Best Buy forced Vole into Vista capable fiasco
28 Mar 2008 | 09:22 GMT
Incapable and unready
WHILE MANY might think it was Intel which was responsible for pushing Microsoft into making silly claims about computers being Vista capable, CRN has come up with the suggestion that the real entity pressuring Vole was US retail giant Best Buy.
CRN has had a closer look at the emails that have been sent to the court in the class action case and claims that, while top Voles do say things like "We are caving to Intel," and "We are allowing Intel to milk the 915", there is something a little more obvious in the communications with Best Buy.
Long before the Intel emails, Best Buy apparently approved a two-tier marketing plan designed by Vista product manager Shanen Boettcher, marketing director Rajesh Srinivasan and, quite possibly, Will Poole.
On August ninth, 2005, Srinivasan told Boettcher that Best Buy had validated the two-tier approach which involved chart listing hardware requirements for what he calls Vista "capable" and "ready" systems.
This showed that Vista ready systems needed to have a "GPU with WVDDM support" but Vista capable systems did not and would therefore be unable to run the shiny new Aero Glass GUI.
The emails show that Microsoft was under pressure to delay its Vista marketing in a bid to get the OEMs to put pressure on Intel to kill off the 915 by October 2006. CRN suggests that the pressure came not from Chipzilla, which did not want to change its roadmap, but from retailers like Best Buy. µ
L'Inq
CRN
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