Dell re-offer XP

[puggit]

Dell have reversed their decision to offer only Vista with new machines:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology

[morningside]

I just read that. Makes me wonder if Microsoft have made a marketing mistake with Vista?
Keep looking at myself but am happy with XP as I cannot yet see a very good reason to swap.

[Davi]

phoned up Dell a couple of weeks back as I couldn't get the machine wanted without vista - 2 minute chat with the sales chap had it sorted. Conversation was along the lines of "If you won't give me the machine I want with XP instead of vista, I will simply buy elsewhere". Instant response was "totally understand, we hear this all day every day, I'll get one out to you with XP instead."

[ThePassenger]

morningside said:

I just read that. Makes me wonder if Microsoft have made a marketing mistake with Vista?
Keep looking at myself but am happy with XP as I cannot yet see a very good reason to swap.

I've seen a lot of arguments against Vista: it's but ugly, it's too resource intensive, it's too bloaty. But... the best argument I've seen is that Microsoft made XP to good. It's been around so long that everyone knows how it works and how to support it... the 3rd party software people know it inside & out so you've got a wide range of options for anything (like Anti-Virus). The current patch level is stable as hell (for Windows) and pretty secure.

To be honest I think Microsoft got the multiple versions thing VERY wrong... what's the term... brand dilution? It should of been Vista Home, Vista Pro, it's a simple scheme and it's been in use for ages so everyone knows it. Combine that with the fact that the world pretty much just wanted XP-SP3 I can't see Vista as being any more wanted than ME was.

Note: Yeah, I remember XP's launch being full of people hating it due to bloat and such. As technology moved on XP's requirements became trivial compared to the system... Vista will probably be the same but I think the amount of time this will take will be a lot longer than the 2K - XP transition.

[sneakyneil]

Its becoming a bit of a pain - we've got loads of clients that are 100% standardised on XP/2K3. Loads of apps, macros, procedures etc. all working harmoniousley and joyousley together with the minimum of maintainance, refined and re-refined over the years. Everyone getting their jobs done with the minimum of fuss. Now.. what's Vista for again? To my shit up, thats what. To make negative waves in my nice, calm pool of tranquility.

I'm not saying it can't be made to work, that people cant start to standardise on Vista/2K7 - but WHY?? The stuff we've got works fine thanks!!

[.Flyer]

Yep, Vista is a bit of a pain. I've finally, after much expense and effort, managed to keep it running on my dev pc, although I certainly wouldn't do it again. Simply not worth it.

Also causing problems with our clients. We have a potential new client who, for reasons not worth going into, have an office running predominantly XP Home (no server, just joined in a workgroup). Our proposal was to install a server and upgrade the clients to XP Pro (purchase licences for Vista, but downgrade to XP), leaving Vista for now as could do without the headache of making them work with Vista.

Turns out that XP Home no longer qualifies as an underlying OS for a Vista upgrade unless you also purchase Software Assurance with the (volume) licences. Which, in our client's case, wasn't required. Probably be cheaper to simply buy full Vista licences (and then downgrade to XP).