Thread: Cutting Prices Won't Save Windows Vista

Here is another article on Microsoft's failure with Vista. Which leads me to the question: is Microsoft on the verge of that "Downhill Slope" eventually leading to another leader in the market? Will it be Google, or Linux? I look at Apple as being only a fringe player, because of their inability to give up control over their system. Apple is the Sony BetaMax of the computer industry.

Cutting Prices Won't Save Windows Vista
March 14, 2008
By Jim Lynch

Microsoft's recent announcement of a price cut for Windows Vista illustrates the desperate position the company is in. By all reasonable accounts Vista has failed and Microsoft is desperately trying to prop it up and put some lipstick on a very nasty and very flawed pig. Unfortunately, it won't work.

Microsoft plans to cut prices is as confusing as its release of multiple version of the failed OS. [/size]

In the United States, Microsoft will reduce prices for Windows Vista Ultimate, the company's top-end operating system, to $319 from $399 for the full version and cut the price for an "upgrade" version to $219 from $259 for consumers who already run Windows XP or another edition of Vista.


It also cut prices for upgrade versions of Vista Home Premium, its mainstream product, to $129 from $159. The price cuts vary by country.

In emerging markets, Microsoft will stop selling "upgrade" versions of Vista, because, for many customers, it will be the first purchase of a genuine copy of Windows. The company will instead sell Vista Home Premium and Home Basic, a stripped-down version, at the upgrade prices.

What Went Wrong with Windows Vista?
How did Microsoft arrive at this awful position?

First it promised far more than it could deliver with Vista. Feature after feature was taken out as the horrific realization sank in that the Microsoft was never going to be able to make good on its promises. Removal of features such as WINFS and PC-to-PC synchronization lowered the value proposition for Windows Vista and helped cement Microsoft's reputation as a company that makes a lot of promises but fails miserably at delivering them.

Another problem with Vista is that visually it comes across as a very crude clone of Mac OS X's interface. It even poaches directly by adding things called "gadgets" which is a clear rip off of Apple's "widgets." Vista's "aero" desktop ends up paling in comparison to what was offered in Mac OS X Tiger and positively stinks compared to the cool stuff in Mac OS Leopard. There seems to be a terrible problem at Microsoft when it comes to design decisions.

Despite all of its billions, Microsoft cannot seem to hire competent UI designers. Why this is so, I'm just not sure. It may have to do with Microsoft's corporate culture. Creative designer types may just be turned off at the borg-like atmosphere of Microsoft and probably don't even consider looking for a job there when there are other companies that appreciate the virtue of great design ideas and expertise.

Worse than the rest of this, Vista's insatiable need for processing power, RAM, and hard disk space has given it a reputation among some consumers as a serious computing pig. Consumers whose machines ran very well under Windows XP have reported in online forums that Vista slowed things down considerably.

And performance isn't the only problem with Windows Vista. Many other users have reported application and game incompatibilities. One has to wonder why Microsoft just didn't start from scratch if there were going to be so many application compatibility problems...isn't backwards compatibility supposed to be the saving grace of Windows? Why bother if many programs won't run or won't run well at all?

What was Microsoft thinking by releasing so many different versions of Vista? How is a home consumer supposed to figure out which version is right for them? It boggles the mind that Microsoft didn't see this problem coming a mile away. It's so much easier when a consumer deals with Apple's OS as there is one version and that's it. Compare that to this mess:

-Windows Vista Ultimate
-Windows Vista Home Premium
-Windows Vista Home Basic
-Windows Vista Business
-Windows Vista Enterprise

One can understand separating the home and business/enterprise editions, but why is there a need for three different non-business versions? Talk about confusing.

Let's face it, Microsoft blew it royally with Windows Vista and has never regained its footing. In fact, as you'll see below, things have only gotten worse in Redmond. Continued... Even worse, it's recently come to light that Microsoft colluded with Intel to con customers into believing that their machines were "Windows Vista Ready" when in fact they weren't. As Lance notes in his column, Microsoft just didn't care what its customers thought, it was only worried about the needs of its partners in crime:

The company's cosseted approach to software development, coddling of Intel, and tin ear for virtually every other partner and its consumers led to one of the biggest driver fiascos in its history and a bad start and unfortunate reputation for its flagship product that lingers to this day.

I've been poring over a 158-page document which includes e-mails and other internal Microsoft documents that were recently made public as part of an ongoing legal battle over Microsoft's Vista Capable program. There's no smoking gun here, but the document clearly shows the years-long machinations inside Microsoft and with its key partners over Windows Vista driver support, the onerous and confusing versions, and tiered logo program.

Unlike e-mails we saw from NASA regarding, for example, the Columbia space Shuttle disaster, these concerns were felt at the highest levels. In an exchange between Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and newly installed Windows Senior Vice President Steven Sinofsky in early 2007, Sinofsky details what most Vista early adopters already knew: the new OS lacked driver support for an astonishing array of printers, scanners, graphics cards, and chips and applications. Even now, more than a year after the launch and almost a year after this exchange, I still come across products that Vista bricks (Digital Blue Cameras and Encyclopedia Britannica 2007 come to mind).

Not only is this in line with Microsoft's usual "screw the customer" mentality, it speaks of a deep and abiding contempt for Windows users. Microsoft had no conscience and no concerns about fairness or value when it came time to choose between the bottom line of its partners and itself versus the needs of its customers. It should have been far more cautious about which systems it labeled "Vista Ready" and should have had the guts to push back on Intel and put the needs of customers ahead of Intel's needs.

Given how Microsoft has given Intel the finger on other issues in the past, one has to wonder why they decided to cave on this one. Didn't they think of the consequences when angry customers found that their machines could not run Windows Vista well? Those very same customers are courageously fighting back by launching a class action lawsuit against Microsoft and its "Vista Capable" program.

Seattle District Court Judge Marsha Pechman, who last year rejected Microsoft's request for a dismissal of the case, last week effectively expanded the lawsuit to potentially include all consumers who purchased a Windows XP PC advertised as "Vista Capable."

In their initial complaint, consumers Dianne Kelley and Kenneth Hansen claimed they were the victims of "bait and switch" sales tactics by Microsoft and filed a lawsuit against the software maker last March, alleging that the company used deceptive marketing tactics to promote the Windows Vista operating system.

Kelley and Hansen claimed that many personal computers labeled Vista Capable before the OS hit stores a year ago were hardly that. Microsoft assured consumers "that they were purchasing Vista capable machines when, in fact, they could obtain only a stripped down operating system," according to the complaint.

In contention is the very definition of Windows Vista itself. Kelley and Hansen argue that some computers sold as Vista Capable were capable of only running a basic version of the operating system that lacks Vista's defining features—such as the space-age Aero interface, Flip 3-D navigation tools, and Media PC functions.

Our tech analyst Joel did a great analysis of SP1 as it relates to games and found that it did, indeed, improve gaming and multimedia experience.

We're troubled, however, by the Crysis tests. In fact, we're warming up a different test system as we type this conclusion to corroborate them. As startling as they are, however, they don't diminish the fact that all the other tests show that SP1 does indeed improve performance, especially in gaming and multimedia.

If you're a diehard Crysis player with an SLI rig, you might hold off until more SP1 tests are published; otherwise, SP1 is a boon to the troubled operating system and deserves serious consideration by anyone running Windows Vista on a gaming computer. Windows Vista is the turd of all computing turds. Everyone associated with it—from Bill Gates on down—will be forever tainted by its stink.

However, I don't think this is enough to save Windows Vista. Too much damage has been done and SP1 is far too little, far too late. Vista's reputation is sealed and nobody trusts any propaganda coming out of Redmond about it.

Vista will go down as one of Microsoft's biggest mistakes ever and the best thing the company can do now is to pay out some cash to settle the lawsuit against it and move forward as quickly as possible on Windows 7. This time Microsoft better not promise more than it can deliver and it had better not put out such a bloated, slow, and buggy mess as Windows Vista. And Microsoft has to make sure that if it labels a computer as "Windows 7 Ready" that it had better damn well be ready for it.

Consequences of the Windows Vista Disaster

The release of Windows Vista has had some positive consequences. Mac market share is up as more and more people look for some way to get off the sinking Microsoft ship and plenty of DIY types are busy downloading Linux distributions as their potential new post-Windows XP operating system.

Choice is coming again to the operating system arena after far too many years of a tedious, incompetent and dull reign by Microsoft. Consumers are shunning Vista and that is a very positive thing for all of us. As Mac and Linux desktop market share goes up, more and more pressure is applied to Redmond to respond competitively. Microsoft's time as king of the operating system hill was a terrible, terrible thing for all of us who use computers regularly.

So as we watch Microsoft stumble and bumble along trying desperately to fix Windows Vista, let's be grateful for that Vista has gotten a lot of people to seriously look at other operating systems.

Choice is a beautiful thing.

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