Rest in Peace, Microsoft XP
By Pankaj Maru
Mumbai, May 20, 2008

In 2007, Microsoft had announced that its Operating System (OS), Windows XP won't be available in the retail market from January 2008. However, the company extended the deadline for XP till June 30, 2008. In addition, Microsoft launched its latest edition of operating system - Windows Vista last year.

According to Prasanna Meduri, director (Windows Client Business Group) of Microsoft India, "Windows XP has been one of Microsoft's most popular desktop operating systems. Windows XP has been in the market for over six years, and over the next few years will be phased out."

Further Meduri says, "Over a year ago, we launched the next version of Windows, Microsoft Windows Vista in the market, and have been receiving very positive product feedback. Customers have reverted on their experiences with Windows Vista, and have widely appreciated the enhanced features around security, user interface, gaming etc."

As for Microsoft's datelines for Windows XP end of sale cycle, the OEM and retailers will have a dateline of June 30 2008, for system builders (assemblers) the dateline will be January 31, 2009 and for the ULPCs (ultra low-cost PC) it will be June 30, 2010.

Moreover, the company will provide mainstream support till April 14, 2009 and extended support till April 8, 2014.

However, all prospective buyers of branded desktops and laptops after June 30 will be left with no options, other than using the new Windows Vista OS and making some more investment in terms of hardware. All the branded laptops and machines will come with pre-loaded licensed version of Windows Vista.

While, Microsoft's decision to phase out Windows XP remains part of its product life cycle strategy, it has raised a debate among the users' community.

Interestingly, there is a mixed bag of reactions on this issue as a section of users wanted more time in the phase out process from Microsoft, while another section viewed the move as nothing more than business strategy and a way of making money.

"Microsoft should have given more time prior to the Windows XP discontinuation. Though, it's always good to introduce new products, the change over needs to be well managed. It's a pain of change and whatever is working well should continue to work," opines S S Rajan, Chief Sales and Strategy Officer (CSSO) of Lattice Bridge Infotech, Bangalore.

He also suggests, "Windows XP is an ecosystem used by large number of users, programmers, and developers. Hence, Microsoft should have invited programmer and developer communities for technical interaction as it's not a smooth process to shift to a new system."

Personally, Rajan prefers working on XP rather than Vista as his laptop data card is not supported by Vista. "About 90 % people are comfortable using XP and so shifting to Vista will be slightly hard for them," he claims.

According to Sujit Singh, vice president (sales and marketing) of Microsense, ever since Microsoft launched Vista, this change was inevitable, in fact the industry has been preparing for this since mid 2007.

Talking on the technical aspect, Singh points out, "Though Microsoft asserts the users shall experience faster booting and quicker resumes from standby when running Vista, it requires more RAM and a better video card than XP."

"Basically, software designed for Vista should only be used on the new platform. Firewalls, anti-spyware and anti-virus software needs to be Vista compatible. There are many buyers opting for Vista and in future the users will get Vista as a default OS," he explains.

According to Singh it's just a matter of time before corporate enterprises embrace the change, while the Small Office and Home Office (SOHO) market may continue to resist Vista as long as there are options available.

Interestingly, Kiruba Shankar, CEO of Business Blogging and founder of F5ive Technologies, compares, XP's phase out process to natural evolution and comments, "Microsoft earns money via up-grading and the company has the policy of killing old products to push new products."

Personally, he considers Vista as a fantastic product against XP and suggests, "It has a good User Interface (UI) and is more cosmetic in appearance." However, in terms of using Vista, Shankar suggests that it involves a bit of learning curve.

While taking a global view on this, Galen Gruman, a tech journalist has launched 'Save XP' campaign on Info World website. The campaign is a form of online petition, where Gruman along with computer users across the world in support of XP are crying out to Microsoft to revoke its phase out decision about Windows XP.


Related Links:

Microsoft Extends XP
Microsoft Adds WPA2 Support To XP SP2