Time for The VAR Guy to eat a little more crow. He vastly underestimated Microsoft’s ability to ship Windows 7 in 2009. Numerous reports now state that the first Windows 7 release candidate will reach selected testers in the next few weeks.
Of course, Windows 7′s design goals weren’t ambitious. According to The VAR Guy, Windows 7 is Microsoft’s attempt to fix and polish everything that was wrong with Windows Vista — including misleading product positioning on low-end PCs.
Still, let’s give Microsoft some credit. For the most part, The Windows 7 beta process has gone remarkably smoothly. And CrunchGear suggests the first Windows 7 release candidate has already reached some testers. Alas, The VAR Guy’s original prediction that Windows 7 wouldn’t ship until 2010 was completely off the mark.
Now, our resident blogger thinks Windows 7 coupled with the forthcoming Microsoft Retail Store initiative could help the software giant to regain trust with consumers and businesses burned by bad Windows Vista experiences.
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The stores may give folks “try-before-you-buy” experiences but, on what hardware? I saw Vista SP0 purr on Celeron-m laptops and crawl on an AMD64 X2 desktops. Cache size, I believe, was the difference. If a customer tries 7+ on some Xeon with huge cache and tries to install it on a P3 back home, they will be burned again. I cannot see M$ demonstrating stuff on every OEMs hardware so whose ox will be gored? AMD was damaged by Vista much more than Intel. If the stores succeed in blessing Intel, AMD could be finished by this. If 7 somehow runs on everything well, how are the stores any benefit to M$?
I question the motives of M$ at every turn. They have a long history of using very hard tactics in the back rooms. I suspect the stores will be another way to secure ultimate loyalty of the OEMs, not the end-users. M$ wants to make sure the only choice to the end-user is their product. In the old days, M$ used to contribute “promotion” to the deal. The stores may be another permutation of “promotion”. The loyalty required to obtain “promotion” was exclusive dealing. They used to build it into agreements. Now with regulators watching, they need unwritten agreements to pass scrutiny. Showing off loyal customers’ stuff in stores may well pass scrutiny. This is the innovation at which M$ excels.
I honestly don’t think Windows 7 released in 2009 will be any better for Microsoft than Windows 7 released in 2010. If people bought a Vista PC only a year or two ago they aren’t going to buy a new system just because it has the latest Windows OS on it. And that’s where Microsoft makes most sales. On OEM installs.
Windows 7 while it seems to have fixed a lot of what was wrong with Vista doesn’t deliver enough compelling features that are relevant to normal users. So normal users aren’t about to run out and buy a boxed retail version of Windows 7.
The two features people have raved about so far are the new taskbar and multi-touch. Multi-touch is useless without a touch screen and a new taskbar isn’t worth the $300USD price tag.
My sister still uses and old Dell laptop with Windows XP Home. It lets her brows the web. Which is all she does with her PC. So she doesn’t see the need for change. Most PC users are like my sister. They won’t buy a new system until the current one breaks down. Especially now that money is tight.
And there is one more problem. Windows Vista SP2 is due out sometime in the not too distant future.
You miss the point.
M$ is going NOW for their MAIN&FIRST distribution channel: PIRACY
Ask someone here in Spain (for instance) how much $/€ does M$ Windows or M$Office costs… they won’t have a clue. Ask them if they have them at home… they will say “yes both of them!” if they are sincere (or not a Linux geek like me)
Once they conquer private desktops in a few months with W7 (if its a worth replacement to Vista) they WON! BECAUSE THEY SAVED PEOPLE INERTIA TOWARDS WINDOWS… all thanks to EmuleMart and WallTorrent!!
Users of piracy copies will end up paying new licenses when buying new hardware in a few years time or will force their companies to do it sooner or later because Windows IS ALL THEY KNOW.
Josvazg: The US market is changing a bit compared to rest of world. Linux really is an increasingly popular option on Netbooks, selected Dell PCs and a growing list of consumer devices. Windows is what MOST Americans know. But a small, vocal US minority is waking up to Linux.