Windows 7 Selling Like Crazy in the UK

Microsoft’s Windows 7 is selling like crazy in the UK - the Windows 7 Home Premium Upgrade Family Pack for XP or Vista is selling particularly well (constantly jumping up and down on the best seller list), as is the Windows 7 Ultimate Upgrade Edition for XP or Vista users and TG Daily is reporting that Amazon claims to have become the biggest pre-order product of all time in the UK.

That’s some pretty heady stuff, as it apparently beat out the Harry Potter books in the UK, including Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows which was their biggest pre-order to date. They claim that just over the past three months alone, only the latest Dan Brown book has beat out Windows 7 pre-orders and that it’s surprising when you look at it as a product versus product (software versus book) competition.

Link: TG Daily

Microsoft Windows 7, the Starter Edition

Channel Insider has an article up discussing the pros and cons of Microsoft’s plans as far as netbooks and the upcoming Windows 7. Specifically, they discuss the Windows 7 Starter Edition, which is going to be a stripped-down version of the “regular” Windows 7 versions/distributions. One of the worst aspects of the Starter Edition will be the fact that it only allows for three applications to be run concurrently.

There will also be some advanced features missing, which I don’t think will be as important (for most) as the three application limit, but CI makes a good case for the Windows 7 Starter Edition versus the Windows XP Home edition that ships with many current netbooks:

The big question is, Will customers be willing to pay for an OS that is arguably less capable than Windows XP Home edition, which is currently found on the majority of netbook computers? Netbooks have proved to be a challenge for Microsoft—the company has had to make special exceptions to get netbook vendors to put a Microsoft OS on those systems, the end result being a step backward down to Windows XP.

They point out what many of us have experienced - where Vista ran poorly on ultraportable netbooks/sub-notebooks, Windows 7 (beta) runs much better and provides for a better overall experience, even when compared to the performance of XP Home (especially in the networking area).

They do make a crucial point that Microsoft can’t ignore: If Microsoft (and the manufacturers who will be working on what editions are shipped with various netbook models) botch it and start pushing out netbooks with the Starter Edition, Apple could very well gain quite a bit with the release of their own netbook. Chances are high that any netbook shipping from Apple is going to ship with a version of Mac OS X that resembles what you see with the MacBook and with the Mac mini (and it wouldn’t surprise me if it’s the same OS X that ships on their consumer products). Apple is very proud of the fact that they’ve managed to scale OS X down to the iPhone, and you also have a huge unofficial (highly unofficial) group of netbook users who have worked out how to install OS X on just about every type of netbook you can imagine. OS X runs well on these devices. Apple also makes use (or has in the past) of the fact that they basically have two versions of OS X they ship (three if you count the iPhone) - the consumer/client version, and the server version. They don’t have a Home or a Home Premium or a Professional or a Business or an Ultimate version.

Microsoft takes a huge risk when trying to push a version of Windows 7 that would restrict you to three applications, and Channel Insider mentions the advertising benefits that Apple would reap:

How will Apple respond to the launch of Windows 7 Starter Edition? I can picture the cute commercials now. Imagine a Mac commercial where the PC guy is shown juggling a couple of balls, the Mac Guy walks in juggling dozens of balls and throws one ball in the PC Guy’s direction, and the PC Guy drops everything

The ads would write themselves, as many American consumers have not experienced a “Starter” edition of Microsoft Windows, and would be extremely upset to find out after the fact that their netbooks with Windows 7 can’t do as much as their netbooks with Windows XP. Retailers would not be happy with Microsoft or the manufacturers, as they would bear the brunt of consumer anger and confusion.

Read: Channel Insider

Microsoft’s Windows 7 Netbook Challenge

Netbooks, Sub-notebooks, ultraportables, whatever you want to call them, Microsoft is trying to figure out how to maximize their revenue from potential Windows 7 sales, without causing the manufacturers to go with an alternative. This is an issue that Microsoft has been looking at for a while now, going back to last november and beyond. Microsft has already had to relax some hardware restrictions on initial limitations they imposed with Windows XP Home licensing, as well as extending sales of Windows XP Home in general.

Given the low price and rapid growth in the market of these devices, Microsoft faces the situation of trying to get people to buy the more expensive versions of Windows 7. Having to offer Windows XP Home on literally millions of machines last year ate into Microsoft’s revenue stream - they would have preferred people buy the more expensive Windows Vista, however Vista did not perform well on many of the machines, plus the pricing was unattractive.

Last week, Bloomberg.com published an article concerning how Microsoft sees the situation and what they plan on doing both from a technical and from a financial point of view:

“The challenge for us clearly is to get the average selling price up,” Microsoft Chief Financial Officer Chris Liddell said last week. “We see Windows 7 at as an opportunity. We’ll have the ability for people to trade up, which would give us a price more similar to what we would normally get for a consumer.”

To push customers to pricier versions of Windows 7, Microsoft is limiting the features of the cheaper edition. The most basic, called Starter Edition, can only run three programs at a time.

Microsoft will make it easy for consumers to quickly upgrade to more advanced versions, as all the required software will already be installed on the machine and it just takes a few minutes to switch from one version to the next, said Parri Munsell, a director at Microsoft’s Windows business.

“If you look at Starter Edition, I really don’t think Microsoft wants to sell that at all — it’s pretty crippled,” said Michael Silver, an analyst at Stamford, Connecticut-based Gartner Inc. “It’s really there just so they can say they have a really low-priced offering.”

If the pricing is too high, they also face the situation of Linux potentially gaining ground - the next major release of Ubuntu has some major enhancements for netbook performance, and Hewlett-Packard and others are offering custom interfaces for Linux (this review of the Mini 1000 discusses it). These devices are actually one area where Linux can do a lot better than other markets, given that the main uses have capable equivalents on both Linux and Windows platforms (Skype, web browsing, etc.).

Read: Bloomberg.com
Thanks to Tony

NVIDIA Ion - Certified for Vista, Runs Windows 7

There was a joint press conference held today in Taipei, Taiwan between Microsoft and NVIDIA, showcasing the new NVIDIA Ion platform for netbooks/nettops and other ultraportable or low-power devices. It was hosted by NVIDIA’s general managers for their MCP and notebook business units, and involved Microsoft’s Senior Director for OEMs and Senior Manager for the Windows client business group. It was announced that the Ion platform (NVIDIA’s GeForce 9400M graphics chipset and Intel’s Atom CPU) has been officially certified by Microsoft for Microsoft Windows Vista Premium.

NVIDIA also showed off the Ion running Microsoft Windows 7. Existing chipsets (namely the Intel 945G) do not fully support DirectX 10 and other graphics features, while the Ion platform/chipset is able to handle them very well. In fact, the demonstration involved running a full 1080p move in the background while NVIDIA was giving the Powerpoint demonstration. They also described being able to encode/transcode video in the background while watching HD video. They also demonstrated “Left 4 Dead” running in 720p video (the game is very graphics-intensive).
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HP to Offer Three Windows 7 Versions on Future Mini Line

In an interview given to Computerworld last week, Kyle Thornton a manager for HP’s business notebooks mentioned that future models of the HP Mini series will have up to three different versions of Windows 7 available.

The versions available will be: Windows 7 Starter (only three applications can be run simultaneously), Home Premium (no limitations on number of applications running, plus touchscreen functionality), and Windows 7 Professional (location aware printing, file system encryption, and presentation support). Thornton did mention that HP had also tested Windows 7 Ultimate (which is the current beta version many of us are testing). He also mentioned that they have seen it “running very well” on HP’s Mini line, inluding the running of Windows 7’s Aero interface (also available in Vista).

HP does plan to continue offering Windows XP and Vista Business support for some of these ultraportables, as well as SUSE Enterprise Linux on select lines (such as the Mini 2140).

The article goes on to discuss HP’s views on the 2140’s target audiences, as well as how they see the 2140 performing sales-wise and where they expect it to do better.

I can’t see them offering the Starter edition outside of a few select countries, given the fact that it limits the number of applications that you can run at one time to only three - that would turn a lot of people off to these devices, especially as they continue to get more powerful over time.

Read: Computerworld

More on Windows 7 Editions/SKUs (Win SuperSite)

As a follow-up to earlier news of Microsoft formally announcing the various Windows 7 product editions, Paul Thurrott has taken a good look at the information and broken it down, product edition by product edition.

The good news is, you should be able to pick up a netbook in the future, and if it has Windows 7 Starter, you can pay the difference and upgrade to a better version of Windows 7. Otherwise you’ll have the limitations that Thurrott mentions:

Windows 7 Starter
Market: Worldwide availability this time but with new PCs only
Key features: Enhanced taskbar, Jump Lists, Windows Media Player, Backup and Restore, Action Center, Device Stage, Play To, Fax and Scan, basic games
What’s missing: Aero Glass, many Aero desktop enhancements, Windows Touch, Media Center, Live thumbnail previews, Home Group creation

This version will only be sold through PC makers to users, but unlike with Vista, it will be sold worldwide. This suggests that netbook makers will choose this version, even in the US. As with previous Windows Starter Edition products, it is limited in some ways: You can run only three applications at once, don’t get Windows 7’s full mobility capabilities, and can participate in but not create a Home Group. Also, there’s no Aero Glass.

One thing Paul brings up - if you have Windows XP loaded on your laptop or netbook, and you want to move up to Windows 7, you will have to do a complete clean install - you won’t be able to upgrade “in-place”. MS is working to make this an easier process, but it will involve backing up your data somewhere (and MS has indicated they have tools to help with this).

Read: Paul Thurrott’s SuperSite for Windows

Windows 7 Editions Announced, Talks About Netbooks

Microsoft has announced the various editions of Microsoft Windows 7 today. They believe most customers will gravitate towards one of two editions - either Windows 7 Home Premium for consumers, or Windows 7 Professional for business users.

There are some major changes coming, and while some were clearly needed, others will be met with derision. The biggest/worst decision as far as future netbook owners should be concerned, is that the OEMs producing netbooks will probably be selling them with Windows 7 Starter. That’s what Microsoft wants to happen.

Windows 7 Starter only allows you to run three applications at a time. Forget about the fact that many of us are using the Windows 7 public beta (which has the “Ultimate” feature set) and that it runs just fine on netbooks. Hopefully most of the netbook makers will offer something other than Windows 7 Starter, for not much more. It’s a software limitation that doesn’t match the fact that by the time Windows 7 is available for retailers, the netbook hardware will be quite a bit faster and better than the first generation from this time a year ago.

From the Microsoft press release:

The first change in Windows 7 was to make sure that editions of Windows 7 are a superset of one another. That is to say, as customers upgrade from one version to the next, they keep all features and functionality from the previous edition. As an example, some business customers using Windows Vista Business wanted the Media Center functionality that is in Windows Vista Home Premium but didn’t receive it in Business edition. Customers won’t have to face that trade-off with Windows 7. With Windows 7 there is a more natural progression from one edition to the next.

The second change is that we have designed Windows 7 so different editions of Windows 7 can run on a very broad set of hardware, from small-notebook PCs (sometimes referred to as netbooks) to full gaming desktops. This way, customers can enable the scenarios they want across the broad hardware choices they have.

Microsoft also felt the need to talk about Windows 7 on netbooks, through Brad Brooks, corporate vice president for Windows Consumer Product Marketing.
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Microsoft Extends Windows 7 Beta Deadline - Feb 10

The response to the public Windows 7 beta was huge - enough that they lifted the initial limits. The original cut-off date was going to be today, January 24th.

A quick check of the Windows 7 Team Blog shows that yesterday they changed their minds. Even as the Windows 7 team continues to receive an enormous amount of feedback, they are going to allow people to continue to download the public Windows 7 Beta through February 10th.

On January 27th, the Windows 7 page will display a warning that there are just a few weeks left in the public beta as far as downloading it.

On February 10th, new downloads of the Windows 7 Beta will not be allowed. If you started the process prior to the 10th but didn’t complete it, you have until the 12th.

Product keys will continue to be made available after February 12th to those who have downloaded the beta, but did not receive a key for some reason. As noted, none of this applies to MSDN or TechNet subscribers - those folks will have continued access to the downloads, etc., as part of their subscriptions.

Read: Windows 7 Team Blog

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