Windows XP: the invincible OS
By Davey Winder in Editorial
Posted in Blog, Windows, Microsoft on
Good news for consumers and business customers alike who would not touch Vista with a slow-running barge pole, bad news for Microsoft which is already touting the wonders of Windows 7. XP simply refuses to die, and Microsoft appears unable or unwilling to turn off the life support…
On April 15th 2007 I penned a story suggesting that the death of Windows XP should be accompanied by an epitaph of good riddance to insecure rubbish. In that same piece I reported how Microsoft had set a date of February 2008 to “kill off XP.”
It seems I may have been premature, as Microsoft really just does not seem to have the stomach to kill XP. This is not all that surprising, especially when you have the likes of Intel flicking the V’s at Vista. Just three short months ago an Intel insider (geddit?) revealed that the company had decided against upgrading to Vista after a “lengthy analysis by its internal technology staff” suggested the costs and potential benefits of making the switch were simply not worth it.
Nonetheless, Microsoft ploughed ahead with the official death to XP strategy and announced it was dead on June 30th when the OS would no longer be available to the likes of Dell and HP, and shrink-wrapped distribution would also cease. Shame then, that at the very start of July I was able to reveal that Dell was introducing a Windows Vista Bonus package for its buyers: the bonus being that your computer came with XP pre-installed instead of Vista.
XP just will not die for one simple reason, well two actually. Firstly there is a genuine demand in the market for an OS which is not as resource hungry as Vista yet is still Windows based. That OS demand is met by XP and not anything else, not even Linux which still frightens off the masses. Secondly, there is the reason for that demand. Which, and I’m sorry about this Microsoft, really does come back to the fact that Vista has just not made a compelling case for itself. It demands too much raw power to perform its magic, and even then you end up feeling like you have paid for Derren Brown and got Paul Daniels.
Which is why Microsoft OEM partners have been able to continue selling XP, with the no doubt begrudging blessing of Microsoft. The get-around is by way of selling a Vista PC with XP in the box and the ability to ‘downgrade’ by way of the supplied recovery disc. Seems quite apt really that you can recover from Vista and end up with XP.
Microsoft apparently had decided that OEMs could continue doing this until the end of January 2009, but under pressure has now caved in and given them an additional six months.
Of course, the fatal bullet could come from Microsoft itself when it releases the much talked about Windows 7 OS. If you cannot wait until the first half of 2010 when Windows 7 is slated for delivery, then you could always try a legit free copy this month as Microsoft is giving away pre-beta builds at PDC and WinHEC if you happen to be attending.
Rated: 68% (5 votes)
Loading ...Comment by Jiffy Whiffer - October 6, 2008 on 12:53 pm
Makes perfect sense to me.
Comment by Rex - October 6, 2008 on 1:24 pm
Exactly what is it that makes you believe that Windows 7 will be one iota better than XP?
Comment by gyut - October 6, 2008 on 1:31 pm
hghghg
Comment by T - October 6, 2008 on 5:37 pm
I’m sticking to my slimmed-down, super-fast, performanced-tweaked TinyXP
Comment by Gabe - October 6, 2008 on 6:00 pm
Microsoft is in a very difficult position here. Continued XP support makes it that much harder to move their technology forward. But they can’t kill it by force because backwards compatibility is probably Microsoft’s biggest selling point compared to Apple or Linux. Microsoft wants customers to spend lots of money, but they don’t want to force such a massive re-investment that Linux merits serious consideration. No matter what they do, the reality is that operating systems are mostly commoditized, it’s going to be increasingly difficult to build any new OS-level features that anyone finds compelling, especially when security and stability lag behind open source.
Comment by penguinv - October 6, 2008 on 10:40 pm
haha, Linux is getting better as Ubuntu. And you can boot it from a usb flash drive to try it painlessly and better than using a CD (faster too)
Microsoft fears consumer wrath. I use XP I like XP and I will not get moved up. I do not need to buy a new computer. I run 3 computers. 2 are XP. The old Pentium 3 (it’s really too slow for windows and though I have the legal number for using 200 pro or XP for it, a disk costs $200. That’s just wrong.)
I installed Ubuntu on it. (First used an Ubuntu CD to save the data from the hard drive onto a flash drive or a floppy - easy.) Then (shrugs) I installed Ubuntu on it to see how it went. Wow. It is faster than the newer computers. When a tab takes long to load (It comes with Firefox.) I can switch to another. Windows won’t do that very well. It has been much less overhead for me. So far I am very pleased with Ubuntu linux.
Comment by Umar - October 6, 2008 on 11:46 pm
xp wil never die!
Pingback by links for 2008-10-06 at DeStructUred Blog - October 7, 2008 on 2:01 am
[…] IT PRO: Blogs: Davey Winder: Windows XP: the invincible OS (tags: IT Windows) […]
Comment by Keith - October 7, 2008 on 6:18 pm
Much better to upgrade from Vista to XP or better still forget Vista & use Ubuntu i use XP Pro & Ubuntu [dual boot] Best of both worlds.
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