Comments on: Windows 7 giveth, and taketh away

By: Frenetic

Frenetic — Tue, 05 May 2009 06:01:25 +0000

One reason I heard suggested for the lack of virtual XP in the “lower tiers”, is that this is due to the fact that most games don’t work in the emulator, so a lot of home users will just be disappointed, and a drag on Customer Support.

Apparently the idea for the emulated Windows XP was just so businesses would be encouraged to upgrade; they had no aspirations beyond that, because this is Microsoft we’re talking about.

By: kinjalkishor

kinjalkishor — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 09:13:13 +0000

Pay Pay Pay for the fat guy or take some hassle and go cheap with Ubuntu. Thopugh if casual people take the final hassle and go Ubuntu then Microsoft is going to have lots of pain to lure them back. May be then it will have to offer a unified good Os at dirt cheap. hee hee.

By: kinjalkishor

kinjalkishor — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 09:10:49 +0000

I really had liked this feature in every release of windows, and that would have been a far more sane choice as u say. Really casual users also need this feature not buisness users only, a big reason why Windows XP Professional became the standard edition almost everywhere. Same is going with Win7 also as it looks like.

By: Steve

Steve — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 09:39:09 +0000

Sure, but I’m saying if that’s their target, they have a serious fight on their hands regarding bare-bones machines. I personally don’t think they can win in the ‘stripped down’ market, because Ubuntu netbooks do it cheaper. I think they would be far smarter to have a single version of the client OS, like OS X, that says here: have everything for a simple price, it does what it says on the tin. No ‘you can use X and Y, but you have to upgrade to get Z’. Honestly, why would people who are not already on the Windows gravy train buy a stripped-down Windows when they can get bare-bones functionality cheaper elsewhere? Especially as they migrate more and more of what they care about to the web?

I think MS is making a serious mistake with this. The way to get new people onto Windows is to give them value added features, not to try to compete with the race to the bottom on pricing / functionality. I seriously do not think they can differentiate themselves in that market. All they’ll probably do is to drive piracy of the more expensive versions.

By: KungFooMasta

KungFooMasta — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 00:39:42 +0000

Steve, you’re not considering all the people who don’t have a PC, or aren’t familiar with computers. I forgot the statistic, something like 6 billion people on the planet, only a few billion are using computers, so that leaves a few billion more to target. As Asi said in first post, they are trying to disneyfy everything and make it simple as pie to use. You can’t assume everybody uses computers because your circle of contacts uses computers.. you need to think on a worldwide scale.

By: Jason

Jason — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 05:12:29 +0000

Easy, its the carrot to upsell people to the $$Ultimate$$ Edition.

By: Steve

Steve — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 13:31:06 +0000

Indeed, and it sounds good. So why not make it standard?

By: Joe

Joe — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 05:44:12 +0000

I have heard this framed as the perfect way to secure adoption of Windows 7 by the businesses. Now if they have legacy applications they don’t have to worry about updating them during the switch.

By: Asi

Asi — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 02:27:00 +0000

Yeah, fair enough

By: Steve

Steve — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 18:08:26 +0000

Sure, but one thing I’ve learned is that Mom & Pop with their machines over the years have accumulated a lot of stuff which they don’t like losing, and don’t necessarily want to buy new versions of just because they got a new OS on their swanky new laptop. It really pisses them off in fact if they can’t use their 6-year old application that they’ve never bothered to upgrade – precisely because they *are* such casual users, and don’t upgrade all the time like us enthusiasts – if something works and they like it, they’ll keep the damn thing for years! I’ve experienced this with the Vista “upgrade” process already, and this XPM would just solve it outright. Except that not everyone will have it.

It’s not like they’re selling Windows into a virgin market anymore, these so-called casual users have legacy issues just like business users. And if they’re going to be forced to start from scratch, well, why not go buy an Ubuntu-based netbook instead if it’s cheaper and they only do photos, web and email? This is the risk MS run by taking their market for granted. They shouldn’t be trying to compete directly with the bare-bones, do only the rudimentary basics market, because they will lose against the cheaper netbooks that don’t have the MS tax. A cheaper, standard Windows client OS would put them way back in the driving seat again (its where they started), I really don’t know why they continue to let others whittle it away from the both ends (Ubuntu at the bare-bones netbook end, OS X at the do-everything end).