Nearly 40 million copies of Windows Vista have been sold in the first 100 days following its release, more than twice the sales of Windows XP over the same time period, Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates said in his opening keynote here at the 15th annual WinHEC. “We have been amazed by the response to Vista and what has happened in the last 100 days. So, in the first five weeks of shipping Vista, we have matched the installed base of any other operating system provider,” Gates told several hundred attendees in an address entitled ‘Platform Innovations for Today and Tomorrow’. In addition, Microsoft said that the follow-on to its Windows Server 2008 operating system will be an interim release due to arrive in 2009.
Way….
I work with 750 people and apart from myself, I can only name 1 other person who has Vista. That person got Vista with his new laptop.
There’s a link to an older article:
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2107715,00.asp
“While Kutz declined to break down the numbers by region or even for each of the six Vista editions, he did say that sales were strong across the globe and that many of Vista’s sales came through people buying new PCs.”
“he did say that sales were strong across the globe and that many of Vista’s sales came through people buying new PCs.”
That constitutes a sale, correct? So when Linux sales start taking off due to Dell pre-loading it on their machines, will that not be considered a sale either? I guess we’ll see.
“That constitutes a sale, correct?”
Yes, but not a Vista sale but a PC sale. The Windows sale happened when the OEM bought their OEM licensed copies.
“will that not be considered a sale either?”
Presuming it will work the same way as with Windows it will not be a Linux sale.
Edited 2007-05-17 06:28
“Presuming it will work the same way as with Windows it will not be a Linux sale.”
I was being sarcastic. My point is that if Microsoft counts those in their sales numbers, everyone gripes about it not being indicative as the true numbers of Windows being sold, or that this is an underhanded way of inflating numbers.
When Linux numbers start climbing due to the same practices (for example, Dell shipping PC’s preloaded w/ Linux) those same people will start heralding the climb of Linux license sales. I can absolutely guarantee this will happen.
I’m not saying I agree or disagree with this practice, it’s just a difference between the Windows and Linux camps.
All things being equal, regardless of how the end user gets a (legitimate) copy of Windows, it’s A) money in the bank for Microsoft and B) a license sale. The license has gone from MS’s hands to the customer’s.
I was being sarcastic. My point is that if Microsoft counts those in their sales numbers, everyone gripes about it not being indicative as the true numbers of Windows being sold, or that this is an underhanded way of inflating numbers.
When Linux numbers start climbing due to the same practices (for example, Dell shipping PC’s preloaded w/ Linux) those same people will start heralding the climb of Linux license sales. I can absolutely guarantee this will happen.
For one thing, you are missing the point that this will only happen because people will realise they have a choice of Windows or Linux, and will be making it in favour of Linux. Historically that hasn’t been the case for computers preloaded with Windows, since even if you know about alternatives you usually had to jump through hoops to get them installed, assuming you were happy picking an OS made by a company that was bound to be (successfully) targetted for liquidation by Microsoft.
For another, in my mind the gripes of everyone I’ve heard who has used Vista are much more indicative than some sales numbers, especially since I’m sure a lot of those sales are OEM sales which result in unbought, unused, or returned copies of Vista lying around either in the warehouse or the home. Dell wouldn’t be bowing to pressure to reintroduce XP if that weren’t the case.
But just like the people who bring up the point that some of those Vista PC’s got wiped and had XP or Linux installed on them, you must deal with the fact that some people will buy the Linux PC because it’s cheaper (Windows license fee) and install Windows on it. I’d definitely expect this to be true for people who pirate Windows, get cheap copies/free from work, have MSDN/Technet accounts, or already own a copy of XP/Vista.
All those hater arguements against Windows work both ways.
It might very well cost about the same. You don’t pay the windows license, but on the other hand the OEM doesn’t profit from all the crapware they install on windows machines.
“I was being sarcastic.”
I figured as much.
“Dell shipping PC’s preloaded w/ Linux) those same people will start heralding the climb of Linux license sales. I can absolutely guarantee this will happen.”
Someone will probably make such a statement and I can guarantee that there will be people who make equally ludicrous statements in MS favor.
“It’s just a difference between the Windows and Linux camps. ”
No it isn’t. We dont know that yet. It *could* turn out to be a difference but predictions aren’t facts.
“All things being equal, regardless of how the end user gets a (legitimate) copy of Windows, it’s A) money in the bank for Microsoft and B) a license sale.”
Right but this is not the same as actually having Vista users. There’s not even a guarantee that all OEM licenses a company purchases will reach the users. They could end up unused if it turns out that people don’t want Vista, for example, and that wouldn’t be good for MS even though they already made money from the license sale.
The same would go for pre-installed Linux of course.
“That constitutes a sale, correct?”
This is Microsoft they have a little thing called *product activation* amongst there nasty little collection of spyware.
They know exactly how many computers Vista has been installed on and know to the exact one. And this is the solid measure of adoption rate.
I think the money they are are raking in over crippling Vista, is difficult to measure after they have crippled so badly the home/premium so there is no “WOW”(sic) left, but at least its a definite number, and you can say Microsoft is successful at getting every penny out of its monopoly. The figures can be routinely misinforming, but the truth outs.
But sales is the one thats almost meaningless, does this include vouchers for vista capable(sic), mass buying from vendors hoping for large volume sales. Special discount. We all know and expect these figures to be crooked. These figures could be 30 Million or 50 Million it still sounds an *awful* lot, but every company fiddles this figure. Software has an advantage in the fact that it doesn’t take up any shelf space. Its the worst indication of anything.
What I think is interesting in all these forums is Vista is not selling itself successfully to the technical, but its selling to an apathetic public, who don’t care whether its Vista or XP. The harsh reality is Microsoft have not generated a buzz around there product. Nobody is exited about Vista. Half a billion dollar launch and nobody cares.
Whats strange about the whole think is I’ve never cared for Vista technically. It offers me nothing. I care about DRM/Lock-in etc but I’m under no illusion that I’m the minority. It won’t kick in till later anyway, and Microsoft’s Monopoly is not going to tumble overnight. Firefox’s penetration is a good example of how a better product that is easy; free; familiar; convenient to obtain; well known. Is not dominating the market quite the reverse, and that has several advantages over Linux….but I did think that Vista would sway the general public. I looked at an article and it was comparing Vista with Ubuntu, and the thing that stuck me was Vista is *pretty* and I think pretty matters. Vista is a the first new OS for 5 years you would think that would be big news ans most use a Microsoft product many hours a day, and would be glad of a change, and I think Aero would be exciting to most users; its pretty cool.
Has the OS really just become a way to browse; write a few letters; and maybe download to an ipod. For every article I see about Vista I see 10 about the wii/xbox360/ps3 I’m beginning to believe that badvista.org etc should stop posting arguments against DRM being bad, and just have a a page that says “so what… and have link to a Stallmans Hamster doing something cute on YouTube”
You can’t track the number of Vista users by the number of activations because most volume license/enterprise versions of Vista don’t activate with Microsft. Furthermore, a large portion of the Vista user base is probably using a pirated copy… which is easy to activate by either a call to Microsoft (they’ll activate a can of tuna with no hesitation whatsoever) or by using patches around the net. And then there are the thousands of MSDN/Technet copies of Vista which don’t count as a sale but do get activated.
In short, I assure you that the number of activations means nothing.
———–
You’re also daft if you think that putting WinFS in Vista would have given it better sales. WinFS, for all intents and purposes, is a file system. A file system is not a sellable feature for the general public. Do you remember any XP ads talking up the switch from FAT32 (in Win9x) to NTFS?
” Do you remember any XP ads talking up the switch from FAT32 (in Win9x) to NTFS?”
Of course you don’t – because that switch happened a decade earlier with the introduction of NT, and of course W2K also had NTFS. Despite that, You can install and run XP on FAT32, although not recommened.
“Of course you don’t – because that switch happened a decade earlier with the introduction of NT.”
Not in the consumer line of Windows…XP was the first MS OS targeted towards consumers that supported NTFS. So the OP is actually correct.
You absolutely can track the numbers of Vista with activations. Its not like those people who used volume licenses on XP are suddenly not going to do so on Vista…this is the same group, and those *can* be counted differently, and they have those numbers.
I am tired of this Piracy Lie. Without mentioning the moaral or legal or marketing point of view. Vista is simply not as easy to pirate. Its not even easy to stay legal, and touch your machine. There are less users either capable enough to steal Vista, and its become a dangerous time for shady system builders/genuine pirates to do so, and causal copying is impossible, in all but countries where it is an acceptable passtime, and even these counties are being slowly squeezed with draconian nag screens, and crippled, but reasonably priced genuine copies, as well as interfering with governments across the globe.
…but seriously are people pirating Vista is it worth it.
With activation in short you have an accurate measurement of the success of Vista.
Do I think WinFS would get better sales…absolutely, for three reasons.
1) Vista is worse in every ay but one from XP from Network performance; Application Performance; Graphics performance from between 10-50%, Hardware support; Application Compatibility; The only thing it does better is application startup time and you need 4GB of memory to have that.
2) Windows98se is still usable today apart from three things integrated internet explorer(sic), running virus and firewall make it kill performance, and the hard drive limits of 120GB imposed in the OS.
3) It has precious little left to distinguish it from its predecessor that is worth getting. Its sold purely on buzzwords and a pretty face.
There are less users either capable enough to steal Vista
You only need one who steals a volume license copy and uploads it to megaupload or rapidshare.
problem solved for the less capable..:
http://theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=39679
no key required
exactly!
i bet you out of the 40 million 39.5 million were forced upon pc manufacturers.
its not exactly something new for Microsoft to lie.
The only reason for multi postings about the “good” sales is because it isn’t.
why keep on posting these press releases? Do I care how many copies they sell? Ditto for linux, ditto for MacOS. Am I supposed to feel all warm and fuzzy if my favorite OS is winning the PR war?
more reviews. more technical articles. more interesting OS news.
You may not care.
But the reality is that the number of users is what drives the market. So yes it is significant to OSNews.
But the number of users seems to be quite low. My website stats puts Vista far behind XP, 2000, 98, Mac OS X and Linux.
“
”
I don’t really think you can class one website’s stats as a global trend.
for example: websites specialising in geeky content (like OSNews, slashdot, etc) would have proportinately more non-windows users surfing the pages than a pop-site (such as myspace, faceparty, etc)
also (without knowing the scale of your site) if the main visiters consist of friends (who, presumably, are often like-minded), then you’re also going to have a proportinatly higher geek fanbase (thus more non-windows users) than if most of your friends were (for example) footballers.
I personally would be more interested in seeing the collated web-stats from a variety of the leading search engines as they’re quantity of hits would be high as well as being relatively unbiased towards a specific computer user type (ie google is used by both geeks as technophobes alike)
Edited 2007-05-17 12:02
Yeah, I’m gonna have to back you up on that one. my site’s stats are as follows:
Windows XP 61.07%
Mac OS X 14.70%
Linux 9.54%
Windows 2K 5.81%
Server 2k3 5.37%
BeOS 1.78%
Win Vista 0.98%
Windows 98 0.76%
So, if I’m doing my math correctly and there are 40M Vista users out there, then there are 72.65M BeOS users! Damn! And I thought there were only a few of us left
Seriously though, 40M sales != 40M users.
I love seeing raw numbers being thrown out at people…
At $100 a copy on average (yes, I know list price is higher, but you can shop around), this represents $4 billion in income for Microsoft. In other words, this represents about 1/8th of Microsoft’s normal total yearly income (including Office, XBox & XBox Live, games, and enterprise). About 80% of the $5 billion development costs of Vista have been paid back (at this rate, another 3-4 weeks or so will do it).
Assuming there are 200 million users in America with computers (I couldn’t find authoritative figures), and that half of those copies of Vista sold in the US (which is rather pessimistic, considering the America-centric distribution of the Internet’s users and resources), then Vista has about 10% of the US marketshare. It’s not quite replaced XP yet, but it’s still more widely adopted than Mac OSX, and… well, pretty much everything else out there. It’s still the younger brother, but I think it’ll pass its older sibling in time for Service Pack 1.
But then again, what do I know? It’s like Mark Twain said.
Its not $100 dollers on average, Its $400 on average. in the UK and higher in other parts of Europe. Check amazon.co.uk.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Microsoft-Windows-Vista-Ultimate-PC/dp/B000…
Ultimate down from $700+ to $600. Although you can get it with Office Ultimate for $1500
what a bargain.
BTW I bought 2 usb network adapters, a wireless router/modem + 4 ports switch; 320GB hard drive; 4GB memory stick; 1 20X DVD writer; 1 8x notebook DVD writer…and a Microsoft Wired Laser Mouse amd still have enough left over to buy this mythical $100 copy of Vista. Rather than a Heavily Discounted version of Vista Ultimate.
Please could you show me where in the UK I can get a non crippleware copy of Vista for $100.
Edited 2007-05-16 23:52
what a bargain.
Fact: The vast majority of people obtain their operating system preinstalled on a new PC.
Which means that, contrary to your assertion, there are very few people actually paying retail prices for Vista.
“Fact: The vast majority of people obtain their operating system preinstalled on a new PC.
Which means that, contrary to your assertion, there are very few people actually paying retail prices for Vista.”
I didn’t realize that that Vista was *free* to OEM’s. This is a revelation to me, and with those adware supported programs they must be cheaper.
I wonder why companies like Acer are complaining that Vista Home is so crippled nobody wants is. Especially as its *free*
Could you show me how to get my *free* copy of Vista
He said no one pays retail price for Vista, not the no one pays. Most large OEMS pay a tiny fraction of retail for their Vista license.
I didn’t realize that that Vista was *free* to OEM’s. This is a revelation to me, and with those adware supported programs they must be cheaper.
I never claimed it was free. What I said was that nobody pays retail. OEMs certainly don’t — and neither do the people that buy their PCs, either.
I wonder why companies like Acer are complaining that Vista Home is so crippled nobody wants is. Especially as its *free*
Keep flogging that strawman.
Could you show me how to get my *free* copy of Vista
See above. And consider taking a fundamental course in logic.
Dwight Shrute?
By cyclops (2.52) on 2007-05-16 15:41:52 PST in reply to “Putting 40 million into per…”
Its not $100 dollers on average, Its $400 on average. in the UK and higher in other parts of Europe. Check amazon.co.uk.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Microsoft-Windows-Vista-Ultimate-PC/dp/B000…..
Ultimate down from $700+ to $600. Although you can get it with Office Ultimate for $1500
what a bargain.
BTW I bought 2 usb network adapters, a wireless router/modem + 4 ports switch; 320GB hard drive; 4GB memory stick; 1 20X DVD writer; 1 8x notebook DVD writer…and a Microsoft Wired Laser Mouse amd still have enough left over to buy this mythical $100 copy of Vista. Rather than a Heavily Discounted version of Vista Ultimate.
Please could you show me where in the UK I can get a non crippleware copy of Vista for $100.
Vista Home Premium, OEM, which is exactly the same as the retail version, and which inviduals may purchase
* US: $111.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16832116202
* UK: £72.98
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Microsoft-Windows-Vista-Premium-OEM/dp/B000…
Similarly for Vista Ultimate:
* US: $189.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16832116213
* UK: £122.48
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Microsoft-Windows-Vista-Ultimate-OEM/dp/B00…
Exchange rate=1.9163 source http://www.onlinefx.co.uk/fx/Stores/OnlineFX/exchangerate.asp
Thank you for your figures, although don’t bold stuff. I notice you didn’t go for basic or retail. I wonder why.
Vista Home Premium crippled US: $111.99; UK $138.24
Vista Ultimate crippled :US: $189.99; UK $235.2
I would say that it costs more in the UK even on the items with the smallest price differences and even these numbers are a *long* way from most Americans paying $100 for a copy of Vista.
From the ad…
This software is not intended for purchase or installation by consumers. Click here for licence details and system builder obligations by manufacturer.
Yeah, that is a real bargain.
He said average, and it’s pretty easy to say it is 100$. Why because most of the Vista’s sold are OEM, 2 biggest selling versions are Business and Home Premium. Keep mind that big vendors don’t pay same OEM price you pay on shop which is little over 100$ on each for normal consumers. And I can’t even want to guess how cheap volume licensing might be, keep mind in this sector it highly depens what kind a package deal you make. And again it’s pretty easy to say that vendors and big business are about 90% of Vista sale, very few people actually buy normal Vista from shops. Even i bought much cheaper OEM version (Premium) costing 100€! So go newegg, search for Vista OEM and you see it’s 112$, and then start posting FUD.
“He said average, and it’s pretty easy to say it is 100$. Why because most of the Vista’s sold are OEM, 2 biggest selling versions are Business and Home Premium. Keep mind that big vendors don’t pay same OEM price you pay on shop which is little over 100$ on each for normal consumers. And I can’t even want to guess how cheap volume licensing might be, keep mind in this sector it highly depens what kind a package deal you make. And again it’s pretty easy to say that vendors and big business are about 90% of Vista sale, very few people actually buy normal Vista from shops. Even i bought much cheaper OEM version (Premium) costing 100€! So go newegg, search for Vista OEM and you see it’s 112$, and then start posting FUD.”
My First Point
==============
I actually liked your post. I won’t even take it as a personal attack. I always find the use of the word FUD lacks any real style.
I use a seven year old computer. It even had windows98 on it for a time. Its not really 7 years old. Just over time I’ve replaced the motherboard, or case, or speakers. been through a CD writer/DVD writer/DVD rewiter, upped my memory twice, put in a TV card. I’ve been through 3 cases and now have a sff. It has moved from a pentium3, had countess hard disks either die, replaced with higher capacity or simply move from ide to sata. etc etc. Computer components are cheap even for anything other than the cutting edge. The reason I made the full time switch to Linux was because Win98 could not support over 120GB. I would have needed a *retail version* of XP to do this. I bought a magazine with a disc on and installed Linux. I simply found no reason to use XP.
I am not alone in this, if you go down to your local newsagents. One of the largest sections is geared towards computer magazines, each one driven by the advertising of computer parts. If you go along your local high street anywhere you will get at least computer shops, fairs selling computer bits. Whole streets dedicated to selling computer parts. Superstores dedicated to people like me. This is without all niche users of multiple CPU; PVR; mini-itx; pc gamers who have been pushed out.
The only people who do this now without Linux. Are those that have access to spare, legally dubious product keys. And those who are happy to steal. Vista is slowly closing these options. Look at the initial backlash against Vista’s EULA that has slowly changed over time to make some compromises. I’m not sure whats changed but the requirements are deliberately vague, and confusing. There are actually semi-offical ways of getting around using an upgrade disk which I think is appalling.
The *only* way I can sensibly upgrade my machine today is having a clean install, and getting new hardware to be viable is treat the computer as a *disposable* item, by simply buying a new *cheap* computer every two years.
Everyone here knows that buying a computer that *will last* is just nonsense. The only way for me use a microsoft platform is to expensively buy Vista OEM over and over again. It is simply something insane
My Second Point
===============
Vista has turned Microsoft into a car salesman, we all know how a car is sold. They put the base price in the window to get you in the store, but you discover it doesn’t have metallic paint, but have a cassette player and wind up windows. Which nobody wants.
The reality about XP home and XP pro for business is the names actually made sense. Home was so right for…well home use I was actually surprised that people thought there was any real benefit from.
Now Vista is a different beast. All the adverts on TV show the flashy interface, all the reviews show this fancy technology that allows you to encrypt your drives…etc etc, but you get none of those things. Look at the sales NOBODY is buying home basic, because its crippleware.
How Microsoft have manged to get away with this as a Monopoly is a disgrace.
These two things have made to Maximize profits by forcing the consumer to re-purchase an item they *bought* repeatedly over and over again…and the most expensive ones. You get less value than you did with XP no wonder they are posting record profits…and Vista has no gains over XP so you really are buying the same thing again for the next 6 years.
The retail version of Vista Ultimate is $700 and that license is still pretty limiting, and I haven’t even mentioned Office.
I think it is an outright offensive *lie* that Vista costs $100. I am appalled that a company can act in such a fashion, and nobody seems powerful enough to stop them, becuase they literally are above the law.
If you really truly think that the Microsoft OS is only $100, you clearly should not be posting here. I actually believe you are lying on behalf of Microsoft.
OEMs pay somewhere in the area of $25 per license, so those revenue figures you calculated are at least 3 times higher than the amount they really made (taking into account that the majority of Vista sales are through OEMs). That puts them just a little over the $1 billion they owe Alcatel/Lucent for that totally ridiculous MP3 lawsuit.
I thought that the Vista development cost was closer to $10 billion than $5 billion. They probably spent $100 million just on protocol documentation for the EU. It’s expensive being Microsoft. If they keep having to offer $3 Windows licenses and other strategic pricing programs to compete with Linux, they won’t be able to afford their abusive monopoly tax.
Besides, it’s well known that Microsoft front-loads their launch revenues by booking volume licensing deals that the OEMs will take many months to sell through. Novell will do the same with their voucher sales to Microsoft, except Microsoft is already running out of those due to stronger than expected demand.
I’d be surprised if Vista reaches 15% desktop marketshare by the end of the year. That means they can’t get 17% of their installed base to upgrade to an OS they spent 6 years and more than $5 billion developing within a year of its release, despite the fact that the OEMs are hardly offering anything else. Is everything really as good as you claim over in Redmond?
Edited 2007-05-17 00:55
If you are market share of install base for OS’s
1 billion computers worldwide. So have reached if these PC’s 4% in 6 monthsish. Ignoring vouchers etc.
on current adoption it should be 13 years before it has the same kind of adoption XP has.
Oh course things could look up with service pack1(sic); home server; DirectX 10 games+halo+games shop. etc etc.
But currently obsolescence through virus and spyware is driving Vista’s sales.
How do you figure..?
4% in 6 months..
8% in 12 months..
16% in 18 months..
32% in 24 months..
64% in 32 months..
100% in 38 months..
Now obviously 100% Vista isn’t going to happen, but around 75% by 2010 seems likely. That would be more in-line with how XP performed, because XP had somewhat fewer copies per computer out after 4 months but sure didn’t take 13 or even 6 years to get 75% of the OS market. If XP’s growth was exponential, Vista’s will be too especially if so far Vista is out-doing XP.
4% in 6 months..
8% in 12 months..
16% in 18 months..
32% in 24 months..
64% in 32 months..
100% in 38 months..
I have never had as much fun as looking at these figures. Growth is linear not exponential. People replace there computers every 5-6 years, and yes it *did* take xp 6 years to get 75% of the desktop market.
XP
84% 2007
83% 2006
73% 2005
65% 2004
growth is a little over 10% a year which is what you expect. Till it hits saturation, and actually adoption slows not *doubles* every year
Edited 2007-05-17 03:11
“which is rather pessimistic, considering the America-centric distribution of the Internet’s users and resources”
You must be on a different Internet. The one we are on has it’s users centered more on Europe and Asia (Japan and Korea in particular) than the U.S.
Wow.. according to your estimate, two out of three people in the US have a computer! What a wealthy nation! And that includes every new-born, kid and grandma, etc
Also, MS does not get 100 USD on a copy, the shops actually selling it make a living on it, too. Vista must be real cheap, considering that MS is flogging it to its employees for about 25 USD (Ultimate full version DVD).
I give it to you, it doesn’t really matter whether it takes them 6, 12 or 18 month to start making revenue on it.
If you want proof that Vista sales suck: MS will kill off XP on 31 Jan 2008 – that’s a good half year, and there are still so many drivers and updated apps lacking. People don’t want it, period.
…the news is they are selling Ultimate.
How every you bend the figures Monopolistic products sell. Whats interesting is the crippleware versions aren’t selling, becuase they offer nothing over XP Home.
source http://www.softwareinreview.com/cms/content/view/77/
“Home Basic: Ultimate minus BitLocker hard drive encryption, full system backup, the ability to join a domain, user group policy support, Windows Fax and Scan, shadow copy, corporate roaming, the offline files and folders feature, Remote Desktop, Windows premium games, scheduled backups, network backups, Windows Aero, Media Center, Flip 3D navigation, Windows Meeting Space, tablet PC support, SideShow, DVD Maker, and high definition (HD) support for Windows Movie Maker.”
Now look at that wiki entry someones bound to post and looks whats left.
“many of Vista’s sales came through people buying new PCs”
Precisely. If Vista wasn’t bundled with new PCs, then the total sales figure would be far far less.
And what about those people that busy Vista laden PCs then wiping the HD clean to go back to XP?
And what about those people that busy Vista laden PCs then wiping the HD clean to go back to XP?
I just had to help my friend do exactly that..she thinks Vista is prettier than XP, but well, Vista wasn’t too stable and it was dog slow. And it was a brand new machine :O So, although it was quite a hurdle to go back to XP, XP just flies on the new machine and doesn’t suffer from the issues she had under Vista. And I strongly think she’s not the only one who will just wipe Vista and install XP.
I work for Toshiba, fixing laptops etc. I start to see more and more Vista laptops coming in, and I have noticed that the ones that have “XP Equivalents” run a lot more smoothly and seem to get things done quicker.
Even the less spec’d models in the series that run XP seem better in terms of performance when compared to the highest spec’d Vista.
Personally, I’m sticking with XP (or Linux if I have the choice).
Precisely. If Vista wasn’t bundled with new PCs, then the total sales figure would be far far less.
So what. How does that alter the fact that Vista isn’t going to be the financial failure that many Linux gloomsters tried to predict …
A lot of those copies aren’t even in use yet, most likely. They are sitting in an OEM warehouse (belonging to HP, Dell etc) waiting to be shipped to a retailer so that they can be sold to consumers.
It is selling faster than XP because there are probably more PC sales in general.
Also, there are people that wipe Vista and re-install XP.
Microsoft should boast the number of copies that are in use, not just the ones that have been sold. Sure, it doesn’t make a difference to Microsoft in terms of profit, but gives a better indication to the product’s popularity than sales figures alone.
Edited 2007-05-17 00:33
“A lot of those copies aren’t even in use yet, most likely. They are sitting in an OEM warehouse (belonging to HP, Dell etc) waiting to be shipped to a retailer so that they can be sold to consumers.
It is selling faster than XP because there are probably more PC sales in general.
Also, there are people that wipe Vista and re-install XP.”
Same is true of other OSes and yet they ain’t selling as good, but all of you are ignoring that Mac + linux fans swore vista wouldn’t sell because nobody wanted XP SP3 as they called it, and they literally meant it would tank, nobody can say that is the case, so you all were wrong again. Deal with it. Being pendatic about relative performance to the previous best selling OS also by MS is of course banale.
Edited 2007-05-17 02:13
These figures are for OEM license sales, not actual copies of Vista sold to consumers. Vista is selling 60% less in retail than XP did. Vista is already a sales flop which is why Microsoft won’t reveal license activation figures that would put the matter to rest immediately and reveal the real userbase for Vista.
It doesn’t, most Linux gloomsters were predicting that Vista was going to be a piece of shiFt and they weren’t far from the truth.
The “how-many-sold-copies” thing is inconclusive, exactly for the reason which was already mentioned: that Vista comes with new PCs. It would be interesting to know just how many of them go back to XP.
The “how-many-sold-copies” thing is inconclusive, exactly for the reason which was already mentioned: that Vista comes with new PCs. It would be interesting to know just how many of them go back to XP.
Considering that the vast majority of people don’t install OSes — they simply use whatever is installed on their PC — I wouldn’t hold my breath, if you’re thinking that people are going “back to XP”.
“Precisely. If Vista wasn’t bundled with new PCs, then the total sales figure would be far far less.”
More than Mac + linux put together though, so are you implying that Mac + linux suck more since you’re going by sales.
The problem with this is that there’s no way of actully know how many Vista new pcs that the user will replace the bundleds operatingsystem with either Xp or some linux dist
especially the linux based comuters are hard to figure out exactly how many they are since the majority of them is installed on a computer that ones came bundled with some version of windows and this dosnt show up in any sales statistics other than microsofts because of this fact.
I think that sales statistics for linux will start to rice a bit ones vendors like Dell and HP starts to offer linux based pc to the public
this howerver will not happen by itself and they need to spend some money on advertising for this to be a success.
people dosesn’t choose Vista because its good and gives a Wow -feeleing
they choose it because its whats comes preloaded on there new computer.
Microsoft still has a monopoly in the pc bussiness
Edited 2007-05-17 08:44
i know a lot of business people in my community and none of them want to make the switch to vista, i had a guy that i know (small business owner) come to me and ask if dell still sold new computers with xp because he didn’t want to make the switch to vista but he wants to upgrade his computers at his business.
point is……. most of these sales are to dell, hp, etc.. and not to enterprises……… most businesses have very little or no interest in vista.
many private parties can absorb differences in os’s, but businesses have a much harder time with that…… especially since some software simply does not run correctly on vista … mostly custom written business software.
“So, in the first five weeks of shipping Vista, we have matched the installed base of any other operating system provider,”
That’s not entirely positive to me, at least…
And BTW… Doesn’t a quote like that reek of monopoly to you?
That’s not entirely positive to me, at least…
The glass is half full. Drink it.
/Doesn’t a quote like that reek of monopoly to you?/
No, it “reeks” of reality.
They’re probably claiming predicted future sales as actual sales for this announcement.
“””
Do I care how many copies they sell? Ditto for linux, ditto for MacOS. Am I supposed to feel all warm and fuzzy if my favorite OS is winning the PR war?
more reviews. more technical articles. more interesting OS news.
“””
Yeah. Thom will mod you into oblivion and prohibit direct replies to you using his administrative access if you criticize a story he links.
You do have a point. But I would prefer to know what Microsoft is doing, and do appreciate the heads up from OSNews on the matter.
I sympathize with you that news about computer science, rather than computing politics, is more palatable, interesting, and pleasant.
Thanks for taking the time to unbury my comment.
About 1 minute after I posted it I had a -5 mod (even though the story had just been posted!).
However, I was confident the OS news community would be on the side of reason.
Me and Thom haven’t always gotten along (some SkyOS related beef). But that’s ok. I still visit this site for OS news.
I agree “some” debate is warranted, but lately I feel like news/media outlets have just been posting PR instead of useful information.
The other part of the problem is all the “number wars” these kind of posts generate. People start to throw around random percentages and “figures” to somehow prove their point.
Edited 2007-05-17 02:54
I agree “some” debate is warranted, but lately I feel like news/media outlets have just been posting PR releases instead of useful information.
You are correct. This is the result of volitile financial markets. The PC makers and retailers have been reporting slowed growth in sales and profits, and have been very busy recalculating forecasts and estimates. Many are laying off or planning workforce reductions. Last year there were higher expectations, and many were looking forward to Vista to kick the growth figures up. This didn’t happen, Christmas season sales flattened some, and the 1st quarter PC sales dumped early. The demand is driving sales back up some, but sales growth expectations are down. Vista is not showing itself to be a driving force in PC sales. There is very little if any consumer interest in Vista.
Thanks for taking the time to unbury my comment.
About 1 minute after I posted it I had a -5 mod (even though the story had just been posted!).
However, I was confident the OS news community would be on the side of reason.
Me and Thom haven’t always gotten along (some SkyOS related beef). But that’s ok. I still visit this site for OS news.
Thom should NEVER use his admin rights over personal issues. If he does, then he should be replaced.
If this world was perfect (we all know it isn’t), then sofware price would be much lower and piracy almost non-existent.
It’s fighting fire with fire. We need water, people!
Instead of wasting Billions of $$$ finding new ways to fight piracy to recoup losses incurred, they should sell software at very very reasonable price so everyone can have a legit copy.
Then by now, MS would truly have sold 40 million copies and more and the figures will be uncontested.
My 2 pennies.
…then why are many OEM’s back peddling and allowing customers to choose XP or Vista. Dell has begun doing this “due to popular demand” and so has HP. I’m an IT consultant and I can honestly say that many of my customers don’t want Vista because it won’t run some of their key software. While it’s true that Vista capable hardware drivers and software patches are forthcoming, people don’t want to wait. XP Professional is an excellent OS when properly configured. Most people see no reason to ditch it for Vista, which is unproven. I’m in total agreement with what others have posted here: If Vista sales are what Microsoft is claiming then it’s because of OEM arrangements (i.e., people obtaining Vista with new PC’s;) not because of retail sales.
Edited 2007-05-17 00:55
I think the best way to look at it is this; best case scenario, assuming that there were no driver or application compatibility issues (big assumption), there would still be issues relating to the terrible performance of applications, the expense of upgrading existing computers to it and the retail price of the operating system itself.
Want to know the interesting part – I’ve never seen the two communities, *NIX and Windows fanboys, so united over their condemnation of Windows Vista; the complete lack of improvements over Windows XP – and what is worse, within the space of time of which Windows Vista was being developed, just have a look at the alternatives – its pretty pathetic when a multi-billion dollar company can push out products which barely compete, feature wise, with free or low cost alternatives.
I really hope their investigative skills in other areas don’t equal the pathetic performance they show when it comes to technology, particularly when the word “Microsoft” comes into play.
I don’t believe this. If Mr. Gates is referring to people “upgrading” to Vista, which means individuals going to a shop and getting Vista from the shelf — no way!
If he means, people purchasing a new computer that comes with Vista and individuals specifically buying the OS from the shelf, then, when combined together – that it might possibly make sense.
Edited 2007-05-17 01:24
40 million copies, WOW, something does not sit right with that quite amazing number … that amount just sounds way too high .. either that or i need to get in the monopoly business quick smart as i cant believe that many would sell so quickly given all the less than sterling press… 40 million in a few months WOW… when does saturation occur, how many more do they have to sell, not give away free with new HW purchases, but sell, before we are all using it …. am i using it now and just dont know it ? I must be if 40 million have been shipped for a fee … Not wanting to call them liar’s but they make it hard !
Market shareish
http://www.pegasus3d.com/total_share.html
40million Vista licenses sold in 7 months when there is 200 million PC’s sold every year is not unbelievable. Even with fudging of statistics. Early adopters, Large License purchases and 100 other reasons. To bump figures.
Whether this is an “amazing” response to Vista is another matter, becuase how do you measure the *success* of a monopoly product.
If I was cheating I would argue that the growth of Linux/MacOSX is an indication of it not being, although it is unfair to include Linux as its really come of age over the past couple of years. Whereas Apple has always had the “WOW” factor and their competing OS is delayed!?
>>how do you measure the *success* of a monopoly product.
Its not about success, there is no disputing this OS will be very successful, it will be by default … my way of measuring is lets count till receipts, which of the current system owners went out an bought a copy of vista ? … That will give true picture of numbers sold, not magic numbers like 40 million in 7 months by companies like Dell et al saying we plan on selling 1 million pc’s this year, ill have 1 million preinstall discounted OEM licences please. That figure only adds to the propagada figure .. not the i want one of those figures .. which to me is what the sensational title eludes to. 40 million Vista copies sold …
Great. Another ******** upgrade cycle on my remaining windows servers. I feel a migrane coming on.
I have never had as much fun as looking at these figures. Growth is linear not exponential. People replace there computers every 5-6 years, and yes it *did* take xp 6 years to get 75% of the desktop market.
Actually I think growth is exponential. To make the calculation easier, suppuse 50% the people by product per year. What do we get:
First year: 50%
In the second year, 50% of the remaining people by the product, thus:
Second year: 75%
In the third year 50% of the remaining people by the product
Third year 87.5%
And so on.
This is of the form 1 – exp(-x) which is exponential.
This is of the form 1 – exp(-x) which is exponential.
With your figures *if* we were talking about install base not copies sold at $40 million. Vista is going to top at about 13% of market share by the time Vista “second chance” comes around.
I think it will be in the region of 30%, with most of Vista’s growth coming from Disposable machines, because in reality even old machines have more than enough power to do just about anything most people really want. I do think Linux has a real chance at making some headway as a *fix* for broken windows, you can see Ubuntu making this process easier.
I do believe that Microsoft are not generating a good vibe around Vista, they get a few chances at it with “Home Server”; Xbox360+Vista Cross Console PC Gaming; Couple of failed products marketed as successful.
But I do think people forget esp those that post that *depressing to read* wiki entry of whats new in Vista and lets face it Vista Premium. How much supposedly cool stuff was dropped. Does anyone remember the 4 pillars/columns whatever that we were promised, before the term got twisted and then dropped, because they were so late in releasing…well anything.
source : http://www.cnet.com.au/software/operatingsystems/0,239029541,240054…
If this vaporware was to appear in Vista second chance in 2009 maybe there would be a accelerated migration to Vista. In the meantime the cool stuff seems to happen elsewhere. Ubuntu is looking a popular alternative to the digg generation seeking a more satisfying computing experience and Apple is looking cool with a phone of all things(we can probably guess what the next ipod is going to look like…you probably can’t call on it)…and maybe a new OS sometime.
Edited 2007-05-17 07:33
not sure, maybe they are breaking records. However, I haven’t seen many Vista’s around. Just heard of one person having it at home. And thinking of moving it, or at least, dual booting with XP. It is a girl, so she kind of likes new eye candy and all, but has an older machine, so hates the speed.
No doubt there will be a lot of Vistas around, people buy their comp with OS preinstaled. However, here (european country) there are some higher than expected and usual movements to Linux desktop in some big companies. Which is also nice. I don’t want MS to dissapear, I want more balance on the market.
as a direct result of this…
or is the anti-virus sw included by default in Vista?
<old quote>
A new report from PC Data is reporting that 250,000 copies of Windows Me have been sold in U.S. stores in the first four days. According to the report, Windows 95 and 98 sold 600,000 copies in stores in their first month, which puts Windows Me on track to sell more than 400,000 units by the end of this month.
<end old quote>
Where did ME end up? In the big green metal storage container out back – thats where!
.. well, probably totally OT, but I wanted to share my opinion with the one eye-candy feature I was really interested in, but which turns out to be useless to me.
I don’t know how this is termed in English, but I am referring to the function that will cascade the open app windows one after the other so that you can flip through them with the mouse wheel.
I like the idea and the looks, but I don’t use it because accessing it isn’t ergonomic and hinders my work flow.
In order to call this fuction it seems to me that I have to click the button in the task bar. So first, I have to mouse down into the left corner, flip through the pages and click. – That takes too long compared to Alt+TAB (or is this also tied to a hot key?) Also, clicking anywhere on to the Desktop doesn’t give me the desktop but the window in front position of the cascade. It takes way longer to access the window I actually want and has virtually no benefit over Alt+TAB – anybody agree? I like the looks but using it is not so cool as I had thought. Well, I am heavily using the key board, it is so much faster than with the mouse, eg Browser F5/6, Windows + D/E/R, etc…
or is this also tied to a hot key?
Windows key+tab.
I don’t believe this for a second.
– First Bill and Steve tried to claim that Vista was the most secure OS ever (then replaced “OS” with “Windows”)
– Then Bill tried to sell Vista’s new features as if they were breakthroughs or groundbreaking stuff never ever seen before in any OS (no comments…)
– Then we have Steve claiming the Zune is doing well and has taken “20% to 25% of the high end of the market” (what a joke!)
– Then Microsoft claims Linux violates MS patents (but they don’t want to get in to details)
– Steve even tried to claim that Windows Mobile has the majority of the Mobile OS market (have they ever head of Symbian?)
Who believes them anymore?
Who cares about this number ? not as if it is coming from a reliable source. It is also an uninteresting number on account of the oem deals. The really interesting number is the one that MS isn’t coming out with. I.e. the number of retail sales
I’m sure ms make the distinction between oem and retail. and I am sure they must have numbers (hmm then again, don’t attribute a conspiracy when mere stupidity suffices). So why not factor in market size and pricing to show what the relative retail numbers are ?
I sell copies of GNU/Linux and I just sold 900 gajillion copies in three days!!!
There, I can do it too.
Damn, you sold seven more than me
Of course Windows will have 40 millions of copies…cracked !
Pirates release fully cracked Vista install
http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=39679
The NoPE release has a major key difference to other previous pirated copies of Vista – it is completely cracked, the product appears activated, updates work, and no key needs to be entered, straight from the installation media without any effort on the part of the pirate.
We presume that the hackers have managed to replace the Vista image on the DVD, with the pre-cracked version. Microsoft moved to an image-based install with Microsoft Vista, as opposed to the usual convoluted set up process.
Several readers have reported it working perfectly.
“Dog bites man” – that’s not news
“Man bites dog” – now, that’s news