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Reuters wrote:SEATTLE (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp. (MSFT.O: Quote, Profile, Research) said on Tuesday it plans to delay the consumer launch of its much-anticipated Windows Vista until after this year's holiday shopping season, sending its shares down nearly 3 percent.

The world's largest software maker pushed back the consumer version of Vista until January 2007 from an earlier target for the second half of 2006 and pledged to ship the next version of its operating system to business customers in November.

Vista is the first major overhaul of Windows since Microsoft rolled out Windows XP nearly five years ago.

Microsoft had originally been expected to release Windows Longhorn, now Vista, in 2005. The company scaled back its ambitions and pushed it out to 2006 before this latest delay.

"We could have just gone ahead, but I didn't think it was the right thing to do," said Jim Allchin, co-president of the company's Platforms & Services Division. "We're setting stringent quality bars on what we do."

Windows Vista is the headliner for a series of upcoming and recently released new products at the software giant, including its Xbox 360 next-generation game console and an upgrade to its popular Office business software.

Microsoft said it delayed Vista to improve overall quality, particularly in security, and that PC makers didn't want the operating system introduced in the middle of holiday sales, because a new version would create instability in the market.

The delay also pertains to Vista loaded on new PCs.

Investors, concerned about the impact of a Vista delay on PC sales, pushed down shares of chip maker Intel Corp. (INTC.O: Quote, Profile, Research) and large PC manufacturers Hewlett-Packard Co. (HPQ.N: Quote, Profile, Research) and Dell Inc. (DELL.O: Quote, Profile, Research) in after-hours trade.

Microsoft's Allchin dismissed those concerns and said he did not expect any change in consumer buying habit especially if PC manufacturers and retailers offer the option to upgrade to Windows Vista when the new product hits store shelves.

Windows, which is found in about 90 percent of all computer desktops, is Microsoft's biggest cash cow.

Microsoft said it plans to conduct a broad consumer "beta", or test, of Windows Vista in the coming quarter.

Redmond, Washington-based Microsoft is planning six core offerings of the Vista operating system, targeting how people use computers instead of PC hardware specifications.

Three will be aimed at consumers, two at business users, and a stripped-down version for emerging markets. Unlike the current Windows XP, there will be no versions designed specifically for advanced 64-bit computing, multimedia computers or Tablet PCs.

Shares of Microsoft fell 2.7 percent to $26.98 on the Inet electronic brokerage. In regular Nasdaq trade, the stock fell 15 cents, or less than 1 percent, to close at $27.74.

(Additional reporting by Duncan Martell and Eric Auchard in San Francisco)

Hamel wrote:I wonder what this means for the video card manufacturers. D3D10 is Vista only. Would they do another refresh of the current generation of cards or would they release their D3D10 cards as schedueled?

Hamel wrote:I wonder what this means for the video card manufacturers. D3D10 is Vista only. Would they do another refresh of the current generation of cards or would they release their D3D10 cards as schedueled?

RThurmont wrote:Every cloud has a silver lining. Microsoft is placing Steve Sinofsky in charge of Windows. Sinofsky previously managed Office, and Office is, in my opinion, Microsoft's absolute best product (if you compare Office to any other productivity suite out there, no one can compete with it in terms of range of applications, depth of features, interface quality, et cetera, on a cross-range basis, although admittedly Publisher and Frontpage are subpar). Hopefully Sinofsky will be able to shake up the Windows group. This business of waiting six years for a new OS when in the past Microsoft whipped them out every three years is nonsense, at any rate.

Keevan_Colton wrote:You want more ferquent OS changes?

RThurmont wrote:Every cloud has a silver lining. Microsoft is placing Steve Sinofsky in charge of Windows. Sinofsky previously managed Office, and Office is, in my opinion, Microsoft's absolute best product (if you compare Office to any other productivity suite out there, no one can compete with it in terms of range of applications, depth of features, interface quality, et cetera, on a cross-range basis, although admittedly Publisher and Frontpage are subpar). Hopefully Sinofsky will be able to shake up the Windows group. This business of waiting six years for a new OS when in the past Microsoft whipped them out every three years is nonsense, at any rate.