DrJBHL DrJBHL

Sometimes, I just can’t understand MS.

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Sometimes, I just can’t understand MS.

from JoeUser Forums

 

This really isn’t very involved. I was looking at two sets of numbers:

 

MS just launched ie9. Supposedly faster and more secure. There are a lot of qualifiers to that.

But, even if there weren’t, I still don’t get how they think. Granted, over the seven months, XP’s share dropped 10% (54% to 44%). IE’s share dropped 10% also (36% to 26%) while the big winner was Chrome (10% to 24%).

So why didn’t they make ie9 for XP which still has 44% of the OS market?

It would seem to me that they would want to hold onto that, no? Was their thinking, “Let them use ie8.”?  Seems to me that’s short sighted (and just a tad arrogant).

Wouldn’t it have been smarter (overall) to say, “These are tough economic times. We understand, and will extend support for XP longer than we planned originally and continue to make ie8 as secure and trustworthy as we can.”?

So can you explain this? – who was smarter?

As Firefox is setting download records, and Chrome is greased lightning, both having great extensions.

98,258 views 61 replies
Reply #26 from WinCustomize Forums Top

NEW! Best catchphrase there is. I wonder what Win8 will be like.

TouchTasks - Access tasks with ease on Windows touchscreens.
Reply #28 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Quoting Philly0381, reply 10
If folks are building their own computers are they still able to buy older versions of OSs to install on them?
End of Philly0381's quote

Google it and you can find it. There are lots of install discs out there for sale yet of XP and you can get them pretty cheap as well.

Quoting Philly0381, reply 21
RavenX no matter how bad Vista may have been it sold and Microsoft made money.
End of Philly0381's quote

That's because people are generally sucked in to all the hype and the need to have the latest greatest thing on the block...and like a bunch of lemmings they just jump off the cliff. If people thought for themselves instead of buying into the hype I doubt MS would be selling as many "New" Os's. Plus as soon as you say your not going to support something anymore everyone tends to bail out...as though the previous OS is going to just stop working.

Reply #29 from Stardock Forums Top

Maybe they did not feel like making it worse than it is in order to accomodate an OS they want to die?

Reply #30 from WinCustomize Forums Top

XP isn't going anywhere anytime soon. Way too many people still use it. Why do you think Microstuff embedded it in Win7 as a virtual OS. Popularity.

Reply #31 from JoeUser Forums Top

Quoting Uvah, reply 30
XP isn't going anywhere anytime soon. Way too many people still use it. Why do you think Microstuff embedded it in Win7 as a virtual OS. Popularity.
End of Uvah's quote

I agree - part of the reason is that XP surfs the Internet well and almost all "plug ins" work with it.  And the majority of computer users just use it to surf - so an 8 year old computer with a browser and a solid OS still works fine.  And XP fits the bill.

Reply #32 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Which brings me to the next question: The ethics of what they're doing/not doing. No argument that XP belongs to MS and in all truth is theirs to support or not, but I do feel it's unethical to force XP users to go and buy something else if only because their money helped position MS to conduct the R&D to come up with Vista and 7.

There's really nothing 'wrong' with XP that WB doesn't fix.  

Reply #33 from WinCustomize Forums Top

One might argue that ethics has no place in the business world. 

Microsoft is a business and the goal of a business is to sell products and make a profit.  Included in their business plan is developing and marketing updated or new products. 

Why do auto makes have new models each year? 

Reply #34 from Stardock Forums Top

Quoting DrJBHL, reply 32
Which brings me to the next question: The ethics of what they're doing/not doing. No argument that XP belongs to MS and in all truth is theirs to support or not, but I do feel it's unethical to force XP users to go and buy something else if only because their money helped position MS to conduct the R&D to come up with Vista and 7.
End of DrJBHL's quote

They are only 'forced' to do so only if they want IE9. IE8 will likely be supported with updates for some time to come, so it is not like they are being abandoned. MS just did not want to make IE9 worse in order to support XP, nor did they want to have to create and support two versions of it.

Reply #35 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Quoting Philly0381, reply 33
One might argue that ethics has no place in the business world.
End of Philly0381's quote

One might not be correct.

Reply #36 from JoeUser Forums Top

Quoting Gwenio1, reply 34
They are only 'forced' to do so only if they want IE9. IE8 will likely be supported with updates for some time to come, so it is not like they are being abandoned. MS just did not want to make IE9 worse in order to support XP, nor did they want to have to create and support two versions of it.
End of Gwenio1's quote

This is true.  However, eventually MS will quit fixing bugs, which is a death knell to any program these days.  Still, many people live with buggy software, so that is not "forcing' them.  It is just a VERY strong suggestion. ;)

Reply #37 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Quoting DrJBHL, reply 32
hich brings me to the next question: The ethics of what they're doing/not doing. No argument that XP belongs to MS and in all truth is theirs to support or not, but I do feel it's unethical to force XP users to go and buy something else if only because their money helped position MS to conduct the R&D to come up with Vista and 7.
End of DrJBHL's quote

With that thinking, we would all still be on win95. It worked fine at the time. 98Se worked just fine. Hell, I was happy with DOS back in the day.

 

Reply #38 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Quoting Dr, reply 36
many people live with buggy software,
End of Dr's quote

Too many software companies WRITE buggy software with no !@#$% accountability at all for their actions. Pisses me off to no end.

Reply #39 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Quoting Dr, reply 36
However, eventually MS will quit fixing bugs,
End of Dr's quote

That's the day this thing becomes a door stop. ;)  

 

Reply #40 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Quoting WebGizmos, reply 39
That's the day this thing becomes a door stop.
End of WebGizmos's quote

Actually that's the day you get to mess around with Linux...

Reply #41 from Stardock Forums Top

Quoting Dr, reply 36
This is true.  However, eventually MS will quit fixing bugs, which is a death knell to any program these days.  Still, many people live with buggy software, so that is not "forcing' them.  It is just a VERY strong suggestion.
End of Dr's quote

However they have continued to provide updates for a very long time in the past. They were still supporting IE6 when IE8 was out.

Unless software has a subscription fee, it is unreasonable to expect it to be supported indefinately.

Reply #42 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Quoting Phoon, reply 37

Quoting DrJBHL, reply 32hich brings me to the next question: The ethics of what they're doing/not doing. No argument that XP belongs to MS and in all truth is theirs to support or not, but I do feel it's unethical to force XP users to go and buy something else if only because their money helped position MS to conduct the R&D to come up with Vista and 7.

With that thinking, we would all still be on win95. It worked fine at the time. 98Se worked just fine. Hell, I was happy with DOS back in the day.

 
End of Phoon's quote

OK! Cool!

Reply #43 from Elemental Forums Top

One big thing to emphasize is that you simply don't need a new computer every few years anymore.  Nevermind the recession - a four year old PC is well behind the curve as far as what is on the market today, but it still does everything a general user needs it to do.

Reply #44 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Gwenio1, reply 41
Unless software has a subscription fee, it is unreasonable to expect it to be supported indefinately.
End of Gwenio1's quote

Reply #45 from WinCustomize Forums Top

I was happy with W95 also but i changed to 98 just to see whats new and to be honest i loved it...Its also not bad to check upcomming OS features ,cause after you checked you know how to work with it.I know many folks that are unable to operate a w7 system but thats because of the lack of interest i think.
Im also one of those guys that will immediatly upgrade to W8 since i work a lot on my personal computer and there have been sweeet changes to the user friendly section.Also there is a huge performence upgrade and driver update an example a 95 system that required a format C: back in the days could be easiely fixed with system rollback in vista.There is so many benefits under w7 compared to 95 that makes it a nightmare for me to even think about using it ever again.uff when i think back to the old 95 days  it was a pain in the butt to format your pc and get every driver installed again.
My compare to that windows 7 (of course its not recommended to just update your old OS.You can but i learned to walk the safe way and make a fresh install.)
95 install up now you had to install drivers mainboard and so on, windows 7 is diffrent you install you update the OS and your done.Thats a huge step i think.
And i think windows 7 unless EP was intended to be Personalcomputer software rather than enterprise software.
I understand the current hype about the Ie9,but its all marketing thats why you get a mp3 along with it.But sooner or later it will come to win95.Its just a matter of time.And besides there is still FireFox.

Quoting FutileEmotion, reply 43
One big thing to emphasize is that you simply don't need a new computer every few years anymore. Nevermind the recession - a four year old PC is well behind the curve as far as what is on the market today, but it still does everything a general user needs it to do.
End of FutileEmotion's quote

thats true.. im still using an Intel q6600 mounted on an old Asrock board attached with 8 gb´s of ram no problems.
Even in games i didnt notice flaws i can play Crysis 2 for example on Extreme smoothly and im only using a GTX260.
I mentioned it before you dont need to get yourself a fancy I7 AMD whatever.The gaming industrie is far behind most of the games get developed for consoles and portet afterwards.So why get a new system now? The current hardware prices are insane the only benfit i can see is upgrade your main HDD to SSD the performence punch is defenitly noticeable thats why most of the user that got themselves a SSD have windows index of 7.9
you pay 200 bucs for a 50% faster system. its better than pay 1000+ bucks for a new system that has a windows index of 6.9 max.

Reply #46 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Quoting FutileEmotion, reply 43
Nevermind the recession - a four year old PC is well behind the curve as far as what is on the market today, but it still does everything a general user needs it to do.
End of FutileEmotion's quote

Explain to me then why my friends Pentium 4 era machine can hardly run Facebook games...

Reply #47 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Quoting DrJBHL, reply 32
Which brings me to the next question: The ethics of what they're doing/not doing. No argument that XP belongs to MS and in all truth is theirs to support or not, but I do feel it's unethical to force XP users to go and buy something else if only because their money helped position MS to conduct the R&D to come up with Vista and 7.

There's really nothing 'wrong' with XP that WB doesn't fix.  
End of DrJBHL's quote

There's no issue of 'ethics'. No-one is forcing anyone to do anything.

And there's WAY MORE WRONG with XP than the Fisher-Price look [which WB can fix] .

It ain't 'just' plug-ugly, it breaks....;)

Reply #48 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Quoting Jafo, reply 47
And there's WAY MORE WRONG with XP than the Fisher-Price look [which WB can fix] .

It ain't 'just' plug-ugly, it breaks....
End of Jafo's quote

Not sure about that one Jafo, been using XP since it came out in beta, it is still my main OS, and I have never had any major issues at all.  But then again I build my own PC's or select the components and have the PC built for me.  All these BSOD's and stuff people talk about are things I have never really experienced.

I do have Windows Vista Ultimate and Windows 7 Ultimate too though, triple boot is nice.  :)

Reply #49 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting DrJBHL, reply 32
Which brings me to the next question: The ethics of what they're doing/not doing. No argument that XP belongs to MS and in all truth is theirs to support or not, but I do feel it's unethical to force XP users to go and buy something else if only because their money helped position MS to conduct the R&D to come up with Vista and 7.

There's really nothing 'wrong' with XP that WB doesn't fix.  
End of DrJBHL's quote

Quoting Philly0381, reply 33
One might argue that ethics has no place in the business world.
End of Philly0381's quote

Ethics certainly belongs in the business world.  However, I think you're confusing business ethics with corporate social responsibility (or some other "businesses should be good citizens nonsense").  Ethical behavior for Microsoft is to look after share holder value, their business partners, and their employees. 

Customers should be treated well or they'll go buy from someone else.  But there is no ethics involved in whether or not Microsoft should support a decade old operating system that has absolutely no licensing fees.  That's purely a business decision. 

I'd argue that it's Microsoft's concern for their customers and those customers unwillingness to upgrade that has kept XP going this long.

Reply #50 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Quoting DrJBHL, reply 27
Here ya go, Uvah: http://windows8center.com/uncategorized/download-windows-8s-aero-lite-theme-for-windows-7/
End of DrJBHL's quote

It looks like a polished version of Windows Classic. Nah ..... I'll stick with Winndowblinds. Its prettier.