Reversing Windows 7 to XP gets yet another reprieve – again – sort of

Published on June 19th, 2009

Posted by Eideard in Business, computers

In a reversal of its earlier stance, Microsoft officials confirmed that customers will be able to downgrade from Windows 7 to Windows XP for a year and a half after the new system ships, or until the first Service Pack drops — whichever comes first.

While some industry observers the modified downgrade policy is a change for the better, at least one analyst says Microsoft still hasn’t enough to provide options for enterprises.

This industry observer says Microsoft simply hasn’t a clue!

The downgrade option is also not available to all Windows 7 users: Downgrade rights apply to purchasers of Windows 7 Professional and Windows 7 Ultimate, so the option isn’t available to customers who buy Windows 7 Home Premium.

Additionally, customers who have either Software Assurance subscriptions or Enterprise Agreements with Microsoft can continue to get the downgrade as long as they want.

Confused, yet?

“Windows 7 Professional and Ultimate customers will have the option to downgrade to Windows XP Professional from PCs that ship within 18 months following the general availability of Windows 7 or until the release of a Windows 7 service pack (SP), whichever is sooner and if an SP is developed,” a Microsoft spokesperson told InternetNews.com in an e-mail.

Understand that, OK?

39 users responded in " Reversing Windows 7 to XP gets yet another reprieve – again – sort of "

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# 1 Patrick said, on June 19th, 2009 at 6:14 am

Eideard, have you seen MS put out any compelling reason for using “7″, other than replacing the crappy Vista OS?

# 2 qb said, on June 19th, 2009 at 6:16 am

They were actually making good progress with their Win 7 rollout. This smells like 20+ management types got in a room and made this incomprehensible policy during a 4 hour meeting while they were busy answering emails on their phones.

# 3 deowll said, on June 19th, 2009 at 6:26 am

I don’t see why MS bothers. Just sell XP or Dos 3.3 to the people that want to run it and sell a modern OS to those not nailed to the past.

I run Vista and I have exactly one major problem with it. For reasons obscure MS does some really crappy things relating to my music, pictures and video. Now I admit that I ripped the music from my CDs so maybe they have an excuse here but I made the videos and I shot the pictures. Their being a pain in the butt here makes me want to sue them.

# 4 miaminica said, on June 19th, 2009 at 6:35 am

If Microsoft wants people to move adopt Windows 7 (or Vista) it needs to stop all of these downgrades.

I’m still on XP but I am so looking forward to Windows 7!

BTW there’s nothing confusing about the article. It’s dumb people that try to make it something other than what it actually is because, you know, Micros — I mean Micro$oft $ucks.

Get a life.

# 5 faxon said, on June 19th, 2009 at 6:48 am

XP works great for me. Why would I ever upgrade? Funny how DOWNGRADING is now a “feature”.

# 6 Maidaa said, on June 19th, 2009 at 6:50 am

A major hurdle for upgrading from XP to Vista / 7 is video driver support, needs WDDM driver

# 7 Hassan Maynard said, on June 19th, 2009 at 6:59 am

Vista will be buried.

Microsoft will replace Vista with Windows 7 but they can’t get away from XP just as yet. This is a next attempt from the software giant to control the direction of the market, in this case moving away from a nearly perfectly running OS (XP).

This is just another stepping stone and similar to the nightmare when Windows ME surfaced (the “Old Vista”). It was questionable then whether it was worth it to upgrade from Windows 2000, a better OS developed at that time from Microsoft.

Windows 7 (Seven) seems to be promising (hopefully if your hardware is less than 10 years old) and a better suitable OS for hardware handling maximizing the performance and overall experience.

# 8 The0ne said, on June 19th, 2009 at 7:05 am

I think there’s a lack of understanding from some of you here.

1. You can’t stick to one product for 5 years plus and expect to be successful.

2. You can’t expect a 5+ year product, especially, software to be MORE capable than newer ones and being able to provide better features.

3. Yes, there are MORANS hehe at MS too.

4. While I hate Vista as much as the next person, Windows7 has the efficiency and readiness that Vista should have been. Heck, Aero UI runs on integrated video!

5. Lastly, you can keep running older software only to find yourself a victim due to lack of support from the MFG fighting against hackers

# 9 Patrick said, on June 19th, 2009 at 7:09 am

From benchmarks I’ve seen, & XP have roughly the same performance. Why switch?

# 10 Dennis said, on June 19th, 2009 at 7:11 am

I have been running Vista for over a year now. Since SP1, I have not had any issues with Vista. Not sure why people are still dogging it. It works. Its 64Bit. And its visually attractive.

# 11 Guyver said, on June 19th, 2009 at 7:15 am

In the meantime, I can’t wait until this open source Windows XP clone comes out in final form: http://tinyurl.com/of5gu

# 12 chuck said, on June 19th, 2009 at 7:16 am

A little free advice for MSFT:

1. Make only 1 version of Windows 7
2. Sell Windows 7 for $49, period.
3. Don’t bother with downgrade rights – just continue selling WinXP for $99 – if people want it that badly, they will pay.
4. Start counting the money. At $49 everyone will want to upgrade. Even mac fanboys will buy it just so they can complain.

# 13 MikeN said, on June 19th, 2009 at 7:31 am

>You can’t stick to one product for 5 years plus and expect to be successful.

Why not?

# 14 freddybobs68k said, on June 19th, 2009 at 7:43 am

@12 chuck

I think you’re right. Looks like Win 7 is going to work okay, but there aren’t any hugely compelling reasons to upgrade from XP. And there is the hugely un-compelling price they are asking for it. At 50 bucks for a well featured version, they’d get the gravy train running again. Without it, (or a compelling reason I’m not seeing) it’s going to be slow going.

I hear Snow leopard from Apple is going to be 30 USD.

On a slightly separate thread I think apple charging 10 USD for iphone 3.0 upgrade is pretty outrageous. The update appears to be mainly little fixes and improvements. Many of the improvements seem to be about apple making more money by selling stuff. So I don’t think so.

# 15 Hassan Maynard said, on June 19th, 2009 at 7:44 am

Just to reiterate what Theone is stating… change is inevitable… we are here because we are growing beings; change is a part of life and as Apple coined the slogan “Think different”. In order to do better we must be better and as a result, it reflects us in all aspects in life including work. So, the time and effort spent from the people at Microsoft today will change what we do tomorrow. No offense, some of us have the intelligence to get it and some will be rebelus not be able to adapt.

“Nothing is new under the sun, only how it is done”, respect technology.

# 16 a said, on June 19th, 2009 at 8:29 am

@15 I think you’re missing one important point – this product is not innovating enough, or some huge game changer to justify the expense…

# 17 Mr. Fusion said, on June 19th, 2009 at 8:39 am

#8, Theone,

1. You can’t stick to one product for 5 years plus and expect to be successful.

Oh???

How many years has the 737 been in production?It is still one of the more popular middle range airplanes out there.

How many years did Volkswagon produce the “Beetle”? Again, one of the more popular vehicles of all time.

How about the BIC Stick Pen? Yup, they still make it even after all these years.

So products can and are produced for decades. All my examples have had some serious modifications through the years but they still retain their original flavors.

# 18 OvenMaster said, on June 19th, 2009 at 8:41 am

Change for the sake of real progress and improvement is one thing. Change for the sake of change is quite another.

I like Chuck’s idea of $99 for XP, $49 for 7. Besides, there are still plenty of places to pick up XP for cheap.

# 19 Floyd said, on June 19th, 2009 at 8:41 am

I’m with Dennis. Vista works just fine. No blue screens or other crashes since I bought my Toshiba laptop with Vista installed in November 2007. I did disable window transparency, because it made Windows hard to read. No worries otherwise.

# 20 Patrick said, on June 19th, 2009 at 8:46 am

#17 Good examples. Here’s another: http://coltsmfg.com/products-c5-q50-COLT_PISTOLS.aspx

# 21 Chuck said, on June 19th, 2009 at 8:47 am

@14

The 10USD upgrade price to 3.0 is only for iPod Touch users. iPhone users get the 3.0 upgrade for free.

# 22 Misanthropic Scott said, on June 19th, 2009 at 9:30 am

I wonder how long the industry will tolerate picoflaccid continually coming out with products so bad that people will pay more to downgrade to the older less crappy version.

I have not used either Xista or 7, so really can’t say how they are. But, people are willing to pay the higher price to be able to downgrade, so …

# 23 Guyver said, on June 19th, 2009 at 9:35 am

17, To a flaw you you use examples that are nowhere near being technologically volatile as the electronics or software industries.

The electronics industry as you should already know improves itself every 12 to 24 months in big ways. Cars and Airplanes don’t make those kind of milestones in the same window of time.

Aerodynamics as we understand it hasn’t really changed much in the way we make airplanes or cars for that matter for the past several decades. You don’t get the technological leaps in these industries like you do in the electronic industries. Why is the 787 sooooooooooo “radically” different? It’s an airplane that gets most of its fuel efficiency from reducing a lot of dead weight through the use of carbon fiber. Technologically speaking this was about the only approach any plane maker (or car maker for that matter) can make in improving something like fuel efficiency.

Theone’s point was that competition is the reason why Microsoft needs to continually release a product every handful of years. If you take out the competition and volatility out of the electronics and software equation, sure we can run on Windows XP for the next 20 or so years.

Be that as it may, you were probably better off questioning how much more productive you could possibly be running MS Office 2007 versus MS Office 2003. Last time I checked, I produce documents on my Office 2003 as effectively as I could on Office 2007. But you could also make the same points with newer versions of OpenOffice. People don’t gripe so much about them given that they’re free.

# 24 US said, on June 19th, 2009 at 9:52 am

I don’t think it is reasonable to expect Microsoft to continue selling Windows XP. At some point they need to focus on the newer versions and not have to worry about bugs on an aging version of its product. I think MS should cut off XP when Windows 7 is released, and focus on allowing users to buy the current and previous versions.

The other problem is that the longer Microsoft lets users stay on old versions of Windows the harder it will be for those users to upgrade later. Novell did this, allowing customers to stay on old versions for so long that the cost of upgrading to newer versions in time and money was so great users just went to Windows.

I work for a large fortune 200 company, we’re still running IE 6 and Windows XP. Its horrible the security risk we are still running IE 6 and Windows XP. Time to move into the next decade.

# 25 rzwo said, on June 19th, 2009 at 10:08 am

why stop at XP? let’s downgrade to ME or Win98… and if this is a downgrade shouldn’t it be a downgrade to Vista???

# 26 The0ne said, on June 19th, 2009 at 10:46 am

#17
As #23 pointed out your examples are not exactly in the same industry. Competition is much healthier and fast pace where software is concern.
Don’t get me wrong, I want to stay with XP myself. However, if there is no support in the near future it will eventually degrade. It is even more enticing for hackers to use XP due to the amount of users out there and to users like yourself. Then consider the business/corporate world. I don’t think it would be a pretty sight to imagine 
Now Vista is not perfect and I absolutely hate it even after several attempts to use it. Windows7 is much like Vista or rather Vista should have been what Windows7 is shaping up to be. It’ll take time for it to stabilize to a certain point but you will have the support still. Sure you don’t have to switch but eventually you’ll be left behind in the dust for whatever service or productivity you’re using your PC for.
Embrace the change. If it sucks gripe and bitch about it like some of us did with Vista and you might get a better product  The griping and bitching includes not supporting or buying the product as well hehe

# 27 Aaron_W said, on June 19th, 2009 at 11:17 am

Vista SP1 is a rock solid OS, Windows 7 is better. I have a hard time with XP these days since it feels like using Win95 in comparison. I used Vista on a Toshiba with integrated video and it flew on 2GB of RAM. Windows 7 is like a spit polished Vista. Why would anyone want to use XP for home use is beyond me.

# 28 Patrick said, on June 19th, 2009 at 11:30 am

# 27 Aaron_W said, “Why would anyone want to use XP for home use is beyond me.”

Because it works as well or better than Vista with less hardware resources? Probably why Vista failed in the enterprise…

# 29 ron.traweek said, on June 19th, 2009 at 12:36 pm

We – the company I work for – just went through a week long engagement with Microsoft and Sogeti to determine what it would take to upgrade our environment from XP to Windows 7. The amount of work to repackage and re-verify all of our applications would be incredible. From what I hear support for XP in the form of patches etc… completely runs out in 2014. Even calculating the cost of moving to Windows 7 is no easy task.

If you are an individual or a small shop with a few apps that stop working or being deployable you can overcome that. If you are a large shop say health care with over 30K workstations and suddenly your EMR or cardio imaging has problems it’s a completely different story.

# 30 The0ne said, on June 19th, 2009 at 12:38 pm

#28

Can’t comment on Vista since I left the camp long ago. But for Windows7 I’m sure you be surprise and happy. Have you given it a shot yet? I have the RC 7100 running on various Desktops and laptops and everything installed and ran fine on the get go. Was a shocker even to me.

I’ve also converted 2 laptops crawling with Vista Premium and they’re now running smoothly WITH Aero on integrated graphics O.o Overall it’s more polished than Vista and it should be a consideration for an XP upgrade imo.

Check it out, you just might like it. If not, well…ditch it like I’ve ditched Vista Never hurts to try for yourself instead of having others tell you right

# 31 Patrick said, on June 19th, 2009 at 12:50 pm

#30 Some of my friends who are tech journalists have been keeping me updated. From their testing it seems much better than Vista. Sounds like you are having similar experience. Thanks for the info.

# 32 hazza said, on June 19th, 2009 at 2:14 pm

I worked as a contractor for Queensland Health, it took them 2 years, that’s right 2 years, to roll out SP2 for XP, I am not kidding.

Can you imagine how long it will take them to upgrade to a different OS? Allowing them to run XP stops them from saying “fuck it, lets migrate everything to Linux.”

Smart move MS, fuckers.

# 33 Cap'nKangaroo said, on June 19th, 2009 at 4:09 pm

Microsoft is including the ability to run XP from inside Windows 7 in a virtual machine to buyers of the Win 7 Pro, Enterprise, or Ultimate. If I understand Paul Thurrott correctly, MS is giving buyers of any of those 3 versions their own copy of XP to run as a VM. Done rite, businesses would love this because they would get to run the latest OS and still keep using legacy applications.

Here’s a link to his description

http://winsupersite.com/win7/xp_mode_preview.asp

# 34 BigBoyBC said, on June 19th, 2009 at 7:35 pm

I wish MS would take a page from Apple’s book and offer a cheap upgrade. I have over 300 XP workstations at work, a cheap upgrade would be a partial incentive to move to win7.

# 35 Paul Camp said, on June 19th, 2009 at 8:17 pm

I’m not confused. Do what you’re told.

See how easy that was? Just like having a Mac.

# 36 mcteapot said, on June 19th, 2009 at 11:27 pm

I hope to run Win XP for ever! It is the best OS Microsoft will ever make…

# 37 frankie said, on June 20th, 2009 at 12:06 am

# 23 Guyver said, on June 19th, 2009 at 9:35 am

Cars and Airplanes don’t make those kind of milestones in the same window of time.

Aerodynamics as we understand it hasn’t really changed much…

===============================================

This is the most dumb-assed thing I’ve heard all week. Aerodynamics evolves constantly. New airfoils are constantly being improved every day. You must be a public school teacher, nobody else would be as fatuously clueless.

# 38 DataCabbitKSW said, on June 22nd, 2009 at 2:31 pm

There are a number of reasons to move from XP to Windows 7 for somewhat older PC users. As an example, Windows 7 includes built-in DVD player support and solid CODECs for h.264 and h.264 AVC, AAC (not FairPlay protected), and numerous others. No need to buy a seperate DVD player program or install CODEC packs that may or may not include malware, or just be poorly written/compiled (see early demuxer add-ins for example). Simplified networking, including better support and handling of WiFi. All of these kinds of things require third party software addons to work under Windows XP. So if you look at it in regards to feature products, Windows 7 will be worth it compared to spending another few hundred dollars buying seperate software that may not work together. I have used Windows 7 and will be (based on price) buying licenses for a good number of my home machines to switch out from Windows 2000, XP, and upgrade from Vista. I will still keep using my linux file servers and development boxes, but my primary and work machines will be moved over once the final version hits stores on October 22nd.

# 39 Patrick said, on June 22nd, 2009 at 4:05 pm

# 38 DataCabbitKSW said, “There are a number of reasons to move from XP to Windows 7 for somewhat older PC users.”

Better pile on the RAM.

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