentations and turn in a ridiculous amount of homework papers and in all that time, has never, not once, ran into a compatibility problem.

She gives her OO Impress presentations on a shared computer running some flavor of MS Office/Power Point and has no chance to "preview" to make sure it "looked right" and has still never been disappointed. No, not even one time. I offered numerous times to buy MS Office and she declined, saying that "it works fine" and didn't want to "change anything", especially if it cost $$.

I'd happily grant that she's not getting a degree in the Graphic Arts (actually, Psych) but to say that OO gives "completely alien" results is simply absurd.