How is Windows 7 different?
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| Author | Content |
|---|---|
| bigg Mar 11, 2009 7:27 PM EDT |
For purposes of running a netbook, who cares if you are using Windows 7 or XP? Microsoft is basically giving away XP to netbook manufacturers because there's a perfectly suitable (in the eyes of most consumers) competitor - Linux. You buy a netbook to do basic tasks, so it doesn't matter what the OS happens to be. Netbooks will never, ever be profitable for Microsoft. Windows 7 doesn't change that. Considering that netbooks are the only segment of the market not going backwards right now, Microsoft is in serious trouble. They can only survive if they've got a decent profit margin - 100% market share and $2 will buy you a cup of coffee at Starbucks. Suppose you run a pay toilet on the same block as ten free toilets. Your profit margin is likely to be pretty thin. You respond by adding an additional pay toilet painted red, as opposed to white. Okay, that's a new color, but it's not clear why anyone would pay $15 to use your pay toilet just because it's painted red when there's a free alternative that provides the same services, but is white. How does Windows 7 provide product differentiation beyond that provided by XP? If it doesn't, how does Windows 7 help them on netbooks? |
| hkwint Mar 11, 2009 8:11 PM EDT |
Well, they're not offering a second pay toilet that's the same, but two pay toilets: One expensive and one cheap, but you cannot defecate at the latter unless you upgrade your license. However, probably the users will find a way around the technical limitations to defecate in the cheap one. The result will be a stinky mess nobody wants to clean up I guess, which makes this a cool comparison! |
| vainrveenr Mar 11, 2009 8:13 PM EDT |
Quoting:Netbooks will never, ever be profitable for Microsoft. Windows 7 doesn't change that..... and yet from one of the linked articles within the ItrunsonLinux.com piece itself : Quoting:Microsoft is planning to offer several editions of Windows 7 for netbooks, scaled-down laptops that cost less than $500. Microsoft wants consumers to opt for the more expensive versions of the software, an approach analysts and even Microsoft partner Intel Corp. say may be a hard sell.+plus+ Quoting:This time, as Microsoft readies Windows 7, the company is planning a basic version, as well as more expensive editions that are also targeted at netbooks. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said last week that he will make sure consumers can “trade up.”+plus+ Quoting:To push customers to pricier versions of Windows 7, Microsoft is limiting the features of the cheaper edition. The most basic, called Starter Edition, can only run three programs at a time.(three above quotes from Dina Bass's and Ian King's 'Microsoft’s Windows 7 May Not Cure Netbook Headache (Update2)', http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=auGu.FxP...) So this particular MS Windows 7 Starter Edition which is aimed squarely at netbook users is actually just an enticement for such users to move right into Microsoft's profit-centric version(s) of Windows 7 ASAP! While there may not [yet!] exist an INDISPUTABLE case of Bait and Switch here -- see http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-a-bait-and-switch.htm -- red flags probably SHOULD go up now regarding Microsoft's strategy for Windows 7 for netbooks as enumerated in the Bass and King piece quoted here. |
| tuxchick Mar 11, 2009 8:28 PM EDT |
How does a company this lame make so much money? |
| gus3 Mar 11, 2009 8:30 PM EDT |
@TC: The same tenet that says "pure drivel drives ordinary drivel off the screen, every time." |
| tracyanne Mar 11, 2009 8:59 PM EDT |
I can offer to upgrade the Windows7 basic to Linux with all the bells and whistles for Free. |
| gus3 Mar 11, 2009 9:19 PM EDT |
@TA: "Insufficient drivel, core dumped." |
| tracyanne Mar 11, 2009 9:30 PM EDT |
oops |
| NoDough Mar 11, 2009 10:21 PM EDT |
>> How does a company this lame make so much money? I know that was rhetorical, but... Four of my employer's mission critical applications run on Windows and only on Windows; ERP, estimating, CAD, and shop floor control. Three of those applications integrate with Microsoft Office. So, what do you think the chances of us converting to Linux are? Out of about 120 client computers, I can count on one hand the number that could get by with Linux (with fingers remaining.) Additionally, we don't do Vista. So we pay a little extra to downgrade (well, upgrade really) from Vista Business to XP Pro. It's easy to make money when you're the only game in town. And the application vendors think it's great because they only have to code for one platform. But they'll cry you a river when MS decides it wants their market. Sorry, had to vent. |
| tracyanne Mar 11, 2009 10:29 PM EDT |
OT: I've just been forced to start using MS Office 2007. It would have to be the ugliest looking application (the window the applications run in looks like a copy of the KDE web style window decoration, which is pretty ugly, and it's a sort of pale blue which doesn't match my desktop, which is the Win 98 style that you get when you set the desktop up for maximum performance (such as it is). Then you get to the Ribbon.... what a piece of puss (according to our new bloke you can create your own ribbon, but i don't want to spend time making it usable, but i suppose I will have to eventually, because it really is obscure. No wonder the french police wax lyrical about how easy it is to transition their members to Open office.org) |
| NoDough Mar 11, 2009 10:44 PM EDT |
>> I've just been forced to start using MS Office 2007. Which reminds me, we also paid extra for Office 2007 downgrades to Office 2003. Most of our users are... umm... digitally challenged. So, due to the sweeping changes, we cannot upgrade to Office 2007 without a huge investment in training. However, I will give Microsoft the benefit of a doubt on this topic. They invested a lot of time and money on usability studies for Office 2007. The people who take the time to get used to the new interface see it as an improvement, but they admit that the adjustment is painful. It took courage to make such a massive change and gamble that it wouldn't be rejected. If they didn't own a monopoly, it probably wouldn't have paid off. |
| theboomboomcars Mar 11, 2009 11:14 PM EDT |
tracyanne as far as I can tell the keyboard short cuts are all the same. My school has installed Office 2007 on all of the computers and when I have to help the Professor I am working with on her computer I just use keyboard shortcuts, because it is easier to figure out how to do what I want to that way. |
| tracyanne Mar 11, 2009 11:38 PM EDT |
I don't know the short cuts, I don't use MS Office all that much, I tend to use Open Office except when I forced to use MS Office, so I never bothered. The only reason I'm using MS Office is because I'm working with my boss who looooves MS Office 2007. |
| r_a_trip Mar 12, 2009 8:19 AM EDT |
However, I will give Microsoft the benefit of a doubt on this topic. I don't give them the benefit of the doubt. I had to start using it a month ago and I'm absolutely not impressed. They invested a lot of time and money on usability studies for Office 2007. The people who take the time to get used to the new interface see it as an improvement, but they admit that the adjustment is painful. I'm pretty much up to snuff with the Ribbon now and I can tell you that it has nothing to do with usability at all! It is just all cosmetics on top of good old Office 2003. Most "pretty Ribbon pictures" are linked to the old bog standard O2K3 and earlier dialogs. It isn't easier, you have to relearn locations, you have to remember pictures as well now alongside new text. It isn't more efficient. Some tasks take more steps now than in previous versions. Tasks that should be (and were) logically grouped, can be scattered over 4 different Ribbon locations in O2K7. My feeling is MS just slapped on an icon bar to be able to say that O2K7 was "new". I haven't seen radical new features, only a few refinements here and there and a massive pain in the neck called the Ribbon. It took courage to make such a massive change and gamble that it wouldn't be rejected. If they didn't own a monopoly, it probably wouldn't have paid off. It took a marketroid to realize that O2K3 is as complete as it gets and instead of truly innovating and coming up with truly new stuff, they decided to use the old "MS makes new with lipstick" strategy. That and yet another incompatible file format. Sorry, but O2K7 represents a major annoyance to me. |
| Sander_Marechal Mar 12, 2009 8:27 AM EDT |
Quoting:That and yet another incompatible file format. That's no excuse anymore because you can get that with 2003 as well. The only difference between 2003 and 2007 is UI lipstick. |
| bigg Mar 12, 2009 9:06 AM EDT |
I recently saw and tested Office 2007 for the first time. The ribbon feels very comfortable to me. Perhaps that is because I do most of my writing in LyX and before that Scientific Word. Mostly it was a big "so what" feeling. |
| theboomboomcars Mar 12, 2009 3:49 PM EDT |
tracyanne, most of the Open Office short cuts will do the same thing in Office. The default ones anyway, any custom ones you have set up probably won't work. When I am forced to use Excel or Word this is the only reason I can get anything done. |
| tracyanne Mar 12, 2009 6:30 PM EDT |
Sorry OT again. We've just gone Silverlight on one of our major clients websites, but certain organisations are refusing to allow people behind their firewall to download the silverlight clientside components, sighting potential security issues. The managing director of our client company said "But it's a guaranteed Microsoft product, they shouldn't have anything to worry about." |
| jdixon Mar 12, 2009 7:53 PM EDT |
> The managing director of our client company said "But it's a guaranteed Microsoft product, they shouldn't have anything to worry about." And technically speaking, he's correct. If you choose to run a Microsoft operating system, you're already trusting Microsoft implicitly. What more threat does Silverlight carry than the latest MediaPlayer, .Net, or IE update? |
| Sander_Marechal Mar 12, 2009 7:54 PM EDT |
Hahahah. TA, just show them the security history of ActiveX :-) |
| tracyanne Mar 12, 2009 9:20 PM EDT |
Given the history of Microsoft's security (or general lack of) I nearly choked when I overheard this. But it does raise an interesting point. Microsoft has managed to completely divorce computer issues from their sieve like operating system, in the majority of people's minds. |
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