Windows XP era draws to a close

After a long-announced transition, June 30 marks the end of an era at Microsoft. Well, really it's the end of two eras.

Most people think of Bill Gates, of course, and I'll have plenty more to say about his impending shift to part-time work in the coming days. But another epoch is also really coming to an end--that of Windows XP.

Windows XP: Get it while you can.

(Credit: Microsoft)

As of June 30, large PC makers will no longer be able to sell Windows XP-based PCs, at least on mainstream notebooks and desktops. Retailers will also have only until their current supply is exhausted to sell boxed copies of the operating system.

Despite a brief "Save XP" movement (and continued criticism of Windows Vista from many corners), it appears that Microsoft is not going to change the deadline, which is now just two weeks away.

Although XP will disappear as an option for most computer buyers, the operating system will live on in several key ways.

• XP will be available on PCs from smaller computer makers known as "system builders" until January 31, 2009.

• XP will be available for so-called ultra-low-cost-PCs until June 30, 2010.

• The low-end Windows XP Starter Edition will continue to be available in emerging markets until June 30, 2010.

• Windows Vista Ultimate and Windows Vista Business come with downgrade rights. Some computer makers are using this option to offer machines that appear as Windows XP products but are "factory downgraded" to XP. The downside is that only pricier versions of Vista qualify, but the benefit is that the machines come with the option to eventually move to Vista for no added fee. Microsoft says it will continue to make XP discs available to computer makers to enable downgrade rights through at least January 31, 2009.

• Microsoft is not ending support for Windows XP. Mainstream support continues until 2009, while extended support is not due to end until April 2014.

The "wow" didn't happen as fast as Microsoft expected when Vista made its splashy debut in January 2007. On stage, from left to right: Dell's Kevin Rollins, Intel's Sean Maloney, Microsoft's Steve Ballmer, AMD's Hector Ruiz, and HP's Todd Bradley. For more photos from the launch event, click on the image.

(Credit: Ina Fried/CNET News.com)

For those who want to get their PC the old-fashioned (and soon to be obsolete) way, you only have a few days left. Here is what some of the big name players had to say about their plans.

Hewlett-Packard: "All of HP's latest consumer and business computing products currently ship with Windows Vista. But we do still offer XP on a select number of our existing consumer notebook, gaming, and business products. This will continue through the XP end-of-life date on June 30, 2008.

"HP has been offering business desktops, notebooks, and workstations with the option to downgrade to Windows XP Pro from Vista since August 2007, and will continue to offer this option on its business systems through at least July 30, 2009. These systems are pre-installed with XP Pro, and the customer receives the Vista license so that they can upgrade to the new OS when they are ready, as well as restore discs for both operating systems. After June 30, if a customer already has the XP image and license, HP also can also install that customer's image on their Vista Business systems through our HP PC Customization Services."

Lenovo: "In line with our agreement with Microsoft, Lenovo will not offer any PC's preloaded with XP after June 30, 2008. Lenovo offers select Vista models that ship with a downgrade XP CD in the box. Microsoft will allow us to continue putting these downgrade CDs in the box until January 31, 2009. However, the majority of PCs we ship don't have the downgrade CD in the box. If a customer purchases a Vista system and wishes to downgrade and doesn't have the CD, they can contact our Help Center to get an XP downgrade CD."

Acer: An Acer representative said that the company plans to stop selling XP June 30. "Acer will offer CD downgrades to XP--based on customers order requests--until the Microsoft deadline, January 31, 2009."

Dell: Unlike the other three, Dell plans to stop selling standard XP machines via its Web site on Wednesday. "Dell systems with XP as the only OS will no longer be available after June 18 on Dell.com," the company said. It will offer a downgrade program for a number of its machines, including all OptiPlex desktops, all Latitude laptops, all Precision workstations and most of its Vostro systems for mid-size businesses. Two consumer gaming systems--the XPS 630 and the XPS M1730--are already eligible for the program with a third, the XPS 730, to be added soon.

The downgraded machines will ship with XP installed, plus an XP restore disc with drivers as well as a copy of Vista and its Vista drivers. It said it will keep shipping XP media until the Microsoft mandated end date of January 31, 2009.

News.com's Erica Ogg contributed to this report.

[cptnkirk_1]

Time for a Mac!

[Remo_Williams]

... a Mac? Get outta here. Time to learn to use torrent clients and Google. Users need to wait out Vista for a few years until Windows 7/8 arrives... or a real Linux desktop that doesn't require a few years of arcana experience to get wireless connectivity working.

-C

[OokiiMamoru]

A larger than normal % of my customers (WalMart) are rejecting XP out right and keeping their machines until they die a painful death and then repairing.

[ppgreat]

" Users need to wait out Vista for a few years until Windows 7/8 arrives"

No they don't. They already did that with Vista over XP and look what happened.

[pubdomains-com]

Time is right for moving to *nix platform now, OS has become more complex and Vista prevents me from doing things on my machine .. not the right approach. My machine doesn't trust me as its owner and I have already started playing with linux.

[bob2600]

I think that vista is truly the beginning of the end for Microsoft Windows and I for one has been using any Windows versions less and less and using Free Open Source operating systems more and more. My upgrade path is directly from Windows XP to Ubuntu Linux then possibly to Windows 7 if Microsoft fixes their bloat and bug problems. I probably will give Windows another chance once Windows 7 ships but after seeing how horrid Windows Vista was I am not expecting much from Microsoft as they have truly dropped the ball as far as Operating Systems are concerned. If Microsoft wants to continue to drop a reliable OS like XP in support of a crap operating system like Vista, I say go on ahead it will only cause people who used XP to go and find alternative platforms like Linux and possibly Macintosh.

[eyepoker]

Vista works fine with 2GB of RAM. You can knock it all you want but if you have the RAM then you have a good experience. Of course, a Mac user would chime in... thats to be expected. Anyway, XP works fine too. There is nothing wrong with the operating system - the issue is with people's ignorance of malware and their gullibility in downloading it. But the OS works great. My system is on 24/7 for months at a time; no crashes like what Apple would leave you to believe. I'll be buying an XP disc today just so that I have another license and so i can get a disk with SP2 on it. XP for my desktop machine and I'll leave Vista on my Vaio laptop. As to wireless connectivity issues - wifi works very well, and bluetooth on my XP machine works very easy as well - connecting to an Apple Keyboard!! No I didn't buy it, the checkout girl at BestBuy didn't ring it up so I feel better about it ;p

[rcrusoe]

That should read "Windows era draws to a close", at least at my company. My boss has already asked me if I plan to convert everyone to Macs. While that won't happen, we do have fewer people than ever that require a PC and we plan to keep buying only Macs and reassigning our existing PCs to those that need them. If we still have need for some Windows machines, when Windows 7, SP1 becomes available we'll give it a look. But we won't be buying Vista.

[bob2600]

Thats the problem right there a properly constructed OS would not need all of that ram to run properly and by vista needing that much ram to preserve the semblance of a stable OS is terrible and needs to be fixed because it is obviously a problem with the design of the OS. The sad realization is this: Vista was a mistake and a poorly planned successor to XP and as a result of that people are holding on to windows XP instead of upgrading. When Microsoft sees that its flagship product, Windows is selling poorly because people are using an older version that they purchased several years a go and not paying M$ for a new operating system they will go and spread fear, uncertainty, and doubt about Windows XP in order to scare people to an operating so poor that it requires such heavy requirements that not even your typical off the shelf computer can muster which results in a a computer that is brand new but slower than the two or three year old computer loaded with XP which is just awful! Microsoft needs to ditch vista before people start losing confidence in their software. And because of vista I have basically lost faith and Microsoft and embraced open platforms that actually work!

[Thomas, David]

I can't figure out the logic I keep hearing repeated here.

Users need to wait out ...

That logic is in-excusable, un-exceptable, with out rational thought, no value, and COMPLETELY disregards the user.

Get a Mac, or buy Linux. Most users will end up buying Macs, if they are looking for a new computer. If not, they will become Liinux users. This is a huge advantage for Linux.

How in the name, of all that is Holy (regardless of ANY religion), can ANYONE tell people they need to stick to Windows/Microsoft at any, and all costs!?!?

[Travis Ernst]

RC, your Boss has the right idea. Go Mac, split it to duel boot (Windows or Mac OS) so the office can stay Windows if they want, or they can also go Mac all on the same computer. No special software, no shell to run software in. Just install Windows on the Mac and DuelBoot upon startup. The suits can decide if they want to force everybody to go Mac or Windows later on. However the physical machines can be all Apple.

[bdaughtry]

Someday will be offered in university business schools as a study in Microsoft bungling it's monopoly position in the computer industry.

[sanenazok]

While I could care less what kind of OS someone else uses, shouldn't there have been a large increase in LInux/Mac users already? The general trend (in these comments especially) is that Vista SUX and nobody wants it, and yet where's the increase in Macs or Linux'es beyond statistical error? Supposedly, businesses were going to drop Vista, yet it's been out for a year and a half and whatever shift was going to happen I guess it must have happened already. I guess if there was a poll taken on these boards, the Ron Paul would be the winner too, shows you the connection to reality doesn't it.

[eyepoker]

"platforms that actually work". But it does work. I do agree that the RAM requirement might imply something negative, but, look how cheap ram is... so, does that really matter? Apple started from a clean slate and didn't care that previous Mac owners would have to throw away their old systems in order to buy all new hardware and software (thousands of dollars). If you take that approach then yes, you can build something leaner. The fanaticism that surounds Mac -users allowed Apple to get away with it. The reality is that the world runs on Windows - if you throw away everything like what Apple did - which is what an Apple user complains about with Windows (the "bloat") - then imagine the impact!!! Its impossible and incredibly irresponsible to imagine such a thing. But, when MS does try to skip/leave behind certain things in an attempt to move forward then people complain about it! They are in a unique and difficult position. Is there a ton of stuff in there that I personaly don't use? Sure, i agree with that. But to say its wholesale junk when everyday so many great things are done on that platform is really short-sighted. What do you think your 911 services runs on? How about all the software that runs your local hospital? or the systems used in the Pharamaceutical industry, or... ad infinitum. I know i seem like an "MS-Fan boy" (to quote the oft-used Apple-inspired phrase) ... but one last thing - if you want the system to stop asking your permission to do stuff (which is to protect you from yourself), if you want to go back to the old way of browsing for files, or go back to the XP look, then configure it to behave that way. Not hard. There are lots of options.

[Brons2]

bob2600, that's nonsense. If you go visit any retail outlet and look at computers, the vast majority of them have 2GB or more of memory installed. Furthermore, an upgrade to 4GB costs less than $100. Vista is just taking advantage of modern computer hardware. My new Toshiba with Vista Home Premium runs a lot faster than my old IBM Thinkpad R32 with XP Pro.

I hear people ask me about Vista all the time when I tell them I got a new laptop. I tell them, I love it and I have it on my desktop at work as well. I think this Vista-hating is taking on a life of it's own, beyond any actual or perceived deficiencies with the product.

[Roberia]

Personally, I don't see what all the hoopla is regarding the end of Windows XP. As a secretary, I've used both systems, and I find Windows Vista to be much better.

[rossstock]

The web is the platform.

[AppleRocks1963]

On June 30th the 'Ow' starts now and becomes the unofficial switch to OS X day.

[Laserdisc]

XP will be missed. I'm not looking forward to Vista... too many companies are building crappy drivers making Vista a not so viable option with my current rig which is less than a year old. I'm hoping Windows 7 will be the OS we've been waiting for. Sort of what Windows2000 was for Windows 98.

But Microsoft isn't the only company that released a crappy operating system. Anyone remeber Apple's Mac OS 9? Oy vey!

[fgoldstein]

> Get a Mac, or buy Linux.

Uh, no. Macs are designer hardware, very specialized, and the OS is not available for 95%+ of the hardware out there. So it'll never be a good answer, any more than telling 95% of the population of the country to move to one state because that's where the weather's nice or the jobs are, etc. The mass market and mainstream markets need support.

Nor is Linux an answer. It's a pretty good server OS whose design is antithetical to desktop support. It cannot reliably support mainstream desktop hardware, and never will, because Linus insists that the drivers become GPL'd as part of his kernel, for him to distribute and modify. That's not how most desktop hardware vendors operate, and many key drivers often (usually) don't work. Sound and wireless are both serious sore points. Let's not even mention 3D gaming.

Besides that, it has two other fatal flaws. Its application base is limited (great for some areas, awful for others where Windows gets the developers) and it is hard to use. The latter is a because most Linux distros have nobody who really understands non-31337 users. So they either require you to be a Unix sysadmin or they treat you like an imbecile. It's a wonderful science fair project; Linus should have gotten a ribbon. It's a terrible substitute for XP.

Vista's a disaster but Microsoft may yet end up forcing it down the throats of an unwilling market just because of their monopoly power.