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Despite all the grief it gets, a properly set up XP system is really quite good and I'd much rather see MS engineering effort going into releasing XP updates than into a whole new OS, even though it won't happen because there's no money in it for them. I'd almost rather them release "XP2" and charge for it; I'd rather pay for that than pay the same amount for Vista.

There is no not really much (additional) money in it for them with the upgrade either. As stated in the article, a very minor proportion of sales are something consumers actually go out and buy. They make their money off the pre-loaded software you find on almost every PC (whether you want it or not). They'd be making money even if they never did anything more than issue service packs for XP-eternity.

This "upgrade" is largely an ego thing on MS's part, and is partly in reaction to OSX.

They'd be making money even if they never did anything more than issue service packs for XP-eternity.

This "upgrade" is largely an ego thing on MS's part, and is partly in reaction to OSX.

You have a point, and if it's an ego/competition thing it's all the more galling since OSX actually came out before XP.

I'd love for someone at MS to have the guts to stand up and say that Emperor Vista has no clothes, and the project is scrapped, with its new security features to be released in XP SP3.