Microsoft launched its latest operating system on October 22, 2009, and
HEXUS took a
seven-part
look at Windows 7. Like many
professional commentators, we were impressed with what we saw, but
effusive praise isn't always inextricably linked to booming sales.
Market research
company, NPD, has some interesting figures for Windows 7 vs. Vista.
Based on measurements for the week of October 18-24, 2009, Windows 7
boxed unit sales, including pre-orders, were 234 per cent higher than
Vista's first-week tally.
“Microsoft’s program of early low-cost pre-sales,
high visibility marketing, and aggressive deals helped make the
Windows
7 software launch
successful,” said Stephen Baker, vice president of industry
analysis at
NPD. “In a slow environment for packaged software Windows 7
brought a
large number of customers into the software aisles.”
Revenue, though, was 'only' 82 per cent higher, with NPD citing pre-order
discounts and a lack of promotional activity for the higher-cost
Ultimate version.
The best-selling Windows 7 SKUs were all upgrade packs, NPD noted, with
Home Premium selling for an average $76, Professional for $147, and a
three-users Home Premium upgrade for $149.
Did you buy Windows 7 on or near launch day? How much did you
pay? Is it worth it?
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Its so nice to get copy dialogs that let you choose between two identically named files (including rename!!!!!).
And not forgetting the more info with no. files left and transfer rates :)Quote
And not forgetting the more info with no. files left and transfer rates :)
The time remaining doesn't impeded copy performance. For short copies it doesn't even attempt to caclulate a copy time because it assigns it to another thread. :)Quote
Your missing out ;) It really is good.... And for free its certainly worth a try.
Agreed, though it's not perfect... Win7 is still slower to start up out of the box than XP on the same hard disk (believe me, I've tried), but not by much. An SSD would sort this out.
I like to have the best of both worlds, two workshop PCs and my "TV" PC have Ubuntu (9.04 and 9.10) and it's just as pleasant to use as Win7. Until I'm able to run Ableton, Paint.NET and Daz3D under Ubuntu, however, Win7 looks like the OS my main workstation will be running for quite some time.Quote
'Only' in the sense that boxed-unit sales were up 3x this amount.
One would expect revenue to be at least 2x, right?
Yeah, OK, the unit sales increase was outstanding, and comparitively speaking the revenue increase looks meagre, but an 80+% increase in revenue is still *huge*, and I think speaks volumes for how well Microsoft have handled the release of Windows 7. It's hard to avoid drawing the conclusion that the pre-order prices were "right", though, and I'll be interested to see how much sales drop off as the retail prices return to RRP - they're *already* high enough to put me off buying any more copies...Quote
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