Vista on track to become fastest-adopted Windows

Ace Pace · Post by **Ace Pace** » 2007-03-26 06:47pm

Sales of Windows Vista in the month of February have actually surpassed those of Windows XP in the two months after its release, according to a report by eWeek. Microsoft Windows client group director Kevin Kurtz told the site that more than 20 million copies of the new operating system were sold worldwide in February alone. This makes Vista more successful than XP, which only sold 17 million copies globally within the two months after its October 25, 2001 launch. According to Kurtz, Vista is "on track" to become the fastest-adopted version of Windows ever.

The figures quoted by Kurtz come despite a report posted by market research firm NPD in February. NPD's report said retail sales of Vista during the first week after launch were 59% lower than sales of its predecessor in the week following October 25, 2001. NPD did also state that PC sales in the week after the Vista release were up 67%, though, which could account for the new operating system's purported sales success.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2007-03-26 07:00pm

Hey, combine LCD marketing and deliberate inducements to upgrade, and you sell your product. Is this something Microsoft really needs encouragement in?

I'm always curious about the large number of early-adopters on OSes. Sure, there are skilled people who are trying it out and can deal with the problems, but most of them must be being sold to regular people who don't have a clue and don't care about any of the interesting things x OS is doing, simply the flash and the 'wow I want the newest OS for some reason' attitude. Of course, since all new builds are Vista and sales are up and Kurtz's number are apparently not corroborated...

Post by **Darth Wong** » 2007-03-26 07:17pm

I love the way they compare the total sales of XP and Vista without looking at how many of these sales are OEM pre-installs.

Howedar · Post by **Howedar** » 2007-03-26 11:31pm

That doesn't bother me nearly as much as normalizing against the number of computers total. You know, because there aren't more computers now than there were seven years ago.

Drooling Iguana · Post by **Drooling Iguana** » 2007-03-27 12:49am

Not too surprising, really. The computer market was much smaller when Win95 came out, Win98 and ME were just minor upgrades to that, Win2k was not meant for home users and WinXP was just a minor upgrade to Win2k. This is the first time in more than a decade that a major new version of Windows has been rolled out across the board, of course it's going to sell a lot of total units.

Durandal · Post by **Durandal** » 2007-03-27 02:04am

Honestly, who chooses to get the next version of Windows? Most people just get it with their new PCs.

Glocksman · Post by **Glocksman** » 2007-03-27 02:17am

Durandal wrote:Honestly, who chooses to get the next version of Windows? Most people just get it with their new PCs.

Well, I chose to get the Dell 'Express Upgrade' for my laptop.

That said, I went back to XP after less than a week.
Between annoyances such as immature video drivers (no color controls at all in the official Dell Vista nvidia quadro 120 drivers), lack of manufacturer supplied printer drivers for my specific printers (2 HP's and a Lexmark laser) that let me run the printers at their full capability, application compatibility issues, and so on, I decided to put Vista off until sometime this summer when hopefully the driver/application issues will be mostly resolved.

It's too bad because like I said before, there's a lot to like about Vista, but I got the impression of using a work in progress, not a finished product.

Praxis · Post by **Praxis** » 2007-03-27 03:14am

Not surprising at all.

Actually, considering how many more PCs are being sold now compared to when XP comes out (and most of those Vista adopters are just people who get it with their PC), the fact that Vista sold 20 million compared to 17 is rather pitiful for Vista.