Downgrade plan for Windows 7 PCs

[DaBees-Knees]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7991708.stm

Anyone buying a PC with Windows 7 pre-installed will be able to swap it for XP or Vista. Microsoft has confirmed that the licence conditions under which the software will be sold will allow people to downgrade. The conditions will apply to both businesses that buy licences for Windows in bulk and consumers that get the operating system on a PC or laptop. No firm date has been given for the release of Windows 7's final version. Downgrade rights are common in Microsoft licensing terms and conditions but the software giant has been forced to expand and extend them for XP, given user reluctance to move to Windows Vista. Microsoft dispute claims that Vista has not been popular, quoting figures that suggest it has outsold XP over similar time frames. However, Microsoft has twice granted Windows XP a reprieve to allow computer makers to get licences for it for far longer than was originally planned. Windows XP, released to consumers in 2001, was also granted a lifeline to ensure that it could be used on so-called netbooks - cut-down net-capable laptops that are proving very popular. At the same time, computer makers such as Dell and HP have been exploiting clauses in the licensing terms that let them rollback machines with Vista pre-installed to the older operating system. The news comes as the cut-off date for free mainstream support for Windows XP ends. From 14 April, Windows XP and Home plus Office 2003 enter their "extended support" period.
This means the only updates and bug fixes these products will get will be to improve security. Microsoft has said that the release candidate of Windows 7, which will be broadly similar to the final version, will be released in late May 2009. The final version is expected in January 2010.

As an XP Pro user that's me happy. 

[Forested665]

Anyone buying a PC with Windows 7 pre-installed will be able to swap it for XP or Vista. Microsoft has confirmed that the licence conditions under which the software will be sold will allow people to downgrade. The conditions will apply to both businesses that buy licences for Windows in bulk and consumers that get the operating system on a PC or laptop.

Thats interesting seeing as microsofts life cycles policy still states that no new licenses will be issued for XP after Febuary 09. That was what the lawsuit was over with vista that they lost. the companies still had xp licenses and were legally allowed to let customers purchase them and downgrade their equipment.
I guess maybe microsoft isnt that interested in moving ahead if they are allowing customers to purchase xp keys again.
I know alot of your are avid XP fans but it does have bugs and eventually a full rewrite is going to be essential. I have yet to see any of these downgrade plans offer xp-64 wich is even more broken then xp but does allow for the amount of RAM that these new pcs are being sold with.
With the former vista downgrade events by following the same suit before you give 7 a good try isnt going to help our computers become any better, This is even more saddening then those of you who refuse to try the new IE because it has bugs that microsoft doesnt know about, and will never know about unless people use their products and encounter them.

-edit-
microsoft life cycle policy info:
http://support.microsoft.com/gp/lifepolicy

[Cobra]

I am actually surprised that they are "giving in" willing to go this route rather than the only downgrade being to Vista.

I'll take it!  Of course, I want to try out Windows 7 first, but being able to stick with XP for another 10 years is something that I would have co complaints about. I have been happy with it thus far. I would prefer not to change as long as I can help it.

[White Stripes]

doesnt mean you -have- to get rid of it at the end of its extended support lifecycle either.... just that the next downadup/conficker will eat it alive....


i would rather stick with win2k on my wintendo for the rest of my windows using days.... but 2010 will put a stopper on that since thats the end of security updates...

course you could always eventually switch to reactos ( www.reactos.com ) their target is a clone of windows XP/2003

[Forested665]

React isnt doing so well. seems less apps work the more they "develope" it.
And microsoft wouldnt give vista as the only downgrade option. 7 is meant to fix alot of stability issues that vista has unless for some hardware reason downgrading from 7 to vista would be a dumb move IMO.
There was another thread wich had an article that mentioned Vista was pulled from the junk bin and finished in a hurry to get a product out the door asap because it had been too long and too many people used xp. and now people are attached. 7 is almost the same as their answer to ME wich was to release the 2k server as a home distro.
I would put vista in the same "dishonorable release" catagory as ME but vista was no where near as bad and I actually became fond of it after a while.

[White Stripes]

quite a few ppl became fond of ME as well...

and i know ROS is really going down the can but try telling the devs that.... their IRC chatters will eat ya alive and curse linuxs' (and bsd and any unixesque OS)  very exsistance.... and yet they dont even have a working floppy drive driver (try to type 'a:' in ROSs cmd and it bsods)

i just wish ROS would go somewhere so the windowsXP holdouts would have somewhere comfortable to go.... (and it would be easier than installing/using wine)....

but as neitchze said; "hope is the worst of all evils, for it prolongs the torment of man"

anyone up to porting robomx to linux?

[Forested665]

From what ive heard that would be quite a task because the code is "trash". If any of the older ones are in VB/VB6 i know of such a program that will recompile it to use the QT library and GLIBC.
I havent looked around too much but there might be some good candidates for that.