@Ric C.
You are correct regarding the dual license issue. I don’t deal with the aquisitions stuff, but we usually get pretty good terms. 20,000 licenses gives a reasonably good bargaining chip. I also wonder if the XP licenses we already have could be migrated? I doubt it, but who knows.
As for the clean install issue, we only do OS upgrades as part of a Hardware Refresh cycle, so that part isn’t really a concern.
@Ric C.
I don’t deal with the money side of things, but in the past we have been able to get pretty good volume license agreements. Plus, I doubt that we would need to have all users have the XP ability. Just the fact that we have the option for the ones that do is a vast improvement.
As for the clean install, we only do OS version upgrades as part of a Hardware Refresh cycle anyway so that really isn’t an issue.
David W.:
That’s exactly what I always say. MS’ lousy business practices aside, I don’t really dislike Windows that much. It’s just that even with loads of brilliant programmers, more money than god, and a standing monopoly over the PC market, Vista (and now w7) is all they can come up with.
It’s just so disappointing.
If that means that I have to be part of the couture crowd, so be it. At least I go down in style.
Sorry for the dual post…silly captcha lied and said it errored. 
Like Zof, I am curious how it will affect corporate IT. Because XP is 9 years old, few people who have only been working IT for the last 8 years have done a large desktop rollout of a new OS. I would suspect that XP will be around for a while longer until Corporate IT just rolls out new computers with the OS already installed. I don’t see them upgrading thousands of computers that currently have a working XP installed on them.
I’m weighing in on the discussion in favor of Win7, and this is coming from someone who could only stand Vista for a month before reverting back to XP. I’ve been using Win7 x64 RC since it was released. My video (ATI Radeon) and sound (SB Xtreme Music) are both running on beta drivers, and the whole thing is more stable than any version of Windows I’ve run on since Windows 2000. I agree with Jeff that Win7 is what Vista should have been from the beginning.
I still have no idea why, after utter disinterest in Vista from the beginning, I’m actually excited abt Win7. I’m very much looking fwd to getting the RTM installed (available to MSDN subscribers Aug. 6) and leaving XP behind for good.
Interesting article, i always said Win7 was like a service pack also (usually when replying to people saying Snow Leopard is one) and both are true. I have to honestly say that XP was my 1st operating system and the only windows one i use often, i have had a lot of experience with especially when having to fix things that have gone wrong with them.
It was actually this that made my 1st laptop a mac (no haters please) and i chose to have windows XP as my virtualisation of choice. Though if Windows 7 is as good as its hyped to be it will be my secondary OS and will get a lot more use than my XP currently does.
sorry i meant to say " i have had a lot of experience with Vista especially when having to fix things that have gone wrong with them."
It’s 6.1.7600 for application compatibility, not because it is 0.1.1598 better.
http://windowsteamblog.com/blogs/windowsvista/archive/2008/10/14/why-7.aspx
Donny V, you’re not serious, right?
You say:
Win7 has all the good things WinXP has but better.
1- fast boot up & shut down
2- Built to take advantage of multi-core processors
3- Hard drive encryption
4- Takes full advantage of graphic cards with the new "DirectX Compute"
5- No pre-installed garbage
6- Windows search is waaaaaay better
And then diss Apple for finally (admittedly, very very late!) providing the iphone with copy and paste. Well.
WinXP has:
1- the ability to hibernate. Computer is off (zero power) and starts super fast.
2- Who has a SMP/MC system? Next upgrade, sure. But that’s not what this is about, we’re talking existing systems. Also, there won’t be that much to gain with dual core systems.
3- TrueCrypt is free.
4- Unless applications start using it, there is no need. Also, you need a DX10 card. Existing systems, remember?
5- Get your computer from somewhere else than the box pushers. Or do a reinstall.
6- There are plenty searching apps out there for XP.
Then, you burn Apple.
Here we go with another list.
1- System standby is perfect, it is way, WAY better than anything I’ve experienced with Windows, hands down. I do not need to reboot, ever. Hibernate also works.
2- See Snow Leopard.
3- At least since Tiger (that’s the next to last version. Go W7!)
4- See Snow Leopard.
5- See any OSX version. (Also, deleting applications actually throws them away! What do you know!)
6- Hello? Spotlight? At least since 1885.
Poor guy. Is it the price?
Sometimes I find that I have a very unique opinion over the matters.
In this “XP-Vista-W7” debate, I think that XP sucks, Vista SP1 is great, but there is no real difference between W7 and Vista (for current hardware!).
Besides maybe improved font smoothing I did not notice any real advantages in W7 over the Vista SP1 which, again, is good.
Vista a good OS and I don’t understand why it should target for 400MHz CPU if you could not buy one even 5 years ago. I’ve just doubled my RAM (4-> 8Gb) and I did notice the difference.
Of course, until very recent there were problems with drivers, especially 64-bit ones. My Canon MF3110 works in 64-bit OS only if I do some magic and install x64 drivers from different model. Sony released 64-bit photo raw files “driver” not very long ago. Preview handlers for Adobe PDF does not work in 64-bit OS even today.
What Microsoft ideally had to do was to introduce Blame Wall Website where they would rank top hardware vendors on their ability to support their hardware both in mere availability of drivers and quality of drivers. Unfortunately, because of stupid US laws of yours, MS would be sued to death for that.
God I love these topics that bring all the prius driving, mac rubbing d-bags out of the woodwork…
'Poor guy. Is it the price?'
case in point.
@remmelt
Let me get this right…
First you tell me to stay on WinXP because I should
stay on old hardware and use third party add-ons to get Win7 functions.
So you then compare the new Mac OS to the old WinXP and tell me
I should buy a Mac that runs on a Intel Dual Core (which you tell me you don’t gain much from with Win7).
…alrighty then.
To the pro-Win7 crowd: it doesn’t matter how much “better” Windows 7 is. No matter how many new features, security improvements, and visual facelifts you give the OS, Regular Joe isn’t going to upgrade unless it offers him a ** compelling improvement over his current setup **.
Regular Joe can browse the web, play games, IM, and write documents on XP just as well as he can on Win7. In fact, he can do it better because he doesn’t have to learn anything new.
Without a clear benefit to non-techies (which naturally makes up the bulk of commentators here), the rollout of Windows 7 will trickle in similar fashion to Vista.
I this a piss take? didn’t find it funny… if not- wow, the major version stayed the same to help compatability…
Without a clear benefit to non-techies (which naturally makes up
the bulk of commentators here), the rollout of Windows 7 will
trickle in similar fashion to Vista.
@Frank, there are many benefits to non-techies, take a look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Features_new_to_Windows_7
Non-exhaustive list: touch screen support, speech & handwriting recognition improvements, better SSD support, much better taskbar UI, Device Stage, DirectX 11, and a whole slew of other new features.
I dislike when people refer to Win7 as a service pack to Vista for those very reasons. 3 years of major development work isn’t a service pack. It’s a major release and it’s my opinion that it is silly to perpetuate this thinking that it’s simply a service pack.
William Brendel wrote:
First, installing a wi-fi driver is not driver hell.
I don’t have to install any driver on OS X, I don’t have to install any driver on Linux.
I don’t have to install such driver on Windows XP Tablet PC 2005.
It’s called par for the course when installing a new operating system.
Not for six laptops that are between 1 and 2 years old. The chipsets are the usual suspects. We’re talking about LG, HP, Sony, Toshiba stuff here. Not “Alienware-weird”.
Plus, Vista drivers generally “just work” in Windows 7.
How many boxes have you installed from scratch with W7 to say “Vista drivers ‘just work’” ? I did it with twelve boxes so far. Two virtual machines, ten real boxes. Did I have bad luck?
If you have to search high and low for drivers, blame your manufacturer for 1) not >working with MS to get it included in Windows, and 2) not making their driver website >easy to navigate/search.
You have got to be kidding me… hahahahaha. Why don’t I blame Canada too, just in case.
For example, Dell does a good job making drivers easy to find.
Therefore, Windows 7 Driver base is good… ok. Good argument.
Second, most consumers–the 95+% of people that will never do a clean install
Where did you get that number from? Why is microsoft offering upgrades so aggressively so users who purchased the crap of Vista can easily upgrade to W7?
What makes you think that your nice Windows Vista box will continue to work (driver-wise) with W7?
Might not. (In fact, I’ve seen it FAIL as I just said before)
In my book, calling your experience “driver hell” is an exaggeration.
Well, apparently you don’t read much, do you?
Stop defending an OS who has “just been not-released”, an OS in which you don’t seem to have much experience apart from toying with the Beta or RC if anything. I don’t know what you do, but I am a MS GOLD partner (not that I really like it) and have to make sure that W7 works on LOTS of hardware we sell.
Guess: It doesn’t.
Windows 7 is the best windows ever. But Windows is such a stupid operating system. Microsoft is slowly fixing things here and there, but they don’t see that the problem lies in the core of the OS.
Eventually it will work.
If I had to use a machine it would be XP or 7, no doubt. But thank god there are alternatives. Good luck installing your new printer on W7…
"I’m saying you should avoid using the rusted screwdriver which is liable to burst into fragments and cause a crippling hand wound at any time!"
Hum, Software does not decay (unless you count the automatic updates as decay). Though I think I know what you’re trying to say, that metaphor just does not hold up. The OS did not add holes, they were there always. Plus, Microsoft has been pretty good at fixing XP as it bobbed along.
I think you need to make your point better of how XP is inadequate (and comparing to IE6 is really not a fair comparison. Its design was bogus).
Last thing, I find it funny that you mention 7 is an upgrade path from XP, when there is no xp->7 upgrade available. But hey, who’s counting?
I want to buy a new computer, my XP computer is 4 year old. I will buy a windows 7 pc in november, looking forward to it.