Is Windows Vista A Best Seller than Windows XP?

Even though Microsoft says Vista has been a better seller than Windows XP, industry experts says it is due to more number of PCs than it was in 2001. Earlier, Windows Vista sales were slowed down because of the incompatibility issues and lack of driver support.

Industry experts says, 2001 was an earlier age where very few people could afford a computer. Now things has been changed and everyone owns a computer. Still Microsoft could only double the sales. (Microsoft says they sold 40 million copies of Windows Vista compared to 20 million copies of Win XP in first 100 days of it’s release) But if you compare the computer manufactures growth to this stats, you will clearly understand that this is way too lower than expected. According to industry, Vista sales are at 59.7% below than the sales of Windows XP at comparable market situation.

What Caused this Sale Decline?

- Businesses are Staying Away from Windows Vista

Businesses are not wasting their time to upgrade to Windows Vista. They run custom programs and it will cost much higher to upgrade the software and then install it on newly bought Vista license. According to news sources only 13% of businesses started using Windows Vista so far.

- Requires New Hardware.

Windows latest features “Aero” need a new age graphic processor and the Superfetch features takes up entire RAM. Hence you are forced to upgrade your Graphics and RAM for smooth Windows Vista performance.

- Windows Vista Upgrade Don’t Work.

There has been many cases where upgrade to Windows Vista from XP has caused problems and many of the users suggests fresh install to avoid such problems. Honestly, I believe this is due to lack of driver support.

- Incompatibilities with Software.

Certain windows software were reported to crash on Windows Vista. This made people think Windows Vista was not ready for prime time. Now after 9 months of it’s release Windows Vista is compatible with top 50 consumer programs.

- Driver Incompatibilities

Device manufactures were slow on building new drivers and hence some of the old systems were unable to upgrade. Most of these problems has been corrected and now Windows Vista supports 2 million hardware devices.

All together, Windows Vista could not make the buzz and hence the sales declined. Perhaps Microsoft should have listened to initial users and hardware manufactures more before starting advertising campaigns. Otherwise, this may lead to higher acceptance of windows alternatives; which I’m pretty sure MS don’t want to happen.