Ballmer: Windows 7 sells twice as fast as past ....

[Night Hawk]

It seems I called that one right when saying 7 would fly off of shelves once out!

Ballmer: Windows 7 sells twice as fast as past operating systems

He dismisses Mac's market share gains

By Eric Lai
November 19, 2009 12:39 PM ET

Computerworld - Microsoft Corp. said today that Windows 7 has sold twice as many units as any other Microsoft operating system in the same time period.

During its annual shareholders' meeting, CEO Steve Ballmer also dismissed market share gains by Apple Inc.'s Mac computer to "a couple of tenths of a percent" and said that many young people would eventually outgrow their preference for Macs.

"Some of it is marketing, some of it is phase of life," Ballmer said in response to a shareholder question about Microsoft's poor perception among younger buyers. "The truth is we do quite well, even among college students.

"Windows 7 gives us a real opportunity to get back that audience," he continued. "With the down economy, people understand that the Mac is a lot more expensive for essentially the same computer" as Windows 7.

More at: Ballmer: Windows 7 sells twice as fast as past operating systems

 

[pparks1]

Well, with the fact that they got the beta and the RC1 out there and people realized that it was a solid system and gave it good props...it doesn't surprise me that it is selling well.

 

[Zidane24]

I laughed so hard when I read how Ballmer considers using a MAC a "Phase of Life"

GO BALLMER GO!!!
:roflmao::roflmao::roflmao:

 

[pparks1]

While the computing parts may be the same between a PC and a MAC...the overall experience is significantly different.

 

[Kencelot]

Well, with the fact that they got the beta and the RC1 out there and people realized that it was a solid system and gave it good props...it doesn't surprise me that it is selling well.

That, and I think a lot of people are realizing that XP is getting long in the tooth, as it were.

 

[Night Hawk]

I couldn't agree with that one more! The setback for Vista at the time was the effort MS put into putting in all of the extras into the next version there but ended up with simply too much running. They preloaded it up in order to start off with a totally new look after the lengthy delays.

Unfortunately while ending up with a more secure Windows seeing far less errors it simply was a bit too much for older systems when considering an upgrade there. Just with the beta builds alone you could see how MS had to make a large turnaround and reduce the unnecessary extras as well as introducing some improvements at the same time.

The end result for those who have at least run the RCs and not simply upgrading at this was the noticable improvement in performance overall along with the "lighter feel" being brought in now. That's one of the greater selling points for the new version!

 

[Win7User512]

I think it goes to show that the consensus of experiences (even having the adequate hardware) with Vista sent the folks clamoring for something lighter, faster, more aesthetic, and just better.

 

[AntiSilence]

Well, with the fact that they got the beta and the RC1 out there and people realized that it was a solid system and gave it good props...it doesn't surprise me that it is selling well.

That, and I think a lot of people are realizing that XP is getting long in the tooth, as it were.

Yep, I loved XP (both x86 and x64) but it is getting on a bit. I didn't use Vista, but tried the RC of Windows 7 and loved it.

 

[jimbo45]

Well, with the fact that they got the beta and the RC1 out there and people realized that it was a solid system and gave it good props...it doesn't surprise me that it is selling well.

That, and I think a lot of people are realizing that XP is getting long in the tooth, as it were.

Don't get me wrong here -- I LIKE W7 -- but Windows XP still has plenty of life in it yet (and in some ways can be customized just as nice - or even better than W7).

All sorts of reasons why I'm not giving up entirely on XP (or W2K3 server -- essentially the same OS - actually XP is a single user version of W2K3 server) just yet -- probably not for at least another year or so .

I'm glad W7 is a success -- W7 is what VISTA should have been --but without VISTA I don't suppose we would have had W7 so quick.

However to re-iterate - don't write off XP just yet.

Here's a customised W2K3 desktop -- XP / W2K3 doesn't have to look / behave old - and you can do it completely with standard functionality. Pic shown below.

I'm not an "Aero" lover myself BTW --if you want those types of desktops use a Linux distro - they have those effects in Spades.

Cheers
jimbo

 

[AntiSilence]

I quite like the Aero look myself I agree that without Vista, 7 wouldn't have come so soon, and also XP is still a good OS especially after all the fixes it's solid as a rock.

 

[Night Hawk]

For XP it actually took SP3 there to really see the amount of fixes needed to keep up with the newer hardwares and programs as well. The move to NTFS over the older Fat based Legacy versions was an improvement in security as well while XP has been in common use longer then other versions leading to large amount of malwares it remains vulnerable to.

When Win7User512 was mentioning people needed something lighter and faster then what was seen with Vista I can pass along some news on 7's performance when fully loaded up with programs over what had been seen with XP and have some good news to pass along here that 7 manages where XP didn't.

I soft of still miss the Classic Windows theme in some ways last seen with Vista but will somehow manage!

 

[catilley1092]

As one of those who bought it, I'm glad that Win 7 is selling fast. I skipped Vista, having been a XP Pro user since 2002. I still dual boot Win 2K Pro & XP Pro on my laptops, and XP Pro SP3 still is full of life. Microsoft is still going to support it until 2014. And even Win 2K Pro isn't dead yet, being under support until early next year, but I seldom use it anymore. But nothing that I've used beats Windows 7. And the deals are on, there will certainly be many laptops bought for Christmas this year. Wal Mart has announced that a HP laptop that sells for around $600 will be on sale for $298 on Black Friday. You can't beat that for HP quality. Yes, Windows 7 is going to convert a lot of XP users.

 

[Night Hawk]

Walmart just had a one day sale in their consumer electronics section about a week ago! Black Friday generally comes in December there for last minute clearances in order to generate the most business before the new year when everything generally comes to a stand still. One HP model was marked down to the $298.99 price for that day only.

The catch there was 7's new release and a means to generate more sales by Walmart a month early especially with the slower economy overall. Looking for a new monitor? Try Staples or one of the other office supply stores when they have a weekly special on select lcds.

 

[chuckr]

Walmart just had a one day sale in their consumer electronics section about a week ago! Black Friday generally comes in December there for last minute clearances in order to generate the most business before the new year when everything generally comes to a stand still. One HP model was marked down to the $298.99 price for that day only.

The catch there was 7's new release and a means to generate more sales by Walmart a month early especially with the slower economy overall. Looking for a new monitor? Try Staples or one of the other office supply stores when they have a weekly special on select lcds.

Office Max has 100 pack Memorex CDs for $14.99...

Grabbed some for 'Live-CD' boot-isos...

100 pack Memorex DVDs seemed good pricing too...

 

[Night Hawk]

The option for burning a startup repair disk is now seen as an option in 7 rather then the need to handle the original dvd if needed or when having bought 7 RTM electronically from MS direct without backup media. It never hurts to have a bulk pack of blank media to cover bad burns or bad disks as well.