Windows 7 Gartner slams Windows 7 downgrade

whoosh · Jun 25, 2009

Windows XP only available for six months

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The company plans to cut off OEMs' XP downgrade rights, which only apply to Windows 7 Professional and Windows 7 Ultimate PCs, six months after Windows 7 debuts, limiting computer makers' moves after that to offering Vista-powered PCs

stevae · Jun 26, 2009

good!!! not to be offensive to anyone, but i'm tired of all the xp yakking... it's time to move on. you have to move forward in life, or you get left behind.

ickymay · Jun 26, 2009

stevae said:
good!!! not to be offensive to anyone, but i'm tired of all the xp yakking... it's time to move on. you have to move forward in life, or you get left behind.

thing is XP is still a viable OS for many users who only need internet and browsing with lower end machines (by todays standards) , there isn't that much more that win7 does in daily use , It just has a much prettier GUI and compatabilities with newer tech such as flash drives and mobiles etc ?

there is a whole world of PC users out there that dont really need or even want the extra advantages of Win 7

win 7 as "the new OS" has more to do with selling new pcs and making money than it has to with practicality for end users

having said that I do love win 7, but then Im a techead and make money fixing stuff for pc users , the majority of them appear to still be using WinXP or getting confused with Vista

stevae · Jun 26, 2009

if a user isn't smart enough, or is too lazy to learn to use the newer technology, then they don't need a computer. should we have continued to use horses, because so many people didn't really need a car? should we have scrapped the idea of the airplane because very few people understood the principles of flight, or had a need to fly?
people either get with the program, and assert themselves a little bit, or they get left behind. PERIOD!!!! finally, peoples needs change with changing abilities. as people learn to do more with a computer, the needs they have of that computer become more and more. almost everyone started using computers to either play games, chat or use email. but as they learned more and more about all the things that a computer can do for you, their needs escalated.
so please don't make excuses for the slackers of the generation. they either get onboard, or they get left behind.

ickymay · Jun 26, 2009

stevae said:
if a user isn't smart enough, or is too lazy to learn to use the newer technology, then they don't need a computer. should we have continued to use horses, because so many people didn't really need a car? should we have scrapped the idea of the airplane because very few people understood the principles of flight, or had a need to fly?
people either get with the program, and assert themselves a little bit, or they get left behind. PERIOD!!!! finally, peoples needs change with changing abilities. as people learn to do more with a computer, the needs they have of that computer become more and more. almost everyone started using computers to either play games, chat or use email. but as they learned more and more about all the things that a computer can do for you, their needs escalated.
so please don't make excuses for the slackers of the generation. they either get onboard, or they get left behind.

and there was me thinking you "didnt want to be offensive to anyone"

the silver surfers I enable to use their PC and keep up with communicating with their grandchildren in australia surely deserve a chance to keep using what they need without being forced to upgrade to something they don't need and will ask more of them than they are capable of understanding ?

I reckon it would be very narrow minded of you to beleive it was only about your generation

SIW2 · Jun 26, 2009

Great answer, Ickymay.

It's not about generation, though, it's about requirements and interests.

Many - nearly all home users are not interested in the newer o/s or the extra things it can do.

They just don't care.

Most people walk into a big PC chain and buy a laptop based on the price, size of the screen , and color.

That is more important to them than the o/s - they just get whatever happens to be on the machine.

They expect it to work when turned on , and recognize their camera when they plug it in . That's it.

Many do not even know which o/s they are running - they don't want to know, and could not be less interested. They certainly do not want to have to do anything to it - except maybe put on a pretty Wallpaper.

Tepid · Jun 26, 2009

I'm sorry,,,, but you all fail to mention the massive security updates and changes. And I am not referring to UAC alone.

Vista was the most secure OS ever at RTM. Including OSX and Linux out of the box.
I can't find the info now, but it is out there.

It is more than just GUI and tech upgrades. You need to do more research.
You are not seeing/telling the whole picture.

Plus,, those with kids, need to take advantage of and use the parental controls.

In other words,,, XP is dead, it is time to get over it and move on.

You know what really irritates me to no end.....
A lot of the people who are not wanting to move to Vista/7 are the same ones complaining about how insecure and virus vulnerable XP is. But it is still viable OS, we don't need Vista(ME) or Windows 7.

There is some real ignorance in the world.

On another note,,,, we could see a major shift in virtualization technology.

SIW2 · Jun 26, 2009

You are right about the improvements - doesn't change the fact most people don't care - if you try to explain - their eyes glaze over.

We are the odd ones - we are actually interested.

No amount of railing against how things are is going to change that.

stevae · Jun 27, 2009

ok, several points to address. first of all, thank you for another excellent point tepid, not only is the newer op sys's much better and easier to use, but they are much more secure. and i agree that these same people who are too lazy to learn, are the same ones who complain about the security of the op sys, and all the other problems of the old op sys's.
next, about being offensive.. it isn't about be offensive or unoffensive, it is about what is the truth. and the truth is that silver surfer's can learn just like anyone else can. i have spent quite a bit of time teaching elder persons about the computer, metiphorically using a library, and all of its parts as an example. and guess what, they are now using vista fairly well. ANYBODY CAN LEARN, ANYBODY!!!!!! i will never worried about offending person's who are too lazy to do the common things that we need to do, to live a decent life. there is no excuse for not learning something as basic as using a computer. there are a million books, magazines and tutorials available today. so why make excuses for the lazy? because that is what it boils down to, pure laziness. these same people use every other technological advance in their lives, why wouldn't they use this one, and evolve as it does. i bet they have learned how to use a modern washing machine, instead of using a rock...
it doesn't matter if someone is interested in how somethings work or not, they still move forward with the technology, in every other aspect of life, so why should computers be any different? finally, if they learned how to use xp, they can learn how to use vista or 7. i mean it's not like they are using a commodore 64 or 128. so they obviously have moved forward. you said that they just want to use email, or chat... why aren't they using regular snail mail? because they have at least in some small way, embraced new technology, and learned how to use email.

omnivious · Jun 28, 2009

honestly, win7 seems more user friendly then xp to me, I personally had problems with vista when it first came out, got a bit turned around doing some of the every day things but as far as win 7 goes, everything seems to be where it's supposed to be, I have been using xp and did not free upgrade to visa when it first came out due to the fact that I loathed it but win 7 is definitely a more approachable os to beginners then vista, I've been working on computers since win 3x and to me, vista was as almost as big of a flop as win ME, and I probably wouldn't have pre ordered the win7 if it wasn't for the rc!

SIW2 · Jun 28, 2009

That's odd,

Vista always worked perfectly for me and still does - it is a superb o/s.

MS made in error by building Vista expecting the hardware and user to be at a certain level of competence.

When it came to market - that expected level was not there. It ended up on machines it didn't run particularly well on. ( There has been plenty of discussion as to how that came about ).

What MS have done is the obvious thing - they took their superb o/s ( Vista) - pulled it apart and reassembled it so it is more suitable for lower spec. machines.

They have made a good job of it - now people with $249 laptops can have the same Vista/NT6 experience many of us have had all along.

On my machine - there is no practical difference between Vista and 7 - in terms of speed or performance. In fact, Vista boots 20% faster.

That is not surprising - Vista is in her element - 7 was not intended to outperform Vista on a decent machine.

Most people who rubbish Vista either got it on a low spec machine - not their fault, or are just repeating the nonsense they heard elsewhere, without even trying it.

omnivious · Jun 28, 2009

SIW2 said:
That's odd,

Vista always worked perfectly for me and still does - it is a superb o/s.

MS made in error by building Vista expecting the hardware and user to be at a certain level of competence.

When it came to market - that expected level was not there. It ended up on machines it didn't run particularly well on. ( There has been plenty of discussion as to how that came about ).

What MS have done is the obvious thing - they took their superb o/s ( Vista) - pulled it apart and reassembled it so it is more suitable for lower spec. machines.

They have made a good job of it - now people with $249 laptops can have the same Vista/NT6 experience many of us have had all along.

On my machine - there is no practical difference between Vista and 7 - in terms of speed or performance. In fact, Vista boots 20% faster.

That is not surprising - Vista is in her element - 7 was not intended to outperform Vista on a decent machine.

Most people who rubbish Vista either got it on a low spec machine - not their fault, or are just repeating the nonsense they heard elsewhere, without even trying it.

I bought my father a laptop recently, his very first computer to call his own with limited experience with computers, and I obviously had to teach him a few tricks and of course I have been using xp since xp came out and my laptop runs xp with vista compatibility but I didn't upgrade to vista due to the driver problem every vista owner had when it first released, microsoft should have done a better job as they did with win 7, with the driver support, and having my win xp media center edition and my fathers vista premium, the vista was just not apealing to me and seemed to need more resource and was worth the cost of upgrade, I have tried to stay up with the times and run the better of os's out there with the least amount of headache, I saw nothing but headache when I setup networks for people with vista machines, xp was simply more practicle for the everyday end user, I understnad the security in vista is better but with all the bs you gotta put up with, it's just not worth the headache, and the support ms gave vista was simply atrocious, I called ms many times to figure out the inner workings of vista so I could get my client's networks to perform correctly and most of the time, I knew more then the tech support did or they lead me to beleive I knew more because they couldn't answer simple questions with me reading off every detail of all machines I'm working with and always blamed hardware for the problem when 90% of the time it was vista's incapability! there are many reasons I am unhappy with vista and if you can't see that, I'm sorry for wasting your time!

SIW2 · Jun 28, 2009

Hi omnivorous,

Wasn't criticising you. You are right , Vista doesn't run all that well on most laptops - MS mistake.

Drivers, however are the responsiblity of the 3rd party manufacturers - every time there is an new o/s they need to get the drivers organised - there were problems when XP came out - people forget that.

Now, at last driver support is good for Vista. Since 7 is so similar to Vista - it doesn't need to go through all that - the Vista drivers work.

That is why it was sensible for MS to rebuild Vista - and call it 7. Vey few compatibility issues - Vista has taken all the flak for that.

I don't use XP myself, but I know a lot who do. They are happy with it - it does everything they want - it has been around so long , there don't have any compatibility issues. They want to stick with it. Fair enough.

You will see a lot of people criticising XP users for sticking with what they like.

They are perfectly entitled to use XP if they like it. Why not - it is their machine.

Mike · Jun 28, 2009

there is a whole world of PC users out there that dont really need or even want the extra advantages of Win 7

win 7 as "the new OS" has more to do with selling new pcs and making money than it has to with practicality for end users

having said that I do love win 7, but then Im a techead and make money fixing stuff for pc users , the majority of them appear to still be using WinXP or getting confused with Vista

Of course, you want them to stay on XP because you will make more money this way with all of their problems? :razz:

But that is essential to the problem: XP users aren't just content with using an operating system that came out 8 years ago, they also want support. It was convenient for entire departments to make the financial decision to stay with XP, but when something goes wrong, its time to blame Microsoft! And this is support that costs money and takes a significant amount of resources to provide the more out of date the OS gets. Why did companies initially move to Windows? Something about productivity, right? That seems to have taken a backstage pass to compatibility and cost-savings

omnivious · Jun 28, 2009

Mike said:
Of course, you want them to stay on XP because you will make more money this way with all of their problems? But that is essential to the problem: XP users aren't just content with using an operating system that came out 8 years ago, they also want support. It was convenient for entire departments to make the financial decision to stay with XP, but when something goes wrong, its time to blame Microsoft! And this is support that costs money and takes a significant amount of resources to provide the more out of date the OS gets. Why did companies initially move to Windows? Something about productivity, right? That seems to have taken a backstage pass to compatibility and cost-savings

I don't think it was productivity but the usability of the gui, and xp in my experience has less issues in my line of work then vista, my line of work being networking home and small business setups. I do believe that windows 7 is more of a hybrid of vista and xp, and superior to both, windows was always supposed to have better usability and that was their selling point, we all know that windows is not known for stability in the os market. Most end users are stupid and require a lot of program guidelines without interfering with their everyday activity and windows xp was easier to setup a network and regulate the network to specific definitions without interference, I've been networking and fixing computers for 14 years and the major steps in windows were win98 xp and now 7 at least for everyday end users. to me, ME and vista were experiments that didn't go as well as they had expected, if you look at the lifespan of the os's it should clarify any questions, win98 and winxp both had nice lifespans and I expect win7 to go over rather longer although I think ms could branch out into different sub os rather then put out brand new ones, they have improved on vista in the past 2 years and believe that it needs total new packaging so they're scrapping vista, which I think is kinda dickish on ms' part but I assumed such things would happen and didn't upgrade, ms should do the rc version thing more and learn the exact market rather then assume.

Highwayman · Jun 28, 2009

The biggest killer punch to XP fanboys living in the past still is that Windows 7 runs on really old specs similar to a pc that is 10 years old or more....so no more excuses about performance on old machines...it runs just as well as xp stripped back to basics with none of the flaws, and with the pre-buy options of Windows 7 Ultimate going for under Ã‚Â£75 for first few months MS should get a lot of milage out of this OS.

stevae · Jun 28, 2009

i have heard many people complain that vista gave them a hard time, but i have never heard anyone say exactly what it was about vista that they hated. i love vista and still have it on another partition. IF YOU BOTHER TO LEARN THE NEW THINGS IN VISTA, then it is an excellent op sys, and definitely a million times better than xp. i never had a problem with xp, and even liked it very much, until vista came out. after using vista for about two weeks, i ended up needing to use a friends machine that was using xp one day, and at that moment i started hating xp. after that little bit of time of getting use to vista, xp seemed like a jalopy to me, and still does. the security of xp is a joke. and it's user interphase is pathetic compared to vista. vista is also much faster, at least on my computer it is. to be fair, i should mention that i never used vista home premium. i always used vista ultimate.
now, i like 7 even better than vista. i think m$ has done well with their op sys's development.

fjgold · Jun 28, 2009

Personally the cost of Vista is what kept me away. That and the early compatibility issue that got so much press at release.
I also was very busy learning linux (Ubuntu and PCLinuxOS) to spend much time learning a new version of Windows. I'm
ready for a change now and Win 7 fits the bill. I'll gladly pay whatever is cost for admission and won't look back to XP or Vista.
I'll still use linux though.

merlin · Jun 29, 2009

I bought my last computer when Vista was being launched, so got a free upgrade from the installed XP. Because of all the bad press about Vista I didn't install it until earlier this year. After getting used to it I have grown to love it and haven't had any problems at all.

I partitioned my hard drive and installed 7 RC when it became available and think its really great. I love the new task bar and its speed and general feel, it feels like a deluxe version of Vista.
I still use XP on an old laptop I have in the bedroom, and for basic use its fine, but lacks the feelgood factor of 7, which I am sure will wear off as the next version ( 8 I presume) looms on the horizon.

I have always been a bit of a techie being a TV engineer in the days of valves (tubes) so love innovation. I find after a while I long for a change almost for changes sake, so computer technology suits me as it never stands still for long. I am not sure that a lot of people share my views though.

I am in my late 60s and self taught myself in computer basics and help out other silver surfers problems when I can.
I find as was said earlier in this thread that most people don't know what OS they are using anyway, and only want it to work in the easiest way possible.
To be honest if you only surf the net and email, I can't see that the OS makes much difference when it comes to upgrading as they all work roughly the same at that level. I have found changing browsers need more adjustment when it comes to helping others.

Regards Terry

Tepid · Jun 29, 2009

I just want to point out that,,, one of the best reason to switch from XP to 7 is better over all security.
That is not to say that XP's security is horrible, it's not, it's they way people use it that makes it so bad.

Vista/7 are aiming to change the way (in the security arena) people use their systems, along with some major security advances in windows.

So, it should be stressed that an upgrade to Vista or 7 is a positive step for security reasons as much as, if not more than the GUI and usability reasons.

People just don't seem to think about or mention this,,,,,, ever.

And that is the funniest thing because most people complain the most about XP, windows in general bad security and horrid ease of virus infection.Vista/7 resolve a lot of these issues, yet, extremely few mention it.

Windows 7 Gartner slams Windows 7 downgrade

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