Microsoft Gives Up On Vista

[cash4notes]

"The question now isn't "Is Vista Dead?" It is. The real question is: Can Microsoft get Windows 7 out in time to save its desktop domination? I think Microsoft "could" pull it off. Here's how."

Vista is dead.

That's not what Bill Gates said at a seminar on corporate philanthropy in Miami on April 4, but it might as well have been. What Gates actually said, according to the Reuters report, is that he expects that the next desktop version of Windows, Windows 7, would be released "sometime in the next year or so."

Goodbye Vista. It has not been fun knowing you.

I predicted that Microsoft was giving up on Vista in January. It seems I was right. Microsoft's own top brass had hated Vista when it first came out, why should they expect anyone else to like it?

Vista SP1 has proven to be a painful upgrade and its performance still lags behind XP SP2 and, the still unreleased XP SP3. Worse still, from a Microsoft executive's viewpoint, Windows is actually losing desktop market share to Mac OS X and Linux. Microsoft never loses desktop market share. But with Vista Microsoft is finally losing customers.

I think Microsoft saw the handwriting on the wall early on. The company started playing up Windows 7 as early as July 2007. Now, Microsoft's business plan is always to get its customers to upgrade to the next version. It's how they make their billions. But, in this case, Vista was barely out the door.

Can Microsoft actually make a Windows 7 that can ship by 2009 that will win customers? Vista was infamous for its blown deadlines. Windows 7 must not only replace the failed Vista, it has to convince Microsoft's customers that Windows 7 will really be better than XP.

That isn't going to be easy. I find it more than a little telling that Microsoft has given XP Home a new lease on life for UMPC (Ultra Mobile PCs). Still. I think Microsoft has one card up its sleeve that just might keep its customers happy and make it out in 2009: Server 2008 Workstation.

In stark contrast with Vista, Server 2008 works extremely well in eWEEK Labs and in my own Linux-dominated office. Even with some security troubles, Server 2008 is a darn sight better than Vista or Server 2003.

Cleaned and Speeded Up

So, what Microsoft could do is use Server 2008's kernel as the core of Windows 7. On top of that it adds a cleaned and speeded up Aero Glass interface, Silverlight and Internet Explorer 8. At the same time, Microsoft should dump the Vista user interface command structure and return to XP.

One reason why people don't like Vista is not only is it slower than XP, it requires them to relearn how to do bread-and-butter operations. While Microsoft is at it, they can also throw out such annoying 'Vistaisms' as requiring users to answer seemingly endless menu choices on whether they really want to install a program or what have you.

To make darn sure that Windows 7 doesn't have the software compatibility problems that still plague Vista SP1, they can also add an XP compatibility layer. This would actually be an XP VM (virtual machine) running with Server 2008's Hyper-V virtualization. If an application doesn't run with the native Server 8 core, no problem; just automatically run it in the XP VM.

Old Windows hands will recall that Microsoft once used a similar approach in Windows NT 3.5 with a WOW (Windows on Windows) sub-system that let users run Windows 95 applications on NT.

If Microsoft were to take this path, I can actually see the company delivering a new desktop operating system by 2009 that users would actually want to use. If they try, as they did with Vista, to reinvent the desktop operating system wheel, there's no way they'll get anything out until 2011 that users will want to run.

And, by then, Microsoft's problem may be convincing Linux and Mac OS users to come back to Windows rather than trying to get XP users to upgrade. - By Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols 2008-04-04

Source: http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Windows/Mic...s-up-on-Vista/

Microsoft knew Vista sucked when they released it and just figured that they would work the bugs out later. With so many people giving Vista the finger and finding other OS Microsoft has to do something.

[The Flying Cow]

Actually Microsoft is releasing SP3 for XP this month. To keep it going, I would think. I mean don't get me wrong, SP2 is still annoying when you instal it, because of the useless programs you have to clean out with XPLite, like the Messenger that comes with it, some of that endless list of MSN games, and piles of other useless things like NetMeeting and bla-di-bla, but I still stick with it because Vista just seems like too big a leap atm. It's basically a MAC clone, visualwise.

[porvtorr]

good think i have not installed vista on my pc.

[escuoop]

I've just switched to it, and it wasn't that bad, and the good thing about it the security.
now most of the hackers targeting XP. Every day there is ton of new viruses.

[Cabalo]

lol @ article and linux noob that wrote it.

true_neo said it all. this is clearly a biased article, and it's worth crap.

i've Vista Ultimate X64 and it runs smooth and hiperfast on my machine, uninstalled windows XP forever, and not coming back to it.

i've a fairly powerful machine (c2d e8400 @ 4,3ghz @ 4gb ram @ 7950gx2) and it certainly runs smooth, no drivers incompatibility at all, the online driver database works flawlessly, it makes a way better usage of the ram compared to XP, which simply doesn't use the RAM for anything and lets it stay unused there waiting for the bus...

soon i'll try out on my home seedbox server 2008, as i am really curious about it. that machine runs windows 2k3 and i love that OS.

[Wi0]

lol @ article and linux noob that wrote it.

true_neo said it all. this is clearly a biased article, and it's worth crap.

i've Vista Ultimate X64 and it runs smooth and hiperfast on my machine, uninstalled windows XP forever, and not coming back to it.

i've a fairly powerful machine (c2d e8400 @ 4,3ghz @ 4gb ram @ 7950gx2) and it certainly runs smooth, no drivers incompatibility at all, the online driver database works flawlessly, it makes a way better usage of the ram compared to XP, which simply doesn't use the RAM for anything and lets it stay unused there waiting for the bus...

soon i'll try out on my home seedbox server 2008, as i am really curious about it. that machine runs windows 2k3 and i love that OS.

+1 I've had NO problems with Vista 32 and 64bit. If you don't have a powerful machine to run it quit complaining. It's not really an OS you just put on a 4 year old PC and expect it to work. I did it right, I built a brand new PC and Vista worked perfect without a hitch and is much faster than XP. Runs sooo smooth on 8GB ram 64bit

[t4sK]

I have to agree. I never did understand the fact that everyone seems annoyed by it. I never had issues with Vista at all. (although I AM a bit of a nix geek )

[tesco]

I have to agree. I never did understand the fact that everyone seems annoyed by it. I never had issues with Vista at all. (although I AM a bit of a nix geek )

It's got a ton of little annoyances but you get used to them.
All microsoft products have those.

[The Flying Cow]

Oh well I guess I'm just a bit frustrated that my lappie doesn't have the drivers for Vista, even though it came with that often-misleading "Vista Ready" or "Vista Prepared" sticker.

And yeah I know people who have Vista running even smoother than my XP. Maybe the article is a bit biased, but all articles are. The truth is Vista did not cling as smoothly as Microsoft was expecting it to. It had to force people to change to it, and TBH not all of us have that kind of cash lying around that we can just *SWOOP* and have a new machine in a flash. It's expensive shite where I'm at ATM. And let's not get into credit talk, coz I am not going down that road any further

[saqib]

I have to agree. I never did understand the fact that everyone seems annoyed by it. I never had issues with Vista at all. (although I AM a bit of a nix geek )

It's got a ton of little annoyances but you get used to them.
All microsoft products have those.

all MS prods have bloat ware . but vista has some exclusive share