Posted on 04/24/2008 8:44:30 AM PDT by Red Badger
Microsoft Corp. chief executive Steve Ballmer on Thursday offered a glimmer of hope to fans of the company's XP operating system, saying customer demand may see the company reconsider a decision to stop selling XP in June.
But Ballmer was adamant that "most people who buy PCs today buy them with Vista."
"That's the statistical truth," he told reporters at a press conference at Louvain-La-Neuve university.
"If customer feedback varies, we can always wake up smarter," he said.
Fans of the six-year-old operating system set to be pulled off store shelves by June 30 have papered the Internet with blog posts, cartoons and petitions recently. They trumpet its superiority to Windows Vista, Microsoft's latest PC operating system, whose consumer launch last January was greeted with lukewarm reviews.
Ballmer said the customers buying PCs with XP are IT departments who are having trouble shifting old machines to newer technology.
Some 160,000 people have already signed an online Save XP Web petition who want Microsoft to keep selling it until the next version of Windows is released, currently targeted for 2010.
Ballmer said he was very confident that Microsoft's US$44 billion (euro27.6 billion) offer for Yahoo Inc. was "a very good price."
He refused to say if the company plans to appeal against a fine of euro899 million (US$1.3 billion) that the European Union levied in February.
Microsoft has until the first week of May to launch a legal challenge against the EU decision that it had not obeyed a 2004 antitrust order to share communications information with rivals.
Joking with the press and even breaking into good French, Ballmer acknowledged that he's finding it hard to keep up with social networking on the Facebook Web site.
"I do have a profile on Facebook," he said. "It's hard to keep up. I get many friend requests from people I don't know."
"There's about 10 Steve Ballmers and I'm only one of them. I'm the one who actually has a picture that looks like me on it!" he said. "I'm hitting a golf ball, that's the real Steve Ballmer."
He was in Belgium to open a Microsoft innovation center in Mons that hopes to boost new startups in the country, creating some 200 jobs over the next three years.
The rectangle button on the far right of the toolbar under a youtube video is the full screen button.
Not at all, in fact I’d like to see more computer threads on freerepublic, rather exchange information with freepers than finding it elswhere.
Once you click on a given youtube video, look at the video window and then down to the lower right corner. You’ll see a tiny window icon there, the one closest to the corner of the window.
Click on it in XP and it actuates full screen.
Hit esc or click near the bottom somewhere to restore small window. I’d have to double check that. If there’s any other question, I’ll bring up a video and take a closer look.
***Do you mind sharing how you get youtube to go to fullscreen?***
As far as I can tell Dell is the only company still selling them with XP. I think they have two now a lower and an upper end model.
They sold the company XP for our new desktops a little over a month ago (they bought in bulk though, well over 500 units) but on the laptop we just purchased, which hasn’t even been delivered yet, the rep told me it was not an option any longer. I specifically asked him since I had heard Vista had too many bugs. Not sure when the cutoff date was, but we apparently missed it.
Once you click on a given youtube video, look at the video window and then down to the lower right corner. You’ll see a tiny window icon there, the one closest to the corner of the window.
Click on it in XP and it actuates full screen.
Hit esc or click near the bottom somewhere to restore small window. I’d have to double check that. If there’s any other question, I’ll bring up a video and take a closer look.
***Do you mind sharing how you get youtube to go to fullscreen?***
Sweet! Thanks for that! It works perfectly on our XP machines! My wife will be thrilled -- she is Asian and enjoys watching a lot of Asian and other music on youtube.
I don't know why I overlooked that little icon in the lower right corner. I often wondered why there didn't seem to be a way to go full screen. In retrospect, I should have done what I susually do when I have a computer question, and just done a google search, and I prolly would have figured it out long ago.
Re computer threads on FR, on the one or two rare occasions when I haven't found the solution to a computer problem by a google search, I have started a thread asking for assistance on free republic, and I have gotten mucho assistance mucho quick. On the other hand, I have tried same on computer forums and been lucky to get one or two answers in 24 hours, and one of the two was a smart-arse answer.
Great, your right on searches for answers. And good on the FR threads. See ya around them!
***Re computer threads on FR, on the one or two rare occasions when I haven’t found the solution to a computer problem by a google search, I have started a thread asking for assistance on free republic, and I have gotten mucho assistance mucho quick. On the other hand, I have tried same on computer forums and been lucky to get one or two answers in 24 hours, and one of the two was a smart-arse answer.***
Microsoft has lost touch with its customers. Seriously.
My family is investigating switching to a distribution of GNU/Linux (possibly Ubuntu) by the end of 2010 or 2011, after both my sister and I are out of school (and thus have no particular need for Windows). And...this is not an idle threat.
You can still buy Lenovo ThinkPads with Windows XP Professional. We picked up two on Newegg a few weeks ago for $600 apiece, and I can tell you that they are better than any Dell I've ever dealt with.
MS really screwed the pooch with this one.
Half of their marketing dept and customer survey folks oughta be out on their ears, yes, it is true that some people actually prefer Vista, yes, it is also true that the VAST majority of people who have tried both like XP way more.
Vista should never have hit the shelves until customer acceptance was way more enthusiastic.
Now MS has to support both.
Thanks!
Guy may be rich and all, but Ballmer’s comments in the article make me think he’s actually a jerkoff or delusional.
LOL!! How did I miss that.
Freakin' BS liar! The main reason was that M$ DEMANDED that the OEM CP suppliers use Vista and not WinXP. Corporate and some consumers demanded otherwise, so if you push you can still get XP.
Freakin' BS liar !!
I got a Dell Laptop last year with XP and I'm waiting for a desktop to be built. It will have XP as well. I don't need a lot of bells and whistles so a basic machine suits my purpose. No complaints on the Laptop.
My current XP desktop is a pre-merger or right after Compaq. About 5 years old with not so much as a reformat. But I did find out a few things after buying my last Compaq that ticked me off. One was two RAM slots. The other was Compaq didn't give XP CD-ROMS but instead the buyer had to make 5 CD-ROM back up disk. I haven't used it and hope I don't have to as I don't know if will work. That soured me on Compaq even though the machine has not failed me.
I might take the Microsoft OS coming in a couple of years but I won't take VISTA even if given a free disk.. I got burnt buying the M.E. upgrade. It would not allow me to do defrag or disk scan even in safe mode.
Thanks for the info. When I ordered my desktop from Dell the other night I went to chat with a sales rep. Huge language issues. I was trying to talk down the price and the Rep kept pushing me to order a printer. The chat session ended and I got a call from British Columbia within a few minutes wanting to sell me the unit. I couldn't talk them down as I was just buying the tower and not an entire package. BTW the caller from BC was very understandable LOL.
In the name of all that is good and holy, please do not buy a Dell. Just get a ThinkPad and be done with it.
Luv the title.
MS offers hope...
Eff MS.
If they want to throw away something that sold well and replace it with something that few want and most are disgruntled with, then they deserve to get their butts kicked.
And to make it sound like this is an issue of the education (or lack of) of the users is the worst kind of arrogance.
If MS thinks XP is faulty or inadequate for general distribution, then sell it to me! I’ll pay ya a couple bucks..
Didn’t think so.
Ships today. Dell had exactally what I wanted at a price I wanted. I looked elsewhere and likely came ahead.
I just checked and Youtube videos go full screen on my Vista system just as readily as my XP systems.
***I just checked and Youtube videos go full screen on my Vista system just as readily as my XP systems.***
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