Immortal XP - Microsoft Reacts
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From early experiences of the new OS, after the first reviews, many were disappointed and decided to remain with the old but stable and working Windows XP. As I mentioned earlier, Microsoft, for some obvious marketing and monetary reasons, tried to sell its product. Many became scared that they would be forced to make the step to the new OS, and naturally online petitions appeared where everyone who wants to stick with the old operating system was invited to sign up.
Despite Vista's improvements (many came with that first service pack), more and more people supported XP and put increasing pressure on Microsoft. Initially Microsoft stood strongly behind Vista despite its problems. In time, however, after the release of Vista's first Service Pack, they were forced to recognize that, while it wasn't selling badly, it was not selling as well as expected and desired.
CEO Steve Ballmer raised some hopes for an extended life cycle in a conference in Mons, Belgium. Later on Microsoft nixed this. The official statement says that XP won't be sold after June 30, but anyone can downgrade from Vista. This option will be maintained by many PC vendors until the middle of 2009.
Additionally Microsoft decided to re-brand the Home Edition of Windows XP and provide a new version under the name of Windows Embedded. This contains something like the properties of a home edition of XP, and is designed for low-end systems. These systems couldn't run Vista anyway due to the operating system's high hardware demands, so this step was no victory for XP. Here Microsoft only tried to become competitive within the emerging new market segment, facing Linux as its adversary.
(Courtesy of Wikipedia)
Microsoft says that if need be, they will revise their roadmap, but so far it looks like everything will go as planned. Bill Gates stated that Windows 7 will appear at the end of 2009 -- well, more exactly, beta versions, as explained later by Microsoft's official PR department. Anyway, the official release is slated for 2010. Recently a few screenshots have appeared showing Milestone 1 of the next big thing.
Many companies decided to maintain XP as their operating system, but not because they couldn't afford to make the upgrade. It's because this will let them skip over Vista and go directly to the next OS, which may be more popular than Vista.
Next: The End of This, But Not of XP >>
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