Vista Sales Slow? It's Those Darn Pirates!

Last week we mentioned that Microsoft was backing away from sales forecasts that it's now calling "aggressive" for Windows Vista through 2008. A lot of people marked slow sales up to a combination of hardware and software support lagging, and the lack of compelling reasons to move away from Windows XP considering how stable of an OS it has become in the last 5 years.

However, it seems Microsoft sees the issue a bit differently.

In the same call last week with analysts saying that estimates on sales were overly aggressive, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer says one way to improve sales is to tighten the screws on pirates through strengthening of the Windows Genuine Advantage protection system. Claiming "Piracy reduction can be a source of Windows revenue growth..."

Specifically mentioned, was targeting emerging markets in Asia, currently hotbeds for software piracy.

The question is, will making it harder to pirate encourage more sales? Or will these protections just prove a minor annoyance that will just take a little while longer for hackers to overcome? And what will be the cost to legal users who find themselves having to prove their "legal" copies to Microsoft in the future?

Source

pirates pirate all the way......I am a proud Vista Ultimate Owner !

One more reason is Windows XP itself. Windows XP is a big competitor to Vista.

one gotta say that m$ were insane when they predicted those vista sales figures sometime ago. who'd buy an os at that price ( except die-hard followers)

this was known by all of us. this was going to happen one or the other day.

Well that really isn't that surprising. Vista isn't really worth an upgrade for the mega bucks considering nothing is revolutionary in comparision to non-Microsoft OSes. I'd rather buy three portable hard disks for more space than upgrade to Vista. Making it more difficult for pirates isn't going to help, the draconian measures will always be circumvented, legitimate users will suffer more and those who can't validate or buy genuine copies will move to other alternatives.

Kiran_tech_mania said:
One more reason is Windows XP itself. Windows XP is a big competitor to Vista.

Agree

The problem of vista is
1) Too expensive
2) Resource hungry

XP Rules !

A

planetcall said:
pirates pirate all the way......I am a proud Vista Ultimate Owner !

Hello how could you install Windows Vista Ultimate with 768 MB RAM........

T

Companies nowday blame pirates for no reason. They only reason why it did not sell for them is because of all those anti-piracy crap,resource hungry, application compatibility and lot more. The reason they it is pirates because they did not have anything else to say. They can not blame on their products so pirates are their target.

J

^^ yeah, quite right to some extent!!

ajaykumarmeher said:
Hello how could you install Windows Vista Ultimate with 768 MB RAM........

Because 512 MB is the minimum requirement.

Even if you do not meet the minimum system requirements, you can install Vista Ultimate but Aero will be disabled. Yeah, that defeats the purpose but at least you can install it.

^^ Yeah, aryayush was quick to reply. I have vista installed on my desktop back at home. It is perfectly patched with updates disabled so i guess I am gonna enjoy it for atleast 1 year or so

Only down side is that I was not able to use aero as I guess the prime pulling factor is the onboard gfx card. Since I am no more at home so I didnt get enough time to fiddle around with it but whatever I saw, gave me an impression that vista is incredibly cool. It indeed is but there is nothing compelling to jump to Vista which already demands good hardware. My XP SP2(forced legit) is pretty much satisfying from all aspects. But whatever.....Vista does look Sexxxxy. The logon screen is something to die for. You cant achieve similar effects with other utilities on xp. The new dreamscape of stardock also beautifies vista to a new level.

East or west piracy is best , Piracy rocks for me . Long live pirates

tech_mastermind said:
Agree

The problem of vista is
1) Too expensive
2) Resource hungry

XP Rules !

Yep..
Plus

3) Consumes Hell lot of HDD space (around 8GB to run smoothly

).. Providing no extra NOTABLE FEATURES than XP. Again you have to install all softwares (Mainly antivirus

) which will again take some more space..
Regarding Themes we can get Equivalent themes for XP.. I dont need just 3D for a cost of 8GB..
XP Still rulez for me!!!!

T

ssdivisiongermany1933 said:
East or west piracy is best , Piracy rocks for me . Long live pirates

Well. I do not agree. It is not good to praise the pirates. If you have money to buy the software buy it. Even the software developers needs money.

don't they know even a lil bit of economics? They seriously expect ppl to buy a software for 5000 bucks in India??

XP was a hit because back then we were using 98SE or NT4.0 ... and now with Vista , we've got XP , Server 2003 ... then why would we invest our hard earned money on some OS that really hasn't made its mark yet .. MS just gives bullshit .. its not the piracy .. its XP ...

Well, whos gonna pay heavy for lower performance! Not a sane soul.

The point bein... no one with a tight fist & a tighter mind will think of goin for Vista right now when XP's bein such a good boy for quite sometime.

Regarding the enhanced look of Vista... beauty-concious ppl'll just go for the Transformation Packs which r free & aplenty. We've got transformation packs from Longhorn to Vista to Macs!!!

Vista's a loser right now. Mayb a price similar to XP or free upgrade to Vista'll encourage a good set of legal users. That's the only way they can make Vista successful right now. Then too.. many'll hesitate for the mere fact that performance'll b hampered(it can b adjusted again) & more importantly... compatibility issues'll crop up for many fav applications and appendages(like camera/phone/printer software).

But a day will come in india ven vista will be freely avelbl vit all hardware wala and then it will rule insted of xp.

T

EagerBeaver said:
But a day will come in india ven vista will be freely avelbl vit all hardware wala and then it will rule insted of xp.

Then they will another OS from MS. The same thing is bound to happen same has what is happening now.

in WB ?? I thought China has a larger Piracy market !

I always thought that Vista's main competitor is XP...Microsoft has taken 5 yrs to make it stable & secure..Now all users like Windows Xp which does all their work without much hassles.Now why wud anyone change over to Vista after taking 5 yrs to adjust to an operating System..Microsoft shud have brought some very very unique features(apart from Aero) in Vista that wud have drove some interest..Maybe the release of Halo2,Crysis & other good games mite help Microsoft with more Vista users..Other than that I dont see y anyone wud be upgrading to Vista

Indyan said:
There are rumours here that MS is going to launch a campaign again piracy in WB. Reportedly, that has driven up the prices of Windows XP.
Dont know, how true it is though.

They've already done so. They were here in my city digging out the large companies that used pirated copies of Windows.

EagerBeaver said:
But a day will come in india ven vista will be freely avelbl vit all hardware wala and then it will rule insted of xp.

isn't it already?

No, it isn't. Not in my city atleast.

well vista hardware requirement is so high , the PC manufacturers are still giving a mere 256 MB RAM .

^^^^*www.smileyarena.com/emoticons/Packs/XP_Style/evil_smile2.gif
Now who's the pirate *www.unterwasserrugby.org/icon_smile_evil.gif

L

Would like to have vista but yep its too damn expensive and what were they thinking piling the cost to that height arrey i'm more than happy with xp pro....

Indyan said:
Are they checking homes too?

No, they aren't.

I am safe anyway.

Most of the peeps(computer buyers) are plain nerds. Most do not do market research before hand and mostly ask for the latest things. The vendors can easily dupe then to get prospective hardware for Vista and thereby making good money out of the GFX card, Mobo and other peripherals. I have seen such examples at least a few hundred times before.
Vendors would surely push for vista as soon as the credible pirated CDs are out there in market and the demand picks up.

The one and only reason I am not shifting to Windows Vista anytime soon is because I use Mcafee antivirus and the 2007 suite, which is vista compatible is crappy to say the least, also I still have 4-5 months of my subscription to the 2006 version left. Maybe after that.

Also, I have never had that "latest and greatest" fad. I used 95 when most of the world was using 98. Some of my favourite apps are 8-9 years old. Why dont I switch? Because I feel no need to. I really find all this hype amusing. When you are using something that satisfies your purposes, why waste money buying new stuff that, in all probability will require a lot of time and energy to to relearn?

R

see in developing asian countries people will definitly buy pirated copies of vista, coz for vista to be considered licenced it needs to access the net for verification, and as we all know that internet penetration is extremely low here so obviously the os is gonna be pirated on a large scale & quiet frankly no one is going to pay more than Rs 3000 for a software which is totally crippled & may not even be compatible with most of the applications.

T

That too paying 5000 to 5 lakhs software is so much for people who is not earning or they earn less. That to this software release new software every 5 years for example microsoft OS.

Why they put activation is another part. They are some people who earns a lot and they do not want to spend money on softwares. Even Small - Scale Industry uses pirated software. That is the reason for anti-piracy protection.

Most of Pirated windows is VLKS which is mainly used in compaines. It is most the emplyoee of the compaines that steals first then come the other people.

Vista Is The Best OS !!!!!!!!! But it is tooooooooooo expensive

It isn't (the best OS, that is).

^^ Yes True.

R

see paying a lotta money for a software like office suites is quite understandable, they performs a lotta functions an all but, who is going to pay that same amount of money for a software that arent even sure if its going to run on their system, is going to be resource intensive an all, as for the games part is concerned not a lot of people will buy the games halo 2, crysis an all, they my shift to consoles simpy because the cost that will be incurred to just get the game running wil be high, considering vista upgrade, then hardware upgrade. in the end M$ really need to think out their strategy here, hell even their 360's arent selling that good, nobody is saying so but thats the truth. People are buyng the PAL version systems from Singapore an all where they are practically 10,000 Rs cheaper.