Industry drags Microsoft around by leash due to XP and Vista
By Mike Ferro
Microsoft in the past have been the industry leader when it came to leading the pack on what should be supported and what should not. However as of late it seems Microsoft has been largely getting dragged around by the industry and not the other way around.
As I’ve written previously about the woes Microsoft is facing with Vista adoption rate, things are looking more grim especially with the class action lawsuit that came about a couple months ago. Also along with reports of diminishing sales of Vista it seems like Microsoft has a tough road ahead.
According to ZDNet, Microsoft faces a class action lawsuit regarding the ‘Vista capable’ issue with PCs which were not actually Vista capable. The story stems from Intel wanting to use their 915 chipset into a series of new PCs around the same time Microsoft wanted to have those PCs with Vista as well.
The problem arose when both parties knowing that the 915 chipset were not Vista capable decided to put the ‘Vista capable’ stamp of approval on those PCs. Now Microsoft is the company who is facing heat from the consumers.
Also due to the explosion in popularity with subnotebooks like the Asus Eee series Microsoft felt the need to assert their dominance into that arena as well. The problem however arose when Vista was found to be to demanding on the Atom chipset.
So, Microsoft made the decision to bring XP out of retirement after their announcement that XP license sales would be marked as ‘end of life’ in the coming months. Largely most subnotebooks on the market currently have Linux running on them. Not only does this poke and prod at where Vista was receiving criticism for its stiff hardware requirements, but Microsoft is finding itself following catchup to a competing OS.
It seems Microsoft has been sitting on their laurels and patting themselves on the back while the industry have made up its mind regarding Vista and hardware technology.
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June 2nd, 2008
This isn’t a rant aimed at the author of this piece specifically, but a bitch at this section in general.
Did I fall asleep and Microsoft fall below an 80% marketshare? Didn’t Apple just settle a couple of class action lawsuits lately? Has this site merely become a redirect to Mac Daily News?
It’s hard to believe that Microsoft has been utterly unable to do a single positive thing in the last 60 days. That’s how far back I went in the archives in this section, and it’s a stretch to find anything even remotely positive. Meanwhile Apple can do no wrong. This is like going to a Stereo website and finding nothing but how great Bose equipment is and the only other mention of other equipment is how it sucks to not be Boise.
How about a nice article on why Vista is a good fit with Server 2008 and why. And how the modularity of 7 was designed to further increase this leverage across the enterprise? You know, the enterprise that is responsible for all your banking, much of your dealings outside of iTunes like online commerce?
I’m about as far from a MS cheerleader as you’re likely to find , I’m not real fond of some of the business practices and the overbearing way they try to kill open standards. I don’t use MS as my preferred OS personally, but I don’t let that influence my judgement at work when I recommend the most cost effective solutions for my IT infrastructure. I’m replacing MS servers with Linux where it makes sense, but it’s far from a wholesale thing. We have a few Macs where it makes sense as well, I don’t hate Apple. But it’s not the best fit from a business standpoint if you look at it as a tool and not a work of art.
In spite of all the warts and rather distasteful business practices, Vista is the OS on the vast majority of all PC’s sold and by a large margin if you don’t slice it into an arbitrary “retail” pie and ignore all the direct sales figures.
I know this is not designed as a primarily journalistic site and is each authors opinion, but hammering Vista and Microsoft is pretty easy now, and the breathless Apple love in the media is the same. A little balance would be nice, there are actual reasons to like Vista by how it fits into the next generation of Windows Server software. 2008 is the most drastic change that MS has wrought since Server 2000. Vista and 7 are designed to leverage those changes. Some of your readers might enjoy a less technical explanation, for balance . You can get Microsoft Bashing anywhere.
June 2nd, 2008
Dude, stop whinning, all of these articles are linked to major publications like PCmag or InfoWorld. I doubt it’s anybody’s fault theres been a string of bad press lately and thats the hot topic news these days.
If Vista sales were phenomenal at near 100% XP market share I bet you anything you would see that news here.