What is it about XP that people just can’t live without

rattelmike · 27 Jul 2009

Although I'm going to get a lot of criticism for this one...but I was able to upgrade from XP to Vista to Win7 without fail. For me it was a matter of having a very old software program running that I wasn't able to re-install as the company is gone and it came originally on 3.5" floppies!

I left XP years ago when Vista was in beta. Sure it had snags but I never experienced the horror stories that others have told. I honestly believe that the worst OS MS ever made was ME. That was a total mistake.

xan K · 27 Jul 2009

mats said:

Can't agree more.

For a CIO it's a simple question: What does it cost and can I save that money somehow?

With Vista MS mad a huge error in marketing by focusing on Aero, Aero and Aero. The CIO saw a new Gui wich means huge costs for education and no return of investment.

IF MS instead had focused on Bitlocker (no need for expensive third party cryptos), The enhanced powersaving (reduced electricity bill), The capability to run all machines on a single image (reduced costs for IS staff) and so on alot more companies would have used vista.
Even today i meet customers and other IT-pros that doesn't know about Vistas capabilities in theese areas since all they heard was aero......
I hope thar MS learns this leasson for Seven but so far it has been Aero,Aero and Aero again and a little about faster boot times but almost nothing about direct access. Even better powersave. The delta repliction for offline files ans so on. All of theese are prodction improvements for the users and if you can show that your users can save 1 hour a week using Vista/Seven instead of XP, any reasonable CIO will launch a case studie to see that his benefits will be and most likley issue an uppgrade.

True case: An organisation with 20K users. The can show that the powesave fetures in Vista alone is enough to finance an uppgrade to Vista, train the users and replace about 50% of their computers. Pay back time, 18 months

wow! excellent first post. I totally agree!

C0NN3R · 27 Jul 2009

Robearl2x said:

I remember reading somewhere that perhaps between 60 to 63 percent of computer users are still using Windows XP. The majority of them use XP at both work and home. With this love affair with an nearly eight year old operating system still in full effect do you think there will be a slower than normal migration to Windows Seven? Especially since you won't be able to upgrade from XP to W7. And just what is it about XP that people would rather fight than switch.

People stay with XP because vista is just a beta test of 7.

noyb · 27 Jul 2009

Yes .. The W7 update will update XP

In Vista or W 7 ..
I’m forced to see Thumbnails on my desktop for some .. but not all Image files.
Since when is a Thumbnail of the contents of a pdf file or a text file .. an Icon ??
My customized Image Icons will not work and I can’t see what I have.

I cannot customize my file type right click context menus to make my work easier.

I cannot organize my Email address book in Folders or operate from a wab file.

I’d love to find a better OS … But where’d all my power tools go ??
Maybe some of us have been spoiled.

akramh · 27 Jul 2009

to answer the questiom, there is two parts, first for business, as other have said CIO have to consider many issues, such as training of their staff, compatibility of their applications and return of inverstment, if XP is able to do the job, why does it need to be changed? if something seems to work fine why fix it or change it?

For home users, most of them are running XP which was probably pre-installed with their system. most of them are not techies, and even propably don't know about vista or windows 7. in other cases, they might not have enough ram to try vista, so sticking with xp works out better for them, until they upgrade their ram or get a more powefull computer, which will propably come preloaded with vista or 7.

masterB · 27 Jul 2009

For me I must have it for work. I don't use XP at home.

Lee · 27 Jul 2009

I remember in 1995 the same thing happening. Now the internet wasn’t the thing it is today so word about 95 didn’t get out like Vista and Win 7, but still it became a smash hit with the home computer geeks of the time. But, in the corporate world this didn’t happen. The company I worked for at the time as Director of Information Systems (IF) decided that to go to Windows 95 was not productive (and I agreed with them). At the time Win NT was going 3.5 and because it had the Win 3.xx interface there was very little training required to upgrade in that direction, hence, that was the route we took. It gave us the 32 bit OS we thought was the way of the future. Today businesses have to look hard at cost of new equipment, along with training/retraining their people. This is one reason Vista didn’t a get leg up; it just didn’t make sense to go with a new and unknown OS. By the time Vista hit the street it was already getting a bad name because of bad drivers, BSOD during installation, etc.

Window 7 is an excellent operating system, having said that as a beta tester since October I have seen a great deal of people on sites like SF finding all kinds of things they don’t like about the 7 OS. The inability to go to classic menus, the dislike of the Superbar; this list can go on and on, albeit you get the picture. If IT techs and home computer geeks are complaining about the fore mention problems then think what it is like for the secretary, clerk, sales rep, and others that use computers on a daily basis they can cause major headaches to IT Techs, and company educators. Try telling someone who is not acquainted with Win 7 Superbar how to use it, then you will be able to understand what it is like to be an IT Tech.

Win7 will replace XP, just not right away, and if Microsoft is smart they will work hard over the next year to ensure Win 7 will meets the standards that the Corporate World is looking for and wants in an OS and Server Applications.

Brand · 27 Jul 2009

First, just that these days, software vendors failed to impress customers with their new products, thus making people confused with spending to upgrade.

Second, people tend to regard OS as a real life platform, like a table. Wouldn't spend to change it if it's not broken.

Anyway, if Windows XP can meet all my demands, why should I purchase Vista or 7 which can do me no good that I need?

cartel · 27 Jul 2009

K3VL4R said:

I don't think that it is not wanting to move from XP, it is not wanting to upgrade to Vista. A lot of people used Vista in the beginning or have heard about too many horror stories about stability and compatibility issues that people had with vista in the early days.

Now most of us know that Vista has been good since SP1 and has had pretty much fixed everything with SP2, but many people are already brainwashed that Vista = crappy so they would not be too easily convinced of otherwise.

That is why we have Windows 7. The "Vista, the way it was supposed to be" OS. Change the package and a bunch of looks and features and your bad Vista hype is gone so you can start selling OS's again.

I've been using Vista since build 5744 and it worked fine.

The biggest problem was the lack of driver support and companies refusing to issue drivers.

Vista can thank Creative and Nvidia for that mess.

KazeNoKoe23 · 28 Jul 2009

C0NN3R said:

People stay with XP because vista is just a beta test of 7.

Not...quite.

Anyway, there's absolutely nothing about Windows XP (short for eXPired) that I can't live without. Windows 7 is a vast improvement in every way IMO.