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Software Windows 7 Grabs 4% of PC Market
Shane McGlaun (Blog) - November 11, 2009 1:37 PM
Print E-mail del.icio.us 42 comment(s) - last by xaders.. on Nov 13 at 10:49 PM
Vista took six months to reach 4% of the market

Microsoft has a lot riding on Windows 7 after Vista was poorly adopted by enterprise users and consumers. Windows 7 so far has been doing much better than Vista and is growing rapidly in marketshare in the computer market.

Early reports showed that retail box sales of Windows 7 were up a whopping 234% compared to sales of Vista over the same time period. A new report has now been published by Net Applications that shows Windows 7 has significantly increased its share of the overall PC market since its launch. As of November 9 Windows 7 has 4% of the OS market.

The adoption rate among users is much higher than the adoption rate of Vista over the same period. Since its launch, Windows 7 has grown 84% in marketshare. It took Vista six months to claim 4% of the OS market when it launched. Net Applications reports that Windows OS' of all flavors own 92.5% of the OS market, a slight decline from 93.06% that it owned in August 2009. Linux owns 0.96% of the OS market with Mac owning 5.27%.

Microsoft is aggressively pushing the new operating system with discounts and promotional offers with retailers like Best Buy. The software giant is also trying to make upgrades from legacy operating systems like XP to Windows 7 easier since there is no direct upgrade path between the two OS'.

Microsoft has maintained that sales of Windows 7 will be largely tied to the sales of PCs moving forward, which have slumped due to the poor economy. The good news for Microsoft is that PC sales are currently growing with a 95% increase in the weeks before and after Windows 7 launched. This is the one spot where Vista holds an edge over Windows 7 – PC sales jumped 170% after Vista launched.


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No surprise, really
By amanojaku on 11/11/2009 1:54:05 PM , Rating: 5
First off, kudos to MS for recognizing and admitting that Win7 sales are largely to do with new PC purchases. I'm willing to bet that most people held off of Vista because of the UAC blowup (it wasn't that bad, really) and the fact that Vista required a beefier system while providing nothing really new. People were more likely to stick with XP as a result. Why pay $150 for something you already have?

Cut to today were Win7 is said to use less resources than Vista, validating the existence of $500 PCs, while offering a much-updated core. That, and the fact that MS offered Win7 previews pretty much since the time it was first developed and the GA release is largely the same, but better. And many people looking to upgrade their aging hardware can do so without spending an arm and a leg and still benefit from significant performance improvements. I think this will be MS' biggest and best OS release ever, but we'll see what the statistics say this time next year.




RE: No surprise, really
By Spivonious on 11/11/09, Rating: -1
RE: No surprise, really
By mholler on 11/11/2009 2:20:26 PM , Rating: 4
Just because they're based on the same kernel doesn't mean that nothing has changed "under the hood". That's like saying very little changed between Windows 2000 and Windows XP. Win7 is a significant improvement over Vista in many respects.


RE: No surprise, really
By amanojaku on 11/11/09, Rating: -1
RE: No surprise, really
By omnicronx on 11/11/2009 3:05:44 PM , Rating: 2
Thats a pretty high level list, low level changes are not going to make that list.

The other poster is right, equating 7 to Vista is like equating 2000 to XP or say.. OSX10.0 to OSX 10.6(same kernel right)


RE: No surprise, really
By amanojaku on 11/11/2009 5:20:59 PM , Rating: 3
I take it you didn't realize I was being sarcastic by contradicting my earlier post. Hell, XP's improvements over 2000 were pretty considerable, too, and largely unnoticed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Features_new_to_Windo...

Now compare the list of new features in OS anything. Generally underwhelming, considering the upgrade cost of $30-$130 and the frequency of release (eight years and six updates vs. Windows' eight years and three updates.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mac_OS_X_v10.0
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mac_OS_X_v10.1
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mac_OS_X_v10.2#New_an...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mac_OS_X_Panther#New_...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mac_OS_X_Tiger#New_an...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mac_OS_X_Leopard#New_...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mac_OS_X_Snow_Leopard...


RE: No surprise, really
By mholler on 11/11/2009 3:10:04 PM , Rating: 2
Yes, that is a list of the "new" features. It doesn't mention anything about the improvements to existing features and code. Where do you think the improved speed and lower resource requirements comes from? Those are the "under the hood" changes that are missing from that link.


RE: No surprise, really
By Master Kenobi (blog) on 11/11/09, Rating: -1
RE: No surprise, really
By tastyratz on 11/11/2009 3:09:27 PM , Rating: 2
to a point.
Vista was essentially a rushed to market beta pre-release for the same system and labeled as a finished product. I think vista at launch was poor in comparison to now, and windows 7 continues the trend of a product that is more seasoned. There is a lot more to an OS than features, and it just goes to prove that you shouldn't release something until is damn ready.
Astronomical problems were the result of nvidia drivers for vista yes, but that wasn't the only issue. I still hold MS responsible for releasing a product unfit to market. Shame on them for rushing the product, and for not collaborating better with a primary vendor in the first place. Granted Nvidia is an outside company they still hold a majority marketshare for the userbase.


RE: No surprise, really
By lecanard on 11/11/09, Rating: 0
RE: No surprise, really
By Topweasel on 11/13/2009 2:09:23 PM , Rating: 2
They are not even based on the same Kernel. I think people are confused with the development of Windows 7. Development of the Longhorn Kernel started way back in the early 2000's maybe even farther back. When they realized in 2005 that they were not going to hit the late 2006 date they started porting user interface upgrades they had been working with to the Kernel used for Windows 2000 and XP. This became Vista. Windows 7 is a brand new for consumers kernel using all of those upgrades they released with Vista plus natural features and developments you expect with another 3 years to work on it.


RE: No surprise, really
By 3minence on 11/11/09, Rating: 0
RE: No surprise, really
By 3minence on 11/11/09, Rating: -1
RE: No surprise, really
By jonmcc33 on 11/11/2009 4:37:42 PM , Rating: 2
I know dozens of people at the last company that I worked for that begged for Office 2007 because Excel 2007 does not have a 65,000 row limitation like Excel 2003 does.

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/excel/HP05199291...


RE: No surprise, really
By 3minence on 11/11/2009 5:44:46 PM , Rating: 2
The customers I supported, small and medium businesses, didn't need the new features of Office 2008. They got it because it's what came on their new PC/Laptop. However, they, like I, have come to except and use Office 07.

65,000+ rows? That sounds like a huge data set. I dealt with things that big while working on my Oceanography Masters but used Matlab to manipulate it because Excel couldn't.


RE: No surprise, really
By Sazar on 11/13/2009 6:22:25 PM , Rating: 1
Frankly, those customers are idiots and you fail at your job if you cannot at least convince them to use the ribbons for even a week to get over the inertia that new adopters have.

Ribbons are vastly superior and many times more efficient than the old menu based setup.


RE: No surprise, really
By jonmcc33 on 11/11/2009 4:33:08 PM , Rating: 3
quote:
Vendors were slow or wanted users to buy new hardware.


Creative Labs anyone? When Vista went RTM my $200 (at the time of purchase) Audigy2 ZS Platinum was reduced to nothing better than onboard sound. Slowly they introduced some of the features back to it and also allowed the Audigy2 ZS to work with ALchemy when it originally was not. It still isn't what it was on Windows XP but I would rather pour salt in my eyes than use Windows XP again or buy another Creative Labs product.

quote:
...XP properly patched was still secure.


It still allows any process to run with full local administrator privileges. I do not call that secure by any means.

quote:
This is probably more vendors faults than Microsoft's, but they still felt the backlash.


Thanks to nVIDIA!


RE: No surprise, really
By 3minence on 11/11/2009 5:51:25 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
Creative Labs anyone?

Funny, that was exactly who I was thinking of.

I seem to have stepped on some people sensibilities with my previous posts. For the record, I used Vista until I upgraded to Win7. It had lots of promise but regardless of what the revisionists like to say, it had some serious issues at birth which, as far as marketing and acceptance, it never recovered from. I'm not saying it was a bad OS, I'm saying it had some issues, deserved or not.


RE: No surprise, really
By Calin on 11/12/2009 5:49:26 AM , Rating: 2
Even if Windows 7 is not much more than an update to Windows Vista, now the market is ready for it:
Vista brought a new driver model, and some devices don't have good drivers even now (hp officejet d145 prints just fine, but scanning takes ages - around a minute to start scanning, for every single page that needs to be scanned). Also, some devices didn't have Vista drivers at all, and some motherboards of less than a year old still have only beta drivers for Vista.
Also, some applications did not work well in Vista, or worked only with fiddling.


By Lord 666 on 11/11/2009 1:47:35 PM , Rating: 2
At least references were cited in this article versus the WSJ hack job.




By Drag0nFire on 11/11/2009 2:03:22 PM , Rating: 2
Wow. Didn't realize he pulled it. Sad day for DT.


By InternetGeek on 11/11/2009 2:20:00 PM , Rating: 2
He didnt pull it out. Even Net apps took the data off. I think they havent actually checked their data and what not. Their latest report is Oct 2009 and Win 7 wasnt out then yet.

I'll wait until the end of the month. You can just replace from one day to the other an OS that's used in over 80% of the computers of the world (XP). It takes time and MS is aiming for the long run. Not just the OS, but other product lines.

Think about it. 15 years for now there will be people running Win 7 because its better for what they do, even though computers and other better OSs are out there.


By Lord 666 on 11/12/2009 10:37:45 AM , Rating: 2
Did you even read what I wrote? I didn't even mention Windows 7! There was a Nintendo article in the WSJ yesterday that was pretty much copied/pasted and used in a DT article. It was later removed from DT.


Early adopter and not regretting it this time...
By Golgatha on 11/11/2009 2:14:16 PM , Rating: 2
I replaced Vista 64bit with Win 7 64bit on my HTPC and Desktop. I liked it so much I bought a newer laptop with it pre-installed and plan to upgrade it to Win7 Pro as well (comes with 64bit Home Premium).

Microsoft did well with their compatibility checking tools, multiple compatibility modes, and Windows XP Mode for backwards compatibility. So far all my old hardware (except the Pentium 4 M, 6-7 year old laptop) works with Win7 (and the laptop only had a couple of missing devices...bah, I just wanted a new laptop) and everything runs much better than it did under Vista. Overall very happy with the upgrades.




By RjBass on 11/11/2009 2:22:31 PM , Rating: 2
Same here. I upgraded an older Gateway laptop with a single core Turion 64 CPU. Everything works except for the sound, but a $12 USB plugin sound card from Newegg took care of that issue. The laptop actually can't really be used as a laptop anymore as one of the monitor hinges broke. So we just keep it on the kitchen counter and don't move it around much. So the USB sound card really doesn't get in the way or bother us much. And the older laptop loves 7. It boots faster and is more responsive then it was with XP.


Our household includes 3 Windows 7 sales...
By FlyTexas on 11/11/2009 3:26:17 PM , Rating: 2
We ordered 3 copies of Windows 7, 2 Home and 1 Pro, for our house.

We were an XP house until now, never cared for Vista, Windows 7 just works.

BTW, I do think some of Vista's problems are/were third party support. Now that 7 is out, companies really do have to catch up, knowing that XP really is dead.




By just4U on 11/12/2009 12:03:47 AM , Rating: 2
The biggest problem with Vista is/was that it was trying to replace a very entrenched Operating System with a unheard of longevity. Hard to do and it's something Microsoft is probably very much aware of as they move past it with their second attempt.


Win7 vs Vista
By McGixxer on 11/12/2009 12:41:53 AM , Rating: 2
Well, I had a few machines with Vista that always seemed slugish for the hardware they were running.

After moving to 7 they run much better. And its not just from the fresh OS install either. Win7 just seems snappier. Its like reading specs about a sports car or a motorcycle. You can look at all the black & white specs and argue them all day long, but none of that matters when you drive it and it seems better or worse then all the specs.




RE: Win7 vs Vista
By xaders on 11/13/2009 10:49:08 PM , Rating: 2
ill buy windows 7 on all my PC in my household which are all running windows XP now. ill prefer windows 7 pro then home premium one.

now, only have one laptop with windows 7 RC on it. also brought windows 7 student version. it sucks because the direct download doesnt allow create a separate disc. have to pay for it. it is an upgrade. the upgrade terms sucks. microsoft need another way to upgrade. vista was like ME was and windows 7 is what vista is suppose to be or some people called it vista sp3.


Black Friday.
By Mitch101 on 11/11/2009 2:01:17 PM , Rating: 2
Of the people I know its probably about 35% who upgraded the machines they have to Windows 7.

The Geeks:
Pretty much all the geeky people I know are on Windows 7.

General Users:
A good portion say thier PC works fine and will most likely never upgrade unless they buy a PC with the new OS already installed. These people generally never upgrade unless you convince them to and do it for them.

MAC Users:
Both of the people I know are also running Windows 7. Both are running Ubuntu also.

Back to School:
I dont believe manufacturers had vouchers out in time for the back to school crowd. Otherwise I would expect higher numbers.

Business:
A very good portion are testing Windows 7 and most seem inclined to go there.




Enough of those statistics
By crystal clear on 11/11/09, Rating: 0
How about compared to XP sales?
By sebmel on 11/11/09, Rating: -1
RE: How about compared to XP sales?
By mholler on 11/11/2009 2:39:33 PM , Rating: 2
Ouch? Considering there are probably tens or hundreds of thousands of computers available at retailers with older OS's already installed is this really a surprise? Not to mention they're probably being sold at a discount right now.


RE: How about compared to XP sales?
By sebmel on 11/11/09, Rating: 0
Sad but honest
By sebmel on 11/11/09, Rating: -1
RE: Sad but honest
By RjBass on 11/11/2009 2:24:10 PM , Rating: 2
Well that's nothing new. People have been claiming that Microsoft has stolen all of it's best ideas from Apple since the beginning. I don't know if it's true or not, but I also don't really care. If it works, then so be it.


RE: Sad but honest
By amanojaku on 11/11/2009 2:38:27 PM , Rating: 5
It's nonsensical to say MS stole the user experience from Apple. The first GUI was found Xerox's Star, so by that logic Apple "stole" first. It's common for companies to use each others' ideas, as long as patent laws are observed.

Anyway, if the GUI was so damn important we would all be using Macs and MS would be the "trendy" OS. And it's not like Apple hasn't borrowed other companies' ideas.


RE: Sad but honest
By Mitch101 on 11/11/2009 3:09:16 PM , Rating: 2
Good artists copy, great artists steal
~Picasso


RE: Sad but honest
By Reclaimer77 on 11/11/2009 2:44:57 PM , Rating: 4
Windows has been "graphical" and "easy to use" since like.. I donno, Windows 98 ?? Double clicking on icons and pulling down menu's isn't hard stuff.

Aside from the glass/Aero stuff, the Windows 7 GUI is basically the same as it's always been. Start Button, task bar on bottom and quicklaunch bar. Some apps now have the "ribbon" menu etc etc. But I don't see how this has mimicked the Mac OS or that it's all that different then it's ever been.


RE: Sad but honest
By Motoman on 11/11/2009 3:42:53 PM , Rating: 5
People believe the Mac is easier to use because the TV tells them so.

Period.

Repeat something enough times in front of an audience and they will believe it - whether or not it has any merit is of no import.


RE: Sad but honest
By jonmcc33 on 11/11/2009 5:04:29 PM , Rating: 2
Taken from appleinsider.com word for word: http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/09/11/11/micr...

The actual interview here: http://www.pcr-online.biz/features/328/Microsofts-...

Nice twist on words, AppleInsider!

Anyway, Simon Aldous is nothing more than the distribution chief for Microsoft UK: http://www.channelweb.co.uk/crn/news/2167515/aldou...

He had nothing to do with the development of Windows 7.

Some salesman at Microsoft mentions Mac OS X in an interview and the Apple crowd goes banannas!


RE: Sad but honest
By sebmel on 11/11/2009 7:55:49 PM , Rating: 2
So the fanboi's are out again hiding away perfectly reasonable comments.

"Nice twist on words, AppleInsider!"

Well, no, actually... more like a direct quote:

"One of the things that people say an awful lot about the Apple Mac is that the OS is fantastic, that it’s very graphical and easy to use. What we’ve tried to do with Windows 7 – whether it’s traditional format or in a touch format – is create a Mac look and feel in terms of graphics."

from: PCR talks to Microsoft's partner group manager, Simon Aldous


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