Windows 7 prices are too high

Until Microsoft recognise that they're pricing too highly, consumers will either keeping avoiding or pirating their products. Whilst I do not condone piracy, I can see how Microsoft is failing to tackle the underlying cause by pricing its products just too highly for their worth, yet creating a strong desire to upgrade due to older software being no longer supported (ie, obsolete). I just hope the OEM prices are more sensible at least or that Microsoft re-evaluates its pricing structure.

Not only may Windows cost too much, but Microsoft really needs to ditch the idea of having different OS's with different features.

At most, make two. One for the home user, and one for the business user. Aside from that, just give everyone the features and quit trying to suck everyone dry.

In times where money is tight and Apple have seen massive increases in sales of Desktop and Notebook computers for personal use, you'd think MS would be trying to undercut them.

But instead they are charging what is essentially charging the price of VAT ontop of a system, for what can only be described as a 'mediocre' operating system at best. Vista wasn't exactly ground-breaking, and the bits that were could have their origins traced back to OS X etc. The sooner MS realise that the last decent attempt at an operating system was Windows 95, the better.

When I purchased my laptop 18mths ago I was looking forward to using it, not knowing that vista had so many problems.
However 19 fatal errors and several weeks working with it to make it run properly and I am now very happy with vista, I for one will not be changing my OS. For what it is it is too expensive to warrant a change. Suggest MS go back to the drawing board and have a rethink on their pricing policy if they want to sell enough units.

I stuck with XP because I kept hearing so many bad things about Vista. But although Windows 7 sounds much better, $200 is WAY too high. And once I hear of the various features that are missing from the low-end version, I'll probably find that I need a higher-tier package, which will be even MORE price prohibitive.

I don't use my computer for the MS Windows experience. Windows is an operating system that allows me to use the programs I need, like Photoshop, a word processor, email and Firefox. XP does a fine job of that already.

This is just one more example of excessive corporate greed in our day and age. Fortunately, unlike health care, this is something I can easily live without.

Good article, but no need to Fantasize about people upgrading to Linux, it'll not happen in the near future.

This article is so one dimensional. Microsoft doesn't expect (or probably want) people to upgrade, upgrading generates hassle with incompatibility and by having the price high in retail it protects the pricing MS have for OEMs (HP, Dell etc). You have to remember before Microsoft, software was seen as cheap and relatively worthless.

I love how snow leopard was mentioned as being a great upgrade too, even though it's just a service pack. So in truth you are paying for a service pack for software you've already paid an excessive amount for (If you consider MACOS to be the apple tax, which hardware for hardware is the only difference).

When you look at what you get, how many thousands of man hours has been put into this, how many millions of lines of code it has it is a real bargain.

You can't compare it to Apple - look how much they charge for the iphone!!

I use Photoshop 11, Office 2003 and Firefox

XP sp3 is Fast and 100% stable with all three

Job done

Vista and 7 Phahh!

I think the prices are fine. Mike above makes and excellent point. MS do not charge for their Service Packs.

" When you look at what you get, how many thousands of man hours has been put into this, how many millions of lines of code it has it is a real bargain "

um, now linux is a bargain - thats completely free - think of all the man hours millions of code put into that !!!

Let me start by saying that I don't think we have a complete picture here... While I agree the prices seem a bit high - let's not forget that Apple isn't by any means being "nice" either. Their hardware costs quite a bit more than a PC and since they are making a killing on the hardware they can afford to sell software at a lower price. In the case of Windows, it is Dell, HP or whoever that is making money on the hardware, not Microsoft.

Yes, this doesn't apply to upgrades but I'm guessing that Apple didn't magically come up with $29 and $49, but instead had some pretty smart people come up with an optimal price based on demand, their hardware business and the current economic situation. Microsoft too probably took a look at the big picture and if we were to do the same it would mean a new PC for $500 ($300 for a "cheap" and $200 for Windows 7) which is still about half the price of the cheapest Mac you can buy.

Also, with respect to multiple system installation given that the Windows 7 EULA hasn't been released yet, I think this article is premature. If you actually read these things, you'd notice that for Office 2007 Home and Student, for example, you can intall on 3 systems. Note that other versions of Office do NOT says this.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=7467D5C4-FA3A-4F9F-82B6-CBCD6108A980&displaylang=en

Given that the Windows 7 Eula is not yet released we need to wait and see what the Home EULA says.

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/eula.aspx

All being said, despite this price difference for an upgrade I doubt this will convert anyone to the Mac since the "Mac lifestyle" no matter how you calculate it is more expensive to purchase maintain or upgrade your system - while memory is cheap, ever compare the prices they charge at an Apple store to what they charge at your local Best Buy? Keep in mind that most Mac users get everything from the Apple store - they have no choice sometimes. If anything it will make people think a bit more before purchasing the upgrade if finances are tight, but I think given the quality of this version of Windows most people will shell out the cash and after we find out more about the EULA we'll know exactly how many systems we can install on.

Saying "Windows 7 prices are too high" is like saying "BIOS chip prices are too high" - without thinking of the bigger picture that a PC is still cheap. This article seems premature and doesn't consider the bigger picture in my opinion.

So, Snow Leopard will only be a Service Pack? And what did you honestly think Windows 7 is? While Vista was (at best) a clunky beta version, 7 is the final product, for which you will have paid twice.
Mine's the one which costs $29 and comes out in September.

Yes I agree they have millions of lines of code to churn out and no self respecting code monkey does that for free. However MS has the lions share of the market and a surefire way of cutting down on the number of pirated copies of it OS's would be to sell it for more sensible prices. They also need to look at shipping 2 versions; Home and Pro. Just like XP this cuts down on confusion with consumers and makes life alot easier where support is concerned.

At the moment XP SP3 fufills all of my needs and ok it doesn't have DX10 but to be honest the differences between that and DX9 are minimal. Until Windows 7 Ultimate is priced sensibly there seems to be little reason for anyone or I to upgrade. If they had a special introductory offer running for the first few months which placed it at the same price as XP Pro then the uptake would be huge. The initial installer base would then act as a referall base for late arrivals.

"...they'll likely consider installing some user friendly flavour of Linux for free..."

And they wonder why people resort to piracy. Set your prices right and most people would prefer a legit version with no hassles for upgrades, patches etc. Rip people off like this and many, many people will wait for a hacked version.

I hope you didnt just use the build the laptop manufacturer put on it?

Whenever you buy a new laptop, first thing you do is wipe the HDD and put on a fresh OS install. Works far far better that way.

As for prices...what are we worried about? We all know we'll be buying the OEM version for half the price.

As a Linux user and advocate I'll personally stick with Ubuntu, however I do have a couple of machines that already have Windows (my HTPC running Vista Home Premium, my wife's laptop running XP Home and my wife's desktop running XP Home) and my laptop dual boots with Vista Home Premium basically because it was free.

I've had a look (granted briefly) at the Windows 7 Beta and I'm quite impressed especially considering the speed increase over Vista. Now if Microsoft were to do like what they have done with the Office licensing for home users then I possibly would buy a copy to upgrade my Windows machines. They would still probably make a fair whack of cash on Windows and Office for businesses anyway who can't use the home versions.

Rob

Microsfots RETAIL products are supported by Microsoft (you can phone them if something goes wrong, You are paying for the support.

OEM versions are supported by the system builder (so are cheaper)

If I had to release a (software) product and sell it without knowing what piece of crap computer you are trying to run it on, I would charge alot more than £150 (bare in mind it will be supported for several years)

Look at the price of Adobe products £150 is cheap.

90% of Vista problems I come across are because people are clueless and trying to run it on a 5 year old PC which was designed for Windows XP.

If a Vista based PC is built by someone with a clue, it is fast and stable, if it is built by 90% of others that look at the minimum spec, and expect it to be fast, i'm sorry but you get what you deserve

Only the commenter ‘Mike’ appears to see the picture here. Why would Microsoft want people to ‘upgrade’ their old machines to Windows 7? That would be stupid considering they are partners with Intel, Dell, HP and nearly every other hardware manufacturer out there.

** IT IS IN THEIR INTERESTS TO SHIFT HARDWARE **

They want you to scrap your old PC, trundle on down to PC World / Best Buy and buy a new one BECAUSE of Windows 7. I am surprised this journalist could not work that out.

Right on, and Snow Leopard has new full 64 bit kernel for a full 64 bit but 32 bit backward compatible OS. Someone try and tell me MS can do that. If you take MS marketing flavours and they have two branches 32 bit and 64 bit it is crazy.

@jason OEM is the way I will go later for my home built (still a killer setup) gaming rig. I will dual boot W7-64 for about $100 (thanks newegg) when I see games coming out that need it and will not run on my 32bit XP or will just run better on 7-64 bit.

Question on OEM Windows. Does not Windows OEM edition look for branded computers such as HP, DEll and the rest to basically force you to buy retail or does OEM versions not care as long as it is a new disk and never activated?
Does anyone know.

@ Mark Tupper

Why aren't you using Photoshop 2.0, Office 97 and Netscape Browser on Windows 98 SE if you are so proud you never upgrade anything. Dick!

Yes OEM will run on Branded PCs.

As for Your first comment do you think Apple could release OSX to run on the billions of different hardware combinations that Windows has to run on, compared to the tightly controlled small ranges of hardware Apple supports?

There is a good reason why Apple will never dare release OSX into the mainstream. It couldnt cope.

I have W7 Ultimate RC on a drive and it's pretty, but pretty useless without a PC upgrade. Let alone having to PAY for it one day soon ...
I'm using Ubuntu 8.10 which is excellent and filled with handy gear like OpenOffice etc. and all FREE!
However, what MS has going for it - still - is 'brand loyalty.'
Close friends of mine bought a new PC with Vista Home Edition installed, and were perturbed to find that they didn't have MS Word or Excel! Which gave them some serious issues with e-mail attachments.
So I downloaded and installed OpenOffice for them. BUT! they weren't comfortable with it becos they thought it was ILLEGAL !!!
So they saved (?) up their money, and bought MS Office Suite, and now they are happy campers ...
Before any MS fanboy makes any smart comments about OO vs MS Office, I should mention that my friends' demands go no further than opening e-mail attachments and writing the odd document or two. Basic stuff.
This is a ridiculous circumstance! And it demonstrates the sheer might of a global conglomerate which frightens everyone with law-suits and patent infringement threats left, right, and centre. It's a deliberate and well-funded campaign to scare off potential open-source users. What a bunch of clowns!
This cannot last much longer.
The sheer uptake of XP PCs and laptops over the last few years leaves MS with little choice about what to do re. W7 except to force them into their new OS.
And MS's bets hinge around the 'brand loyalty' I mentioned earlier.
It takes a lot of money and advertising to convince ordinary people that there's only one way to go. They have to pay for it. They are stuck with add-ons like anti-virus software and SpyBot as a normal way of life without which they feel uncertain about security.
With a Linux OS, one has to deliberately download and install with 'root' privileges a file which might alter the way that OS proceeds. Clicking on a hyperlink in Outlook Express invites potentially instant trouble, or later issues with Trojans.
Anyway, back to my heading ..
Eventually the world will wake up to the fact that Windows is a mess that can only get worse.
Losing heavily on the server market - where everyone with half a brain utilises Unix servers - and with virtualization growing day by day in functionality and utility, the good old days of Windows are sliding to an end.
Eventually home users will see through the hype, and opt for price (zero) and usefulness (100%)

Mike.

Gareth Evans believes that this situation is still not sufficiently extreme to promote a move to Linux in "the near future". He is absolutely correct: I am typing this using Ubuntu (Linux); an operating system I installed on a laptop over a year ago when Vista proved to be such an unnecessarily expensive and massively backward step. I haven't looked back. It's still working perfectly.

Naturally, I still have an XP machine for playing games and running more "standard" software for work purposes, but for safe daily access to the world wide wibble using a "low spec" computer, Linux scorches anything released by M$.

I have been using the windows 7 rc since it was released and I have to say that every time I use vista or xp I get disappointed because it doesn't do something that windows 7 does. Never mind the fact that in the ultimate version there is an option which gives it 100% compatibility with xp software as it runs it through full native speed virtualisation. Upgrading on a mac is literally a service pack. I upgraded to mac osx leopard and for the life of me the only thing I can find different is stacks in the dock. The price is expense for windows but it's worth it, unlike buying a mac and just opening your wallet while apple helps itself every year

@Regulas:
64-bit kernels by Windows are Windows XP x64, Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2008, Windows Vista, and soon to be - Windows 7. Maybe I was missing your sarcastic humor pointing out the fact that Mac users have been suffering without 64-bit for so long? Microsoft had working 64 bit code even before the first AMD Athlon 64-bit chip was released. (I know this because I saw it running.)

@Mike: $50 or so gets you Office 2007 with licenses for 3 computers that will suit your friend just fine. If you didn't give them this advice - you must not have liked them too much or don't have a clue. I'm sure there are other possibilities but this is supposed to be a trolling insult.

Saying Win7 is a service pack is like calling every version of MAC OSX a service pack from its original incarnation (2000), when you think about it like that you've had 7 service packs costing $129 each, plus the latest 1 at $49. Lets estimate OSX costs $200 if you think of it as part of the Apple Tax.

Lets compare XP - $65 for OEM XP (released in 2001), SP1 FREE, SP2 FREE, SP3 FREE, $149 for Windows Vista Upgrade (2007), SP1 FREE and $179 for Windows 7 Upgrade.

So in the last 9 years you would have spent $1152 on OSX, in the last 8 you would have spent $393 on Windows.

Mine's the one I don't have to pay for Service Packs.

MSDN FTW!

"every time I use vista or xp I get disappointed because it doesn't do something that windows 7 does"

Name 5 things.

I invested in a new PC last year it came with Vista (what choice!), I waited until Vista's SP1 was released in order to avoid the initial problems.. well I was dissapointed most of Vistas problems still exist, it is a shoddy system, MS admitted this and now have Win7, which they want me to buy? so Im supposed to fork out twice within 12 months to get an OS that works properly? in this economic climate do they expect me to be happy about that??? IM NOT!

It's not just the price of Win7.
I'm an IT teacher and the techies at school ALL run Linux OSs in their lab.
They have it all figured out far better than me.
They are cluey dudes and know what's going on.
The Education Minister, being heavily lobbied by MS twirps, will soon sign off on a contract which eventually will force schools to go with Win7, having skipped Vista and forcing schools to ditch hundreds of thousands of quite useful 400 mgz PC boxes which are still quite capable of running under XP 99% of useful programs like SolidWorks which after all is hardly new.
Schools are an enormous market, and that's where MS has targeted its sales.
One can only imagine the pressure placed upon Government agencies to implement unnecesssary upgrades when the previous hardware is fine and the software is undemanding of the extant system.
The kids get cross when they can't get on line quickly. That's a network issue rather than a problem with their school PC or laptop.
Apparently that will be fixed once everyone updates to W7 ...
I DON'T THINK SO!
The techies want Unix servers, so that kids can't plug in a USB device and screw the system with .exe games and programs at point. Kids are dead smart.
I feel sorry for the techies because they know that a far superior server option is available, but our Government is locked into special deals with MicroSoft dealers.
I think that it's pretty screwy.
I believe that it's on the record that Google and YaHoo use Unix servers.

Mike

Average Joe has XP and buys Vista ($200); he isn't pleased. 2 years later, M$ releases a fix for Vista called Windows 7, average Joe has to pay an additional $100 to upgrade, but average Joe was told there are compatibility issues so he buys the full Windows 7 ($200). Average Joe has paid $400 for a broken OS and its fix.

I wonder why average Joe has to pay such a high price for a fix...

woot! yay for high windows prices! another score for linux!! :D

90% or more of Windows in the home is purchased with new computers. A computer manufacturer pays about $25 for the OS. The retail version is massively more expensive. Why is this. Well MS made big deals to make sure their OS was in every computer. This gave MS a monopoly and gave the compute3r manufacturers a huge advantage. How is a small shop of DIY to compete with the crap the OEM retailers put out when the OS is the single most expensive part in anything but the highest end system. Yes you got it right.. a $300 and a $3000 will pay pretty much the same for the OS pretty much.

Now you know why people bootleg the OS so much.

Just paid $296 for a Technet subscription, will cover my 5 home PCs plus get all sorts of other stuff, Office 2007 Ultimate etc. Compared to the cost of 5 W7 licences it was a bargain.

Yup. High priced..
But probably set that way for two reasons.
MS likes lottsa cash, and helps boost new PC sales. $200-$300 for a retail license or $500-$700 for a new system that comes with it.. Uptake on '7' will have more realistic numbers as I don't foresee a lot of people wanting to downgrade from it on their new PC.

I avoided Vista due to the many problems reported by users and gurus. I figured there would be no need to get the latest "shiny" since it cost so much, demanded so much, and seemed to be more problems than it was worth. Meanwhile, all the Mac fan boys and Linux geeks have been beating their drums. I've held off on going there, but it seems like it won't be long before I stray down another path. Seems now would be the time for Apple and Linux to push forward with great savings over MS.

The author might want to do a bit more reading. If you look at the FAQ, the "Upgrade" pre-release versions (and prices) are valid for XP in a clean install.

"I am running Windows XP, can I upgrade to Windows 7?"
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/buy/offers/pre-order-faq.aspx

You do not need to purchase the "Full Version" if you already have XP. But you may want to run the "Upgrade Advisor" to see if your videocard can push the new desktop.

You just will not be able to magically hit go and have it carry everything over as you do with Vista.

I suspect this little detail is hidden in the FAQ to boost retail sales on release for those who do not read the fine print.

F*ck, this is the crap that keeps analysts in jobs these days? "It is too expensive" - real wisdom there, how long did it take the analyst to come up with that conclusion?

JUST STEAL WINDOWS 7 FROM WORK! That is what intelligent people do, I know I am going to.

Even if Microsoft GIVES You FREE O/S, Plainly marked on Plastic Box. FRE NOT For Resale. Aggressive Activation will break that Gift & Demand Payment-s, within days of its use. Its ONE Lousy Ass'd Company Run By necro. Thats Microsoft breaking Its Most dear promise to resellers. Just isn't worth effort to deal with rip off. You Take Burden of poor management. Management by Felons.

Linux Anit that BAD, for causual user.

BAD Hardware with crummy marketing leave Jack poor boy. Jill came tumbling after.

Hey- Hon Barak, Nationalize MICROSOFT. Microsoft Promised FREE Software to ALL, In Exchange for Data & Testing. MICROSOFT IS LIAR. vondrashek

Its time... Radically Simple, FREE of Cost, Viruses, Spyware, and BS... Linux for the PC is Here!

As a brit living in the UK I just bought 5 upgrade copies of Win 7 premium for $250. At $50 per upgrade licence I have no issue with the price. My UMPC cost over $1k and was ad og with Vista, Win7 made it useable, so money well spent. Win7 has a lot of compelling media center improvements over vista for my HTPC so again justified. I play games on my desktop so directX 11 is a must, again justified. I could go on but when it costs less most components in my home built PC's and has a longer "useful" life than a gaming graphics card or a hard drive I have no issue.

Not many people go into stores and buy Windows operating systems.

Generally PC's are sold with the operating system pre loaded and every Dell or HP that gets sold with Vista on it leads to a sizable cut for Microsoft.

Only problem is nobody is buying PC's at the moment given the current climate and few people are likely to go pay that much for the operating system.

I think us nerds will either download it or buy it up pretty fast but I can't see many people buying PC's this year and I sure as hell can't see people putting down 120 bucks in a computer store for Windows 7.

I think Windows 7 should do fairly well but in the bigger picture it will be a huge failure with fewer PC's and copies of the OS beind sold due to the financial climate.

upgrade to 7 when it costs a hundred bucks. Or less, meanwhile -I am not aware of a single innovation it possess to incite me to upgrade. Maybe someone is in the know... I mean -NTFS was plenty of reason to upgrade from 95/98 to XP, XP became pretty solid after SP2.

Whatever.

MS,MS,oh MS. Have you not learnt yet? Crystal ball prediction. Win 7 fails to be a huge success, not because of ability but by MS being shortsighted and plainly GREEDY.....
The first thing MS forgets is the huge contribution by thousands of beta testers, which clearly cuts down a lot of MS expenditure. And that alone should be reflected in retail price. They have the nerve to want such a price for the minimum win 7 version? It should be consolidated to ONE OS version. Seems they have not learnt from vista.
So if you got Vista with SP1 - keep it. If you got XP sp2/sp3 - keep it.
If and it will get pirated, do what you think is best.

I have paid for windows vista business and it won’t run properly on my system with frequent blue screen with no explanation. There is no way I will pay such a high price for what is basically a fix

You should read the license to MSN/Technet/Action pack. Typically it says a) it may be used for support and development purposes only - not production and b) the licenses expire if you do not renew each year.

Sure, you could ignore that, and I'm sure Microsoft won't deactivate your copy, but if you're going to break the license terms anyway why don't you just pirate it?

OEM vs Retail is very simple. OEM is tied to the motherboard it is activated on. Retail can be moved between computers. Retail contains five Microsoft support calls. OEM must be supported by the vendor that sells you the computer.

OEM no longer has to be sold with hardware, and if anyone says this is true they haven't read the license. It can be sold from, and to, anyone provided it hasn't been opened.

If the motherboard you're using with OEM fails and it is impossible to find a suitable replacement, Microsoft might let you reactivate on a comparable motherboard. They aren't obliged to help if you decide to drop an anvil on your Core 2 Duo motherboard and decide to replace it with a Core i7.

Some manufacturers have special cases, where the activation is tied to the BIOS. They get a special version of Windows. I.e. Dell Vista only works on certain Dell PCs. Unless you're selling computers in the millions, this doesn't apply to the rest of us.

To re-iterate what was said about 64 vs 32bit. Windows 64 bit has been around for ages. It's compatible with practically all Windows software. 32 bit drivers aren't supported. 16 bit Windows and DOS are not supported. Otherwise it's pretty good, and much better for large memory situations.

MS doesnt really care what motherboard the OEM is installed on. Just as long as its one OEM license to one computer.

I've moved my OEM licenses around and MS hasnt worried. I'd had to call into MS to get the license install number refreshed and they just ask that its only installed on the one computer.

Fair enough.

We change the name, we changed the version, we changed the packaging. It is now time for you to hand over the cash. We could have lowered prices if you would have given us your money for Vista, but NOOOOO, you had to whine and moan about how well it works. What is the MATTER with you people?

Hello?! Have we EVER made anything that works to expectations? Why this sudden holding us to the fire?

It is time. Pay up. Now. Do it.

VC

Hi Charlie

It's a bit stupid to try to compare the pricing for a Windows 7 upgrade to the latest upgrade for OSX (Snow Leopard, is it?). The biggest reason is that Apple is a HARDWARE company and Microsoft is a SOFTWARE company. Microsoft makes it's money by writing and selling software. Apple makes it's money by making and selling very pretty and ridiculously expensive computing devices.

While OSX is good, it is not Apple's primary product. It is practically an afterthought. They can sell it at a much lower price because their goal is not to profit from OSX upgrades, it is to profit from hardware sales. They're happy just to recoup development costs for OSX. That's why most major revisions to OSX come at the time that new hardware is launched.

Maybe if the EU would stop fining Microsoft into Oblivion and wasting their time they wouldn't get backlashed and might have prices that compare to Americans.

And to compare Windows 7 to Snow Leopard is a joke. Snow Leopard is a 1-year service pack with minor tweaks where Windows 7 is effectively a 3-4 year developed OS revamp.

While the Home Premium upgrade may be priced at $120, it is available for pre-order for nearly $50.

They have no problem in selling Snow Leopard for $30 (compared to MS's $120 for Windows 7) because:

1- They already charged you $1500 extra for the same hardware when you bought your iMac.

2- They're _selling_ a service pack.

3- Andrew has a very good point. MS sell retail versions for more compared to OEM versions because they charge for support. They don't know what they heck you're going to run their OS on unlike Apple. Do you really think Apple would sell Snow Leopard upgrades for $30 if they were to remove all those artificial restrictions and officially enable running Snow Leopard on non-Apple hardware?

Rampant piracy is the excuse that inflated software giants like Microsoft will use to justify their absorbent prices. But those prices are what drives piracy into overdrive. Not even on the large scale profit making schemes that some shady companies use. Joe User will learn the ins and outs of torrent sites and from there all of the keygen/activation scheme breaks available. Even though the Activation process put in place by Microsoft was supposed to be their weapon of choice, all its done is added a speedbump to the end-user that has to reload their machine after a crash.
Microsoft themselves could do a lot to legitimize their own software if they charged a MUCH more reasonable price for sure. $320 for a flagship operating system? Really? And the only real benefit is that it includes hard drive imaging software to make on the fly backups. Something else Apple does and does for the VERY low upgrade cost too.
Yes, Microsoft has earned a big BOOOOO for their price points on this one.

Whatever sales of retail and upgrade license MS manages to sell, is just gravy.

The real meat & potatoes is what will be shipping on new hardware, and MS pricing to OEMs bears no relationship to the retail pricing.

I never even considered upgrading to Vista at all, I run XP64 and its been rock solid right out of the box. The main reason for not wanting to go to vista was the issue of DRM. Dont want it on principal thanks very much.
Now Windows 7 is about to be released for sale and it has MORE DRM than vista had. I dont agree with this at all.
I also dont like the way Microshaft try their best to keep the subject covered up.

So Microsoft take Windows from 6.0 to 6.1 giving it a new user interface and some under the hood changes and fixes and that is a new version.

Apple takes OSX from 10.5 to 10.6 giving it a completely redeveloped and redefined engine ready to take advantage and make it easy for developers to take advantage of multi threading and GPGPU from the core, and convert 90% of the built in apps to 64bit and in turn of these changes increase the speed of the bundled apps by 200% for some of them, yet only tweak the UI so you call it a service pack.

So it seems that the UI makes a OS upgrade a service pack or a full release even though a Windows service pack would at the closest resemble a 10.6.x release as these are the releases that have bug fixes, security patches, and the occasional new features and drivers.

Honestly there is little doubt that these prices along with the continued use of the idiot DRM system and UAC systems built into Vista and Windows 7 is gonna continue to hurt the MS market share. I mean seriously look at the number after 2 years Vista still only has a 3rd of the usage XP has plus the linux usage has doubled and major manufacturers have even started openly preloading linux on their machines which you never would have gotten before without spending 10 hours on the phone arguing before Vista's bomb. It's also gonna be worth pointing out that if Windows 7 has the same or higher requirements then Vista it's gonna be increasingly difficult for OEM's to show a profit on systems unless MS is selling Windows 7 to them cheaper then Vista because the systems will have to be higher end but to maintain sales in the current economy they can't raise their prices.

Not to mention DRM is something a lot of people are moving away from because they realise it hurts them more then helps cause all it does it inconviences their legitimate customers, proof of point EA abandoning DRM for the Sims 3 release. Honestly there has not been a DRM system which hasn't been hacked inside of a month, these days usually inside of the week before a given item launches so the cracks are ready to go on launch date.

Also I gotta say that the lack of a volume license package is possibly gonna hurt them more then the high prices regardless of the version. I've had a bit of dealing with the multi license support of MS with the business versions and let me tell you it's not exactly the best. Honestly having a 5 license version ready on store shelves would get them a lot more small business purchases rather then having to go direct to MS to buy the corperate version and then work out with them how many licenses you wanted at a price which they can change whenever the mood hits them.

http://t.microcentermail.com/ajtk/servlet/JJ?H=506i14&R=1100146513&P=16184650;1100146513

Go to that link, the company has several stores around the country and this might just help all of you.

THREE DAYS ONLY!!!

Upgrades

Windows 7 Home $39.99

Windows 7 Pro $89.99

Linux FTW!

Linux will continue to be refined, updated, have performance increases, compatibility etc.

The other OS's are far too slowly developed and don't offer the customisability that you can get with Linux.

Replacing your window manager to suit your preferences isn't that hard and no other retail OS has such capability.

It's just a matter of time before it surpasses everything else. I wonder which Microsoft OS is going to be on all those new ARM laptops coming out? Hmmm.

If users with older PCs can't afford to shell out the better part of a grand to buy a new PC and monitor, they'll likely pirate it for free instead of ponying up the substantial wad of dosh needed to get Windows ME II SP7.

(fixed)

I would guess my company's policy is similar to a lot of others:

1. Existing desktops and laptops stay on XP (we never went to Vista, even new PCs) -- no upgrades in general

2. They're working an internal version of Linux distribution (it's actually not bad, have to give them credit for the recent progress; they moved a lot of stuff around and aliased it so it looks a lot like XP, and it is pretty rich -- lots of free programs, kind of cool actually, and a LOT better than Linux of even a few years ago)

3. They're also working on a support structure for Apple OS, PCs, they sure have some proponents there.

4. When Win7 gets out, they'll do a comparison, pick whichever works best, is most effective, or all, as appropriate, probably early next year.

So mostly, it's going to be wait and see, which after the Vista disaster, and given the current economic environment, seems like a pretty good idea.

I am a little surprised about the Microsoft upgrade pricing being so high, seems like they would like getting people off of Vista quickly. Not that Vista was as horrible as the press made it out to be, but it wasn't good, kind of the WinME of the NT line, big time consumer of resources compared to XP and Linux, and frankly buggy in the UAC and driver areas. Win7 sounds promising, of course Vista did too ( before it was out), but if you're a poor abused Vista user, seems like they could have felt your pain a bit more, eaten their pride and profitability, and as a bit of an apology offered lower pricing. I think if Bill Gates was really running things at Microsoft, they would have done just that, but it's just not the same company, now that his personal involvement has cut back.

I'm expecting that Win7 is mostly going to attract WinXP users who never took the plunge with Vista. So 8 years later they'll pay some $300 or something for an upgrade? That's not so bad.

Anyway, their pricing is about the same as it's always been. Quite frankly Microsoft isn't gaining a whole lot by catering to those cheap-asses who whine about buying 2GB of RAM or think their $250 netbook should have a $200 OS for free. They probably weren't future customers anyway. Gotta cut your losses somewhere.

Personally, I'm impressed with Win7 RC's performance. It's about high time to move on from WinXP.

By combating piracy, and raising the prices at the same time, they are cutting off their "customers" from both ends.

Hadn't it been for rampant piracy of the 90s, Windows would have ended up in the trash bins of history. They would have never succeeded in getting the HW OEMs sign exclusive deals with M$.

As most of us know, DirectX 11 will come with W7. For that one some of new GPUs are comming also,[i.e NVidia GT300]
Those guys that also pay hard for a GPU plus 34nm SSD, W7 is just a little bite to their pocket.

People can't upgrade their Windows machine's RAM or OS, so they'll get Linux?

So, I can't have a new BMW, so I'll buy a Kia?

There's something a bit faulty with that logic.

People will upgrade when people normally upgrade . . .when they get a new computer.

Been using the RC for a while now, and have to say I'm impressed. Only had an issue with one driver, had to use compatibility mode which actually works now, everything else just fell in, including free AV and firewall, Firefox has no issues, Office 2003 in, Photoshop 7n various other things. System runs faster than it doees on XP with exactly the same programs on an "old" PC (Athlon 2600XP 1gig ram, 320gigs hard disk space, FX5500 gfx card) and even runs aero. Definitely impressed with it.

So what? anyone who finds 80 quid too much to pay doesn't want or arguably deserve a contemporary computer. I know people who would happily pay twice or three times that for a handbag. An iPhone 3 G S will cost shitloads more. Get perspective....

"That $120 is a pretty big nut," said Baker, "especially when you can buy a new PC for around $300."

Baker pulled out those figures from his behind. At $300 you get a copy of Windows preinstalled with the PC. Same will happen with Windows 7 is released.
Pathetic article!

With respect to XP, neither Vista nor Windows qualify for the description "upgrade", unless you consider running slower a feature.

"Whatever the market will bear." That's why certain sports shoes, sports jackets and etc. carry such a high price tag. It has nothing to do with recouping R&D, retooling, or development costs. As long as people will pay, the prices will stay high.

If people want prices to drop, then people have to lower demand.

The latest price I've seen for Windows XP Pro retail is $160 for the upgrade and $269 for the full version. Why? Because the vendors can get away with it and because it's becoming a rare commodity.

Oh well, no Windows Vista 7 for me ... I like the crappy old XP I have. And I paid $133 for it via Microsoft's Home User Program through my former employer.

My copy of Snow Leopard will only cost me £7.95. There is no chance in hell I would pay for windows 7 at these prices.

@Mike
You do know your argument is TOTALLY FLAWED in trying to say that macOS is more expensive than windows by counting the number of service packs. It only shows that windows is a product of poor quality that NEEDED the stupid number service packs to fix it.

I love the fact that Vista buyers/users will get screwed by having to pay again for this release. The sheep that adopt crap for no other reason than because it is new deserve to suffer the degraded experience and performance of their foolish trust and ignorance. It's these type of people that allow corporations to run roughshod over consumers rights and benefits by attempting to make bad products the defacto standard of the day by purchasing them without any meritable reason. As a result, those Vista users can shove their whiny ass complaints up their azzes about how they have some loyalty right to a free upgrade for whatever reason. Microsoft cares only about control and money and when you stop providing them those resources, your opinion matters about as much as an Ubuntu user. So admit your foolishness for "downgrading", cough up the cash for your "service pack" and try not to be such ignorant sheep in the future.

I for one will stick to XP for my gaming until there is a compelling and justified reason to upgrade. For goodness sakes, if people haven't learned that growth (upgrading) for the sake of growth is a bad thing then you don't understand our world's crisis. Real growth should provide enhancements, benefits and increased prosperity and I don't mean just for the corporations.

at $200 for home premium, that would mean that OEM license on a place like newegg would be around 130 dollars.

Please do not tell me that an OS like XP which lasted me 8 years is not worth 130 dollars.

People always wig on the retail boxed versions. I do not want tech support, even though it is actually really good. I could see within a year the oem license, full install, will be around 110 dollars. Fools on these forums (like myself) buy 200+ dollars worth of 50 dollar games per year.

Who isnt going to buy L4D, D3, SC2 and some other random game? Add those up and your OEM full install will be cheaper.

Vista runs slower if your comp is a hunk of rotting poop.

It is faster in many benchmarks. Dx 10.1 (not 10 necessarily) runs games really really fast. Vista just was unnecessary to ever buy. Now that the world is going to dx11 and beyond, for a gamer, you really have to go the windows 7 route.

How does one define something slower? a 200 mhz bump in processor costs around 20 dollars and will negate any possible slow down a user might experience.

My only objection is the difficulty at times running older games that are better than newer games.

You want faster? get NT 4.0 and put it on a 3.5 ghz intel. Now that's freakin fast. Or, Windows 2000 and do the same. Makes xp a bit slow compared. Do you really want to do that though? for the 5% gang?

too much whining not enough xx

A lot of people like me bought a retail copy of win vista and yes we still want to upgrade (we have issues I know that ).I cannot believe that MS punishes legitimate customers (especially vista retail customers which we are like virgins not too many ).The prices are too high for an OS which is actually the
fixed version of the previous not an advanced version but the 'correct version'.Also it happens to own a mac besides my pc and yes Leopard is much cheaper without the 'editions'
start,basic not too basic ,professional ,ultimate ,avant garde etc.Its an OS
godamnit a program to run other programs
and use devices it should be transparent and cheap

i'm an avid gamer and video encoder. xp is fast. i've used vista and there is no reason to use vista or win7 at this point. not even directx10 is being used in games yet to any extent. vista is about 10% more sluggish on pc than xp. pretty sad that netbooks have to use xp still isn't it. microsoft is a dinosaur and dying slowly every year.

Stating that these prices are too high because people can buy whole computers for $300 is both misleading and ignorant.

Baker quotes the probable prices for the full retail versions of Windows 7. Again, these are full retail prices. A vast majority of computer builders avoid full retail copies like the plague, opting instead to buy the markedly cheaper OEM copies.

One online merchant is already offering an OEM copy of 64-bit Vista Ultimate with a free upgrade to 64-bit 7 Ultimate for $189. It would be more realistice to quote those numbers than the $119 very few people will pay for a Home Premium upgrade at retail, unless, of course, you're biased towards Linux or trying to start a flame war.

LINUX:
Great OS. Lack of quality software. Game manufacturers do not code for it (probably because of Open Source nature of system innards). LINUX lovers will proclaim, "I can run any Win app using WINE!" Liars.

MacOS:
Very pretty (tho' getting a bit dated looking, don't you think?). Only runs on Mac hardware, which is the same as 3-year old PC hardware, at 5 times the price of said 3-year old PC hardware. At least Apple gave up on making their own processors, otherwise iDiots would be paying 10 times the price of 3-yr old hardware. Game manufacturers don't code for MacOS; they may *port* to it, but no native code. 1000's of games and other software (ahem, free portable apps) for PC, 10's for Mac. Apple's got an incredible pair on 'em, advertising Mac as the hip choice, when it *won't play games*!

Win 7:
Running it on desktop (2-yr old innards) and laptop (3-yr old). Screams like a cheetah. Used the beta before the RC, and all I can say is, I'm really impressed with how rock-solid the performance is. I have the bones of 5 different unrecoverable Vista installs on various HDDs, all of which occurred for some random, unfathomable reason. Since February, I've had *zero* BSODs, hangs or spontaneous reboots with Win 7.

I'll be buying OEM Ultimate version for c. $170, and it will be the best money I've spent on software in a loooong time...

Yes the prices might be too steep, but the upgrade preorder of home premium or professional is very reasonable. Ive preordered mine it only cost me $50 which is fair.

Sure many will argue that it might have many flaws ect, but it does not mean il install it the first day il just wait until they fix the major problems and install it later.
Il get win 7 eventually why not now?
Its the best opportunity.

I don't understand why vista has got so much bashing by people all around the world. I have been using vista for a year now, and can safely say that it has not caused any major problems for me.It has an amazing interface and all the softwares/games which i have tested are being run perfectly. I guess if u have the right specs for vista then it works like magic. The worst part is many people have not chosen vista due to its negative popularity without giving it a change.

I have seen a ridiculous amount of bad info. Saying that a Mac is more expensive (aka 1500$, hence the OS is cheaper) just perpetrate the myth. Choose your Mac, then go on Dell and try to build the same thing. First of all, Dell will be a little more expensive and you are definitely not getting the same hardware quality and design. Full cost for OSX is $129. Having an SP at $29 makes sense. The reason why MS didn't dare to charge for their multiple SP is because they already charged at least 2x more for XP or Vista, and if you don't SP your OS, you put the entire line in danger, because the millions of security issues.

MICROSOFT....NEVER AGAIN!

I designed, tested, and manufactured Media Center Servers professionally when the MCE UI was developed in beta many moons ago for Windows XP. The aggravations that Vista caused me after XP MCE caused blood to shoot out of every raging orifice of my being. At the time I was a Microsoft devotee and purchased several copies of retail and oem Vista Ultimate copies.

I waited and waited, but Microsoft never once gave me my money's worth for Vista Ultimate after nearly a year of unresolved (And maddening) NVIDIA/VISTA driver problems (TDR, anyone...anyone?) So I decided to buy an iphone and an imac.

I am currently running Windows 7 ULTMATE RC2 on VMWARE on Leopard and although I appreciate that Microsoft has copied many of the already visual and simplified organizational structures of the Apple OS X Leopard operating system, I can't say that I see any tangible reason why anyone who was ripped off purchasimg Vista Ultimate should have to pay ANY MONEY AT ALL for Windows 7 Ultimate.

I was shocked and abhorred to find out that the fuckwads in Redmond think I should pay $219 for an upgrade that should be given away for FREE to those who wasted their money on a broken Vista OS that cost them time and productivity and NEVER delivered anything Ultimate, unless an ULTIMATE MIGRAINE, ULTIMATE PAIN IN THE ASS, ULTIMATE ULCER, or ULTIMATE PSYCHOSIS counts for anything.

I sold my XBOX 360, my $6000 media server that I built, & my Creative ZEN MP3 PLAYER.

Just about the time I was considering drinking the shit-flavored Windows Kool-Aid again....I quickly had flash backs and remembered that I vowed to never give MS another dollar of my money ever again.

If you work for Microsoft and you are reading this then you are a fuckwad and you should considering suicide.

In the mean time I will wait for Snow Leopard which will leap frog Windows 7 when it's released in a few months.

Microsoft, you can send all your hate emails to jcarcopo@live.com

I use MobileMe now and only use my live account for spam which is all it is good for.

( I have 20+ years using, testing, recommending, and supporting Microsoft, but now I am one of the many converted Mac users who helped Apple achieve a 10% (and growing daily) market share

Be ready greedy shareholders to lose money because of windows 7 wouldn't sell much , not at those prices . I'm sticking with XP with or without support from MS . When my comp gets infected ? I will make sure to send many outbound emails to the Co-op like MS . Lets all infect the internet and watch what the big boys will do about it LMAO

Think of a program as a pile of endless sand in your backyard. Now if it's endless why sell it for 200$ why not 10-30 and why sell it with a licence that restricts buyers from using it for anything other then a small sandbox only in their own backyard? Why can't i take it to grandmom's place to make swimming pool with it?

Once a program like the windows os is written, it is there and it's endless u can copy it zillions of times with only the cost of the cd or dvd :p or u can copy it on a USB stick for free!

Lower prices and a non restrictive licence is in order, DRM my ass! Or why not give it only for the dvd and package price then offer services for money? Makes sense to me tbh. Apple is in this regard no different.

MS is just greedy and knows that it monopolizes the market that's why it does things like this.

The only way to break this is to stop using windows.

I for one will not use win7, Vista or any other windows anymore. I'm sick of having to pay for vista then for win7 cus wista sucked then for another licence cus i changed my pc! I'll go with a legal hackintosh or mac or even a Gnu/Linux like Ubuntu or Mint or Fedora or Suse.

just google bit torrents learn how to use it, it very simple best program is utorrent then download windows 7 for free. as the master key has been leaked the version im using is seen as fully legit. i know that many people dont agree with downloads and iso and all that but come on £150 for 7, they only did windows 7 cos they messed up with vista.

So, the point is to maximize marginal profit. Microsoft's marginal cost for a copy of Windows is just a few bucks, so most of what you pay goes straight to the bottom line.

Now look at the marketing data.

If cutting the upgrade price in half would get them more than double the number of upgrades, it's a good idea.

If cutting the upgrade price in half would get them a few percent more upgrades, then they'd be idiots to do it.

BTW, comparing Microsoft and Apple upgrade prices is apples and oranges. Apple's updates are far more frequent - the cost over time of staying up to date is about the same. In contrast, Microsoft doesn't charge for major service packs.