Windows 7 is still gaining users while Windows 8 plateaus

The Inquirer ^ | April 1, 2015q | Chris Merriman

[dayglored]

THIS MONTH'S OPERATING SYSTEM statistics from Net Applications show that the spectre of Windows 7 is simply refusing to shift for Microsoft.

The wildly popular operating system shows no signs of slowing down its dominance with a 58.04 percent market share (+2.05).

A full two-point jump is quite an event in these parts at the best of times, but it's just embarrassing for an OS that has already been superseded.

Users are likely to be hanging on for Windows 10 now. The preview build of the upcoming platform is holding steady with just under one percent of the market.

Windows XP, meanwhile, continues its inevitable slump, although still at a far lower rate than one would expect for a defunct operating system. This month it sits at 16.94 percent (-2.21). Poor bedraggled Vista, with its even more painful death, is at 1.97 (-0.14), dropping below the two percent margin.

The outgoing flagship, which has hung upside down as a distress signal since inception, has taken the tiniest of jumps to 14.07 (+0.03). The split sees the latest 8.1 version up slightly at 10.55 (+0.06) and Windows 8.0 at 3.52 (-0.03).

These tiny changes in Windows 8.x represent the rather poxy state of affairs for what can fairly safely now be branded a Vista-shaped failure, and a resistance on the part of the public to embrace it so close to the launch of Windows 10.

[Greysard]

Still finding Office 200 more than adequate.

Of course. It was good enough for Origen :-)

This PC runs Win7, and I have no urge to move it to anything else. I have tried Win10, and it is functional... but it looks flat and terribly ugly. The stock Start menu is still broken in many ways (they still cram those Modern apps into your throat, for one) and requires Classic Shell as a replacement.

Win10 can run Metro/Modern applications in windows, which is how it should have been done from day one. It starts up and shuts down faster (like Win8), but that will be lost on pretty much everyone because sleep works fine already. If it has other improvements, I do not recall them (this should already tell you that they are not that spectacular.)

My media laptop that I use to play internet radio runs Linux Mint. I don't think I rebooted it even once in last few months. Originally it was shipped with Vista.

[Kirkwood]

If I can backdate to Win 7 if Win 10 turns out to suck then I’m willing to give Win 10 a try.

[doorgunner69]

If I can backdate to Win 7 if Win 10 turns out to suck then I’m willing to give Win 10 a try.

I did a complete diskOS copy/reinstall something or other when I tried Win 7 on my old Xp machine, just in case. Plan to do the same if, and when, I try 10 on this 7 machine.

I am so sick of OS "upgrades". Xp was the only one I was happy with.

[W.]

Heh, when I started with DOS, everyone got Win3.1

When I got 3.1, everyone had Win95.

When I got Win95, everyone was moving to Win XP.

Reckon I'll stick with Win7 for a while--it's a lot less work than 3.1 or 95 ever was... :)

[dennisw]

The only problem with Windows 8 is lack of a start button. Microsoft made a huge mistake by not making it an easy to turn ON-OFF option for desktop/laptop users. This was pure ineptitude. This was not fully corrected in 8.1 either.
This mistake provided an opening for>>>>>>

All the homoerotic -Apple fanbois piled on their hate and disdain and smug superiority over this. Apple fanbois lead this charge. And the sheeple believed it and lapped it up in a conformist frenzy.

My own solution was to download and install “Start 8” which installs this all important start button which will be returned in Windows 10

[dennisw]

I agree that Windows 8 is very good. It seems the average laptop/desktop user is dumb and incapable of installing a start button from the internet

[BigCinBigD]

Once I got used to it. Windows 8.1 is fine.

[Lumper20]

Win 8.1 is nothing. It is very easy for hackers to get into cloud. The best windows for security was XP pro.

[dayglored]

> 200 million Windows 8 licenses had been sold as at February 2014. That’s no bomb.

That's fine for the Microsoft Sales Department. But what matters overall is what the people who use it do with it. And despite the fact that Win8 was pre-installed on millions of computers -- practically every new one sold -- for the past 2 years, the actual use hasn't done much:

Count of "licenses sold" matters to MS Sales, but no one else. Vista sold a ton of licenses too -- do you remember when vendors were told they could sell a computer with XP installed on it, ONLY if they ALSO included a Vista license with it, so that MS could rack up another "Vista license sold"? I remember that...

Anyway, it's okay that Win8 didn't do all that well. Win10 is gonna take off like a madman. It all works out in the end.

[stylin_geek]

I do not like the GUI on Windows 8.

However, the ability to run virtual machines along with RSAT tools for 8 are more than enough to offset the lack of start button for me.

The system is good in a production environment, providing, of course, the person using it, me, is an admin. No way I would ever push 8 out to my end-users. I’d wind up being chased down the street by a frustrated mob.

[ßuddaßudd]

Well, in the past 6 months I’ve purchased a Win8 Dell box and Win7 software to upgrade my old XP box. I use the Win7 box most of the time,, and my kid likes the Win8 since he doenst know any better..

[zeugma]

Win-Win for everyone.

I saw what you did there.

[GBA]

Surprised, but not surprised. I tried Win 8 and hated it and having to relearn how to use an OS all over again.

(So...Microsoft, you thought it was a good idea to move and hide the power switch? Seriously??)

Eventually I gave that new Dell Win 8 computer to my sister and bought a home brewed machine with Win 7 from a local computer shop instead.

They can force me to buy Win 8 if I don't have a choice, but not if I do.

[SmokingJoe]

Huge difference between how Vista and Windows 8 were sold. For quite a while after Windows 8 was launched, most PC’S being sold at electronic outlets like Best Buy were still Windows 7 PC’s in the main because of the radical change in the interface of Win 8. PC makers did not force Windows 8 on anyone. If anything, the opposite was true.
In any case Windows 8 sold very well, despite there being more Win 7 PC’S on offer after the Win 8 launch. Irrespective of whether Win 7 sold better at launch than Win 8 or not, Win 8 sold very, very well.

[NCLaw441]

I had troubles with my wife’s Windows 7 system, especially things like printing to the network printer. When her drive crashed, I replaced it and got Windows 8.1. I don’t like the interface that much, but network connectivity was much easier and more stable. Can now print our of internet explorer and email, unlike before.

I use an iMac, and it is great.