Gates: Vista is doing just fine

Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates says sales of Windows Vista have been "rapid", with more than 140 million copies sold worldwide.

Gates, speaking in Tokyo, said the figure represented "a very rapid sales rate," according to a Wall Street Journal report on Thursday.

Despite the sales figures, Microsoft has admitted to struggling with the public's perception of Vista. Windows XP, Vista's 7-year-old predecessor, is still popular among both businesses and consumers.

Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates speaks at the Consumer Electronics Show in January.

(Credit: CNET Networks)

Microsoft already extended the deadline for ending XP sales to large computer makers one time, allowing sales through June 30, as opposed to ending them this past January. The software maker also granted a more narrow extension, allowing XP to be used on ultra-low-cost computers through 2010.

More recently, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said that the company might reconsider its decision to stop selling XP next month.

While Microsoft ponders yet another stay of execution for Windows XP, it's readying a new version of Windows, being developed under the code name "Windows 7."

Gates, speaking in Miami last month, seemed to indicate that Windows 7 could come earlier than expected, perhaps within the next year, putting far ahead of the anticipated development schedule.

[rcrusoe]

I suspect a large number of the "140 million copes" of Vista sold are being used to legally downgrade to XP. Like many businesses we purchased XP but installed W2K while waiting for WXP to prove itself. However in the case of Vista it's likely many licenses will never be used to run Vista.

[Penguinisto]

Actually, uptake of Vista among businesses was recently quoted at a mere 6.3%, so I suspect that yes, the bulk of "Vista" sales are actually VLK's that are being throttled back to XP based on that fact alone.

[davidwb45011]

140 million copies sold - that number certainly includes all the copies of Vista not being used by people like me who installed XP in frustration. I'm guessing it also includes all the copies that are sitting in stores gathering dust. Gates can say what he likes but the people who know understand that Vista is a disaster of Titanic proportions.

[jonathan_a]

"Steve Ballmer said that the company might reconsider its decision to stop selling XP next month." ???? What is he talking about? I dunno if this only applies to the USA, but here in Quebec Canada, you cannot find any copies of Windows XP at all. All PCs or laptops come pre-installed with Vista whether you like it or not. The only reason Vista is selling is because you don't have a choice anymore. Just when I bought my Dell XPS, the default OS that Dell is offering is Vista. I had to go through the list and find "Windows XP Media Edition" which any computer illiterate may miss if they don't search hard enough. The PC community hates Vista, no one likes it, but many are either stuck with it or don't have a choice to use it because they just don't have a choice unless they get a pirated copy of XP.

[Sabocat]

I'm pretty sure that "Windows 7" may be the worst "code name" ever.

[john55440]

On the consumer side, Vista-preinstalled dominates the market.

[Penguinisto]

So explain why Dell and HP are so nervous about not selling XP anymore. ;)

[ewsachse]

"A number of the 140 million copes' of Vista sold are being used to legally downgrade to XP"? <br />That is the stupidest statement of the century. Why would anyone do that?<br />Plenty of people run Vista with no issues. The majority of the issues people have with Vista is 3rd party device drivers. Nvidia is known for causing around 1/2 of all the issues with Vista. No one holds their feet to the fire for their substandard device drivers and substandard hardware.<br /><br />The media, message board clowns, and Mac fanbois love to gang up on Vista, but all they can provide is anecdotal stories on why Vista is so bad. They cannot provide any empirical evidence to back up their claims.

[Penguinisto]

"[i]Why would anyone do that?[/i]" Because you can get full compatibility and an average of a 150% performance boost by doing so? Because you lose all the bloat and the bugs? This isn't rocket science here...

[random1138]

I ran Fista for 7 months, and finally downgraded to XP. Why? Because Fista is slow, and doesn't run apps very well despite some welcome improvements in some areas. XP, by comparison, is quite snappy and runs all my apps just great. The Fista performance penalty is not worth the things that I do like about it.

[PinkFloydYoshi]

Not entirely. A lot of software developers don't wish to support Vista for multiple reasons, and a lot of huge software vendors don't support Vista either. Avid Adrenaline HD will not run on Vista and is not supported by Avid, which is software Channel 4 use to render a lot of their television content. We've got 438 Vista Downgrade licences and we've opted for XP throughout as a lot of the software packages we use all show incompatibilities with Vista, ArtCam, Cubase SX, the soundcards we use in all our music machines, our Ranger for Networks software, our Avantis Disc Library client, VMware Infrastructure client, none of it works or works partially in Vista, but it all works fine in XP. Thats why people use those Vista Downgrade licences to take advantage of downgrading to XP, and of course, a Vista downgrade licence still counts as a Vista Install, even if the end user uses the licence to downgrade to XP.

[Signal-Support-System-Spc]

Every time the public responds with accuracy to the inferiority of a product, some subject product lacky shows up to similarily represent "the public" in its defence. The empirical evidence that you suggest is all around you and us. Hence why Bill has at least twice already made comments on Win 7. Vista is the dirty bomb of the Digital Age and we all know it. The question is not how many people are experiencing operational difficulties with Vista. The real question is how many are not. The reason why estabolishments are down grading to XP is because it works. We are still running XP in the US Army. Why? Because it works. The only reason why anyone should even consider upgrading to Vista is for Direct X 10 support and this applies only to a minority who can afford the processing power to play a limited number of DX10 games. Vista is for the extreme gamer who naturally runs it as a secondary OS. For companies that want reliability and efficiency, XP is the standard. Vista might as well be called Millenium Edition 2.0 - An OS whose cons far out way its benefits.

[Sabocat]

I'm pretty sure that "Windows 7" may be the worst "code name" ever.

[Zaunto]

Microsoft of course hasn't indicated who that "$140 million copies" of Vista were sold to. I suspect that since the general public has been avoiding purchasing the upgrade for their Windows XP PC's that run just fine, that most of the sold copies of Vista were sold to computer manufacturers. I don't personally know anyone who has upgraded to Vista. Where I were, everyone was informed by the IT department not to have Vista pre-installed on new computers purchased because they will not support it. Most businesses have the same view. I purchased a new PC last year with Vista and only found out afterward that I could NEVER downgrade because none of the hardware in that PC has Vista drivers. Service Pack 1 STILL will not install on it.

[john55440]

On the consumer side, Vista-preinstalled dominates the market.

[The_Decider]

Not because consumers want it,m but because there is really no option when you walk into a Best Buy or Wal-Fart.

[lancop1]

I suspect that rcrusoe and davidwb45011 are both correct in their assessments of Vista's current market position. A look at various user forums will confirm the realworld feedback of the user community, and numerous pundit articles all document the many reasons that businesses &#38; high productivity power users are mostly saying "no thanks" at the moment. It seems that many of the major software vendors are forcing their Security 2.0 products on the IT World, ready or not. A word to the wise: conduct thorough pilot test rollouts in a virtual lab that simulates your production network before you try to go live with all of these new bleeding edge technologies. You don't want your mission critical apps down because of incompatability issues. That said, early adoptors are forging painfully ahead with the implementation of Security 2.0 solutions, and, in the long run, the new security architecture should raise the bar on hackers considerably. Just don't neglect your virtualization security and make sure you still have eyes to see your network traffic - even Security 2.0 is not a "set it and forget it" technology.

[QASIMARA]

Sorry lancop1, but how do you know you are not part of a pilot test rollout? Ever hear of of the double blind method in research? Until more than 50% of the public are on 2.0, it's a test run. Please fill out your surveys and census forms as best you can. The next generation will laugh at how we fumble with these basic questions.

[Zaunto]

Microsoft of course hasn't indicated who that "$140 million copies" of Vista were sold to. I suspect that since the general public has been avoiding purchasing the upgrade for their Windows XP PC's that run just fine, that most of the sold copies of Vista were sold to computer manufacturers. I don't personally know anyone who has upgraded to Vista. Where I were, everyone was informed by the IT department not to have Vista pre-installed on new computers purchased because they will not support it. Most businesses have the same view. I purchased a new PC last year with Vista and only found out afterward that I could NEVER downgrade because none of the hardware in that PC has Vista drivers. Service Pack 1 STILL will not install on it.

[brio101]

So what. A sale is a sale. ALL companies are in business to make money. After you buy a product and pay for it, companies don't care if you set fire to it. They got your money already.

[qabana]

Why Vista is just fine<br />1. Most people that buy a computer dont know(dont understand) the difference between the 2 OS<br />2. Most of the people that understand the difference will believe that MS is going to fix it<br />3. Most of the people that KNOW that MS is NOT going to fix it, will not be able to downgrade because drivers will will not be available for XP. In my case, after buying a gateway laptop, gateway support said that they did not know how to downgrade. It took a bit of detective work and reading a lot of forums for me to find all the drivers. Now my machine is working fine with XP. I was lucky that the manufacturers did provide XP drivers. But I can imagine many others do not.<br />4. Most computer sellers DO NOT provide the option of selecting the OS. It will be nice if it was a standard procedure to select the OS after buying the machine. But microsoft has a monopoly on this. ALL pcs sold at your local retailer will come with Vista.<br />5. Linux has no manufacturer support is terms of drivers. The very few manufacturers that do provide linux drivers , provide them in experimental or beta states with no guarantee.<br /><br />So this is why Gates and MS dont care if vista works or not.

[The_Decider]

Thank you for stating the obvious. MS wants and needs its customers to live in ignorance.

[Imalittleteapot]

I'm another one that technically bought a copy of Vista because it shipped with a computer I wanted, but removed it and do not use it. I also know many people that would have removed it but didn't know how, and I know people that do like Vista. It's a real mixed bag.<br /><br />Even though SP1 is out and Vista was released almost a year and a half ago it still hasn't gotten overly popular and neither has its perception. MS says they want to release Windows 7 around 2010 or so . If that actually happens that means Vista only has about another year and half to pick up steam before MS starts bashing how insecure and unstable Vista is so they can sell Windows 7. So, I don't know how popular it will end up being. According to MS it isn't going to have the settle time that XP had.

[Penguinisto]

to rcrusoe: Actually, uptake of Vista among businesses was recently quoted at a mere 6.3%, so I suspect that yes, the bulk of "Vista" sales are actually VLK's that are being throttled back to XP based on that fact alone.

[MaLvaDo39]

You DO have a choice... the better choice being a Mac and OSX.<br />You can slum it with Windows on the Mac too if you think you must.

[Imalittleteapot]

I'm another one that technically bought a copy of Vista because it shipped with a computer I wanted, but removed it and do not use it. I also know many people that would have removed it but didn't know how, and I know people that do like Vista. It's a real mixed bag.<br /><br />Even though SP1 is out and Vista was released almost a year and a half ago it still hasn't gotten overly popular and neither has its perception. MS says they want to release Windows 7 around 2010 or so . If that actually happens that means Vista only has about another year and half to pick up steam before MS starts bashing how insecure and unstable Vista is so they can sell Windows 7. So, I don't know how popular it will end up being. According to MS it isn't going to have the settle time that XP had.

[DeathNACan]

The largest percentage of Vista sales do indeed come from pre-installs. <br /><br />Microsoft has taken this one step further by offering to PC vendors and OEM the Vista downgrade option wherein Vista is installed and the option to downgrade to XP is offered. This allows them to further inflate their sales number giving investors the miss impression that Vista sales are better than they actually are, as if counting forced pre-installs wasn't bad enough.<br /><br />Some Questions: How is this not a case of management misrepresenting sales figures to investors and to the public? What is the word that is usually used to describe misrepresenting something for financial gain? Why is the S.E.C. not looking into this? Are the investors and the public, who make investment decisions not entitled to know the truth?

[Thomas, David]

Soooo MANY people have issues with Vista, far beyond driver issues, and compatibility problems. Yet someone is always trying to CONVINCE everyone else that it's fine. This IS a case where you ARE being TOLD to LIKE something you REALLY don't. The latest version of Office is a reflection of the perception of failure behind Vista. It didn't have be that way, it didn't have to be so difficult. The bottom-line is, besides the intentionally ANNOYING UAC, which makes the USER feel like a TOOL for their own computer, is there were changes, simply for the sake of making changes, that provided no true user benefit. It felt as if they went into a room, rearranged everything, splashed some paint on the walls, and then tried to sell it to you as a new room. Every single experienced computer user, who has worked with DOS through VISTA, Linux, Unix, and various other operating systems, KNOWS this OS is an incredible disappointment.

[BigOldNerd]

LMAO Does anyone believe anything that Gates or Ballmer say anymore. They both know that they have put out the worst OS since ME. They have been losing market share to both Mac OS and Linux and will lose more when they stop the sell of XP. Has anyone notice how they bully the Computer manufacture in pushing Vista. Go into any retail outlet and try to find an XP system, they do not exist. Go online and try to find a laptop that has XP, they do not exist unless you go with one of the smaller online specialty custom sellers. To make matters worst try to purchase a consumer computer that does not have Windows install. Call HP, Dell, Gateway or any of the other large players and tell them you have an OS you do not want to pay for a system with Windows installed. They will apologize and inform you that you must pay M$ for a copy Vista if you want to buy one of their computers. So Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer have set up a system that gives them a way of claiming that Vista is selling robustly even if the end user never uses it. I do wish the courts would look at this practice and do something about it. M$ day is coming and they are using false and misleading sales numbers to claim that it not just around the corner.