On Aug 10, 10:35 am, Roy Schestowitz <newsgro...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
> Broken Windows
>
> ,----[ Quote ]
> | Not since Windows ME or Mac OS X 10.0 have I observed a more troubled
> | consumer operating system. This is a difficult post to write, because I
> | really don't want to beat on Microsoft about Vista yet again.
> `----
>
> http://www.microsoft-watch.com/content/vista/broken_windows.html?kc=M...
>
> He gets slammed if he criticises Microsoft. He even made developers sad...
> because he meets Microsoft employees.... he said Vista was bad. Not even
> Microsoft sites can get to like Vista.
Microsoft is claiming 60 million Vista Licenses "shipped", but even
today, it seems that consumers and corporate customers are willing to
pay a little extra for Windows XP Professional rather than settle for
Windows Home Edition. At the same time, they seem unwilling to pay
extra for Vista Business or Ultimate. Because Microsoft sells the new
XP licenses as an "option" to a Vista License, the OEM can order a
"bucket" of Vista Licenses. If the OEM purchase 3 million Vista
Business licenses, they could actually ship 2 million XP licenses and
1 million Vista licenses and Microsoft can claim this as 3 million
Vista licenses.
This isn't exactly illegal, but it is deceptive. It's not like the
Federal Trade Commission or the Security Exchange Commission is
actually going to enforce any of the laws relating to fraud, or
securities fraud. Part of the problem is that Microsoft's major
customers are the OEMs and CIOs. Microsoft sells almost no licenses
directly to customers (Actually, they are selling more "Upgrade"
licenses to retail buyers of Vista machines).
> Other cases of Windows 'simplicity' that even {your grandma}^tm can handle:
>
> 10 things you can do when Windows XP won't boot
> ,----[ Quote ]
> | If your computer powers up okay, but the Windows XP operating system won't
> | boot properly, you have some troubleshooting ahead of you. Here's a look at
> | the likely culprits and what you can do to fix the problem.
> `----
> http://articles.techrepublic.com.com/5100-10877_11-6031733.html
It's interesting that this topic is coming up again. I'm almost
beginning to wonder if Microsoft is actually willing to sabotage
Windows XP customers by pushing out occaisional "Security fixes" that
crash or corrupt the machine. I just recently had the exact problem
they described. A few problems though. First, I didn't have a spare
machine running Windows, so I couldn't create a recovery disk (I was
on the road). I didn't have the installation media (machine was
originally shipped with a recovery partition, but that was blown away
by corporate installation image).
If these security updates are causing damage, it probably isn't a
deliberate act, but rather a side effect of moving the "A-Team" to
Vista support, and using a less experienced "B-Team" of second and
third string players for XP support. Combine this with reduced
funding, and it's possible that the patches being released in the past
few months are just not as well tested before they are "force fed" to
customers.
The main question at this point is whether these "Oops" patches will
drive people to Vista - or to Linux and Mac.
The OEMs seem to be spotting a trend toward Mac and Linux. People are
purchasing Windows XP, but they are not purchasing the optional MS-
Office software. They are purchasing additional RAM, and they are
purchasing Linux compatible WiFi cards instead of Windows-only cards.
All of this indicates to the OEMs that customers are buying these
machines with the intention of installing Linux as the primary
operating system and using XP as a secondary operating system. At
least that still keeps them in the market. Meanwhile Apple can't keep
up with the demand for their Mac Mini and iBook machines.
A bigger problem for OEMs is the whole "White Box" market. Many
smaller players and no-name players are now picking up more and more
market share. Some estimates indicate that "White Box" now makes up a
larger share than Dell and HP combined. Companies like Acer and E-
Machines are now making Linux-Ready machines that are very popular
with budget minded Linux users.
The other trend the OEMs are starting to see is that the "Linux-Ready"
machine buyers are no longer the "rock bottom price" people, but are
now buying the high end machines. Lenovo was back-ordered on the Z61p
which was designed for Linux. They made a T61p machine that also
sports the 1900x1200 display, up to 4 gig of RAM, Intel Duo Dual-core
64 bit processors, and OpenGL optimized ATI or NVidia Video cards.
The customers are buying the machines with XP preinstalled, but it's
getting pretty obvious that most of these customers are using
virtualization to run XP and Linux at the same time. It's also
beginning to look like they want Linux as the primary operating
system.
> Windows is polished?
> The Genius of Microsoft Windows
> http://www.thegooglecache.com/rants-and-raves/the-genius-of-microsoft...
I've seen this one too! I wonder if that's another one of those
"Security Updates"?
I'm not sure how much longer Microsoft can successfully alienate 500
million XP End-Users in hopes of winning 100 million Vista End-Users.
Even though Microsoft doesn't sell to end users, their customers -
OEMs, DO sell to end users, and telling people who purchased new XP
machines in the last 2-3 years that their machines will be corrupted
to the point of being dysfunctional by a bunch of "Security fixes" is
not a great way to earn their loyalty.
Letting Corporate Customers lose 90% of their work force for 2-3 days
while they recover their corrupted hard drives isn't going to win
popularity points with them either.
How much longer before these tactics backfire and End-user
dissatisfaction begins to manifest itself in dramatic and sudden drops
in revenue? Corporate customers might opt to cancel their support
programs, or just let them expire. Many companies are already
establishing formal policies for the transition from Microsoft Office
formats to Open Document Formats. In some cases, they have even
published a list of "features" not to be used in public documents any
more.
On the flip side, it's beginning to look like Steve Ballmer is more
interested in cooperation rather than exclusion. It may be that as
Bill prepares for retirement, Steve is beginning to look at Microsoft
without Bill and thinking that maybe Linux isn't so bad after all.
Microsoft has been working much more closely with Sun, and has now
offered to license their Remote Desktop and other Windows specific
technology and patents to the other Linux vendors, allowing them to
more effectively integrate Windows as a Client or as a remote system
with Linux as the main operating system.
The irony is that this strategy has actually paid off very well for
Microsoft in the server market. Many companies are now deploying
Windows 2003 "virtual servers" that are actually running as client to
Linux based systems such as VMWare ESX and Xen. In many cases, these
customers are even using IIS and .NET as a "front door" to more
dynamic "Home page" based portals. Clients can register, get a
persistent cookie, and the next time they go to the home page, it will
be configured based on their preferences and interests. Ironically,
most of the back-end systems are still Unix and Linux, but the
virtualized Windows server has increased the overall market share of
IIS and Windows. One of the big bonuses is that .NET 3.0 provides the
ability to code once and have both an IE with ActiveX interface as
well as a "Generic Browser" (Mozilla, Opera,...) interface without
having to write special "test code". Again, Microsoft has found that
it's more effective to "play nice" with competitors and follow the
standards than it is to try and "play dirty" by corrupting all the
standards and trying to trick corporate customers into painting
themselves into a corner.
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