Right now, the net is abuzz about remarks Steve Ballmer made at a Belgium news conference today. The buzz comes from a Reuters story which quotes Ballmer as saying that Windows XP’s life cycle might be extended if customers demand it. Contrary to what all those reports online might indicate, there really is no change in policy here.The exact quote from the Reuters article goes as follows:
XP will hit an end-of-life. We have announced one. If customer feedback varies we can always wake up smarter but right now we have a plan for end-of-life for new XP shipments.
A week ago, Ballmer had this to say about the possibility of extending Windows XP’s lifecycle:
And we have a lot of customers that are choosing to stay with Windows XP. And as long as those are both important options, we will be sensitive and we will listen and we will hear that. I got a piece of mail from a customer the other day that talked about not being able to get XP anymore. We responded, XP is still available. And I know we’re going to continue to get feedback from people on how long XP should be available. We’ve got some opinions on that, we’ve expressed our views… I’m always interested in hearing from you on these and other issues.
As you can see, little has changed. Microsoft states that it will listen to customer feedback, but that as it stands now, Windows XP will ‘end-of-life’ coming June. There’s little Microsoft can do – flat-out announcing that XP’s lifecycle will be extended yet again would be another admission that Vista hasn’t been received as well as they had hoped, which would only hurt Vista’s sales instead of help it.
And, according to Ballmer, most retailers and consumers are choosing to buy Vista, so it doesn’t seem likely – as of yet – that there will be any change of plans regarding the end-of-life of Windows XP. Don’t worry, there’s always Windows Server 2003.
So why not post 5 other messages about this world-changing issue tomorrow?
Because I think the story hasn’t been covered enough yet. It’s interesting to track down everything someone has added to this issue, or not. No boring technical details, new innovations or whatsoever, which just result in headaches.
So, Microsoft CEO ( although he’d make a fine “Chair”man )
is now saying that Windows XP could be extended?
Who didn’t see this coming?
Anyway, I’d rather have a look at the latest Linux releases ( Ubuntu Hardy Heron or Fedora 9 ) than hear
about more Microsoft BS from SB.
Good thing you’ve got money Stevie cause you’re lacking
vision, class and hair.
I’m betting that he’s looking for a way to charge a bit more for XP so he can eat his cake and have it.
MS BS from SB? I like it – got a nice ring to it.
Balmer.. what a idiot
I can give a good reason to extend XP… in one word
VISTA
well that’s what he is indirectly admitting: that vista has real problems that aren’t just in the imagination of people who dedicate their lives to be against microsoft.
From a marketing standpoint continuing to sell XP would NOT hurt they’re business if they priced it the same as the equivalent Vista’s… Then it would be win/win and the USER could speak with their wallets. “Oh it would hurt our sales of Vista” should mean **** to them and their stockholders since they could still say “Yeah, but we’re still selling XP like hotcakes” – if anything I’d say this constantly pushing the date forward is just a ploy to get wholesalers and even private users to stock up on copies of it ahead of time for quick cash in their pockets. “Order now while supplies last!”
But with so many vendors NOT having XP as an option on all configurations, shelving it prematurely all they are doing is driving the more savvy users away, likely increasing piracy (since sorry, but *nix on the desktop is still a pipedream and OSX is a tinkertoy) – Given a choice between legal XP and Pirate, I choose legal. Given a choice between Pirate XP and Legal Vista… That’s a grey area for me once the channel of XP dries up.
Not that WGA hasn’t already INCREASED piracy – I was running a pirated/hacked wga nuetered copy of XP with my LEGAL key, just so I didn’t have the headaches of calling them on the phone about my copy being ‘deactivated’ three times a week while I’m swapping out CPU’s and video cards for benchmark testing or upgrades. (I change hardware a LOT)… It’s WHY I’ve switched to a LEGAL copy of XP x64 since there is NO WGA in XP x64!!! It’s just a bonus that I get use of my full 4 megs of RAM instead of the 2.5 or so XP let me use even WITH the /3gig switch. (since I’ve got a 640 meg Ge8800GTS, a 256 meg 8400GS and 256 megs hardware mapped from my EMU Morpheus sucking down the top gig of address space)
Also why I don’t trust them as far as I can throw them with this whole ‘subscription’ rubbish. It’s a pain in the ass with Apple, It caused ‘linspire’ to fall flat on it’s face, so naturally they have to try it to combining it with their anti-piracy methods that are more likely to make saavy users use pirated copies than legit ones. BRILLIANT.
Running windows XP on 4Mb of ram must be quite a challenge.
This issue is not, IMO, about sales figures. It’s about reputation and PR. If Microsoft backtrack too much on keeping Windows XP alive, then it will be seen as an admission that Vista failed. Failed products damage a company’s reputation and as people look to upgrade [wether they need to or not], alternative OSs will be adopted.
>> Megs
Oops, Yeah, I’ve been at this so long I STILL haven’t made that adjustment. (lord help me when tb becomes more commonplace)
Could be worse, I could have said K… or even bytes. My first machine only had a quarter-k of static RAM, and that was on eight chips of 16 bits each.
I didn’t mention Server 2003 just as an amusing note. I see an opportunity here for Microsoft to silently promote Server 2003 to people who demand Windows XP. This would avoid the loss of face for Microsoft.
Just yesterday I made the switch from XP to 2003. I used to run 2003, then switched to XP (I believe I lost my 2003 disc/case with the license attached), but somehow, I never felt at home in XP. So, I downloaded the trial of Server 2003, which works for 180 days, and now I feel all happy again. It’s slightly faster than XP too.
So, 179 days left to get my hands on a cheap 2003 license
.
Yes, I agree. I tried Server 2003 for a while but a Logitech mouse driver killed the whole userland driver management.
It turns out that the same thing happens in XP too, so I may revert to 2003 again.
You may consider to try Server 2008 (free for 240 days). I installed the 64 bit version one month ago and it’s doing very good so far, even enabling Aero with all the bells and whistles. I “officially” got it to try developing on a 64 bit Windows, but World of Warcraft plays just as nice as it does in XP.
But of course that’s on my new machine, a Pentium Dual Core E2180 @ 2.5 GHz with 4 GB of RAM, and an 8600GT 512 MB. I’m mostly concerned about memory usage (takes 1 GB just to do, well, nothing), but I think it could run on much older hardware.
stestagg said….
I’ve got some bad news for you, Vista has failed. I’m not saying this because I’m someone who has ‘dedicated their live to be against Microsoft’ I’m saying it because it’s true. Look at the market’s reaction to Vista, and you’ll realize its been incredibly hostile to it.
I have never had so many End-Users come up to me and empathetically tell me they do not want Vista on their new computer, isn’t there some way they can still get Windows XP? (I show them how to order from the business side of Dell’s website and they’re happy…or I just point them towards TigerDirect..)
With Windows 2000 the benefits of jumping to Windows XP was clear–cleartype to be exact!
The transition from Win9x to WinXP was also clear, moving to an NT based kernel allowed more RAM to be used and for application crashes to occur without taking down the whole system with it…there were real benefits to the move.
That is not the case with Vista. Every Vista machine I’ve seen and used has either felt dog slow, or a veritable super computer that just managed to use all that computing power to stay where Windows XP already is…
—bornagainpenguin
you will get a Vista licence with an XP downgrade option
I thought that was already the case.
That is how the rest of their software seems to work. I tried to buy SQL Server 2000 the other day (for deploying a legacy app) and the MS sales guy told me my only option was to buy a 2005 license, then I was licensed to run any older version of the product I wanted (even if they were not supported anymore). I asked him if the same was true for all MS products and he said he was pretty sure it was.
They would rather you pay for the latest license so they can use the stats for marketing. They really don’t care if you use the actual software or not. We’ve had clients wanting to run the latest versions of MS SQL Server before our software was certified for it. So we put them on SQL Server 2000 because they had a license for SQL2k5 already.
Dell recently announced on their website that for business customers (Optiplex, Latitude lines) that they will pre-install XP Pro if you buy a Vista Ultimate or Vista Business license based on Downgrade Rights. They will provide you with a OS disk and an option to upgrade to Vista.
However, here’s the twist. Dell is only supporting the pre-installed factory image of XP. If you choose to install it yourself, then no support.
If you wipe out the pre-installed factory image of XP and reinstall using the provided disk, they won’t support you.
This is Dell’s way of providing XP to the masses, but concentrate on “encouragement” of moving to Vista.
At first, I though…oh, they’ve changed gears again. However, reading the fine print, this is worse then if they yanked it away completely.
Edited 2008-04-25 15:13 UTC
Its logical they would.
Look how many new sub-notebooks are opting to have XP installed by default.Even the OLPC is heading that route.
Makes no sense killing the goose that laying the golden eggs.
I would love to see Microsoft shut down XP immediately so all the Windows slaves will feel the Microsoft love for them (love=Vista).
For one thing…MS is already doing this with Win NT for the US government. The feds dictate to Microsoft that they WILL support NT for as long as the government sees fit to run it. Now I’m sure they’re on a timeline too, but government departments are usually the (absolute) slowest to adopt new technology than any company out there. And yes, I just compared your god and arab fearing government to a corporation….deal with it.
Personally, I feel Vista was a clever marketing scheme. Not unlike the New Coke debacle of the 80’s. Yes, I’m showing my age here. What better way to win public adoration quickly than to release a product so bad, that it makes the mindless masses yearn for the previous product. Kind of like having George Bush in office makes most (sane) people wish we still had Bill Clinton. So, it’s almost instant gratification (for Microsoft) with a win-win to boot….they release the lumbering albatross called Vista. It flounders and garners much hatred (as predicted). Then they appease the lot of us by becoming the benevolent masters they’ve always wanted us to think they are, by stepping in and “saving the world.” “Oh, we’re sorry….here’s your Windows XP back. That will be $140.00, please.” And the consumer world rejoices…..along with the shareholders. Only a monopoly could pull that stunt off and live to tell the tale.
So, let’s tally up the recent pros for MS:
– Vista finally released = Shareholders happy = Profit
– Vista pre-installed by OEMs = Microsoft Tax = Shareholders happy = Profit
– Vista hit SP1 status, which made some corporate customers adopt. = Shareholders happy = Profit
– XP gets stay of execution and continues to outsell Vista. Shareholders very happy = Mucho Profit
Ballmer is shady, I’ll give him that. He knows how to run a monopoly.
Id say its a shame that MS have to extend XP – it old and not fit for purpose. I wouldnt wont to by a new PC with XP – and Ive got 3,000,000 (or what ever) viruses to agree with me. The security in XP is so bad that we have armies of spam bots etc and keeping XP free from malware is beyond the capabilities of most users, XP must be responsible for billions of dollars lost to cyber crime.
And why do we have the situation where folk are crying out to keep XP – because Vista is awful and Microsofts monopoly like dominance prevents people from changing to other platforms.
Edited 2008-04-26 07:55 UTC
140 millions Vista licenses sold
http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleB…
Edited 2008-04-26 10:01 UTC
casuto said…
When you control the market, you too can “sell” as many licenses as you want and call it a win…
I have a close family friend that is now stuck with a Vista dog of a laptop that she hates, but she bought it because “no one was selling XP and I had no choice.” I wonder how many of those are like her?
–bornagainpenguin
PS: She was not happy when I showed her Dell’s site at that time still selling XP with some of their home editions… Speaking of Dell, I wonder how many of that number are Vista “capable” machines still running Windows XP? Or how many of those machines came with a license for Vista but are running XP?
Edited 2008-04-26 11:16 UTC
The reason most people want XP on a new computer is that they hear a bunch of BS about Vista from somebody they know who read that BS on the internet from some idiot blogger who thinks he knows everything about computers. It’s getting ridiculous.
Except, when that somebody actually knows what he’s talking about. Dismissing everyone as ignorant idiots tells more about the dismisser than those poor folks.
casuto said…
Yeah, how dare those people believe their own senses over the drivel coming from Redmond Promotions?
Hmm… This is the twentieth time now I’ve heard that line from people pushing Vista…
Ummm… guys I hate to be the one to tell you this, but unless you vary your talking points a bit more, it becomes obvious that’s what they are.
Also the use of an ad hominem doesn’t work much in your favor anyway, and does little to convince anyone you’re right and they’re wrong, in fact it may push a person further from your position than they started when the conversation began because you’re now attacking them…
In any case, I’ve used the betas, spent time in various stores testing machines with Vista preinstalled from the manufacturer, and have worked on machines owned by friends with Vista installed on them.
In every case unless the machine was one we would have classified as a high end gamer pc two years ago, pushing up against the limitations of the hardware the operating system left the machine feeling like a dog. This same machine Windows XP would fly on, doing exactly the same things and using the same programs. This same machine which would fly using Linux or OSX86…
I think it is a real examination of the evidence that leads us to our dislike of Vista, not this fantastical and paranoid notion people are “out to get Microsoft.”
–bornagainpenguin
You missed his point completely. Most people who are complaining seem to have never even used the damned product. Reading some loser’s blog isn’t isn’t the same as using the product.
Nope. I used Vista and it was awful.
tomcat said…
*blink*
He had a point? I must have missed it over the sounds of his earlier astroturfing. (Or do we just call that trolling these days?)
tomcat said…
OMG SAUCE PLZ!
You know its funny, I keep hearing that–but no one ever seems to have any sources or citations to back it up. Yet people keep on claiming there is some faceless, random boogieman out there magically convincing people Vista is bad….
Hmmm… Beer Gooood! Vista baaaaaad….
It almost feels like a forced meme someone is trying to start…
–bornagainpenguin
You penguin fanboys are hilarious. On the one hand, you insist that nobody is upgrading to Vista and, on the other, that everyone has tried it and hates it. You can’t have it both ways. When you figure out which story you’d like to use, stick with it; otherwise, I’m going to continue to point out the idiocy of your illogic.
Edited 2008-04-28 19:08 UTC
I’ve got Vista on a laptop here, I’ve been playing with it for over 2 weeks now, it is very pretty and certainly feels more friendly when you’re just doing the basics.
That said, when you want to get into the guts of the beast, it makes things deliberately hard in a way that simply isn’t necessary. XP I had something of a love hate relationship with. But that said, when I needed to get down and dirty in the settings it didn’t present me with layer after layer after layer of crap to dig through in order to reach them.
I don’t like the fact that XP feels faster on an Athlon 64 3000 (Socket 754, 2Ghz, single core) with 512mb ram against this things coreduo 1.7Ghz with 2Gb of ram. I don’t like the fact that Vista mangled my Opera install to such a degree I was left no option but to remove its remains (as in, boot it works, boot a second time and it doesn’t). I don’t like the 5-20 second white out pauses on what is essentially brand new hardware for no reason. I don’t like that it randomly thrashes the HD with no feedback as to why.
I tried it, and whilst day to day it was ok, I would expect nothing less given the specs of this system, indeed I’d expect it to thoroughly flourish. But all I can say is, “its ok, I guess”.
When my own desktop is operational again, I’ll be putting something like Elive on it again. I just can’t see Vista cutting it long term for me, YMMV, of course.
Thank the gods I get to give this crap back.
tomcat said…
Because no one can have more than one computer, right?
Because it is impossible to encounter anyone unfortunate enough to have bought a Vista machine because they were unaware they could still get XP, right? …right?
(Major hint: I’ve already said a close family friend bought a laptop with Vista and she hates it but was unaware there were other options. It sometimes helps to read the threads…)
Because no one in the history of the world is curious enough to make (several) trips down to the local computer store (a couple times a week) just to check out the new toys…err computers….surely no one could be as interested in computers they’d do something like that, right?
Here’s a clue–you don’t have to have purchased a copy of Vista to have used it. There are multiple ways one can try out Vista. There are the various free trial versions Microsoft gave out at their developer conferences, for one.
But of course no one here would be geeky enough to actually go to an event where they talked about the new release of …okay I’ll stop now..
tomcat said…
Ummm… ilogic? LOL…pot, kettle, black?
–bornagainpenguin
The reason why Microsoft pushed out Vista is because they had to draw a line and say, OK we dragged out feet and held things up long enough and we need to ship. If there are any bugs, we can knock them out later with Windows Update and Service Packs. It took a lot of work to re-write all of the stuff in Vista…since Windows is so big now I wonder if there is a corporation large enough to push out a flawless version of such a big OS. I don’t think there was a conspiracy, I just think that Sales finally trumped Engineering in Vista, to understate the obvious.
Dano