UK price of Vista (again!)

[Brian Wescombe]

Well, Amazon UK had Full Ultimate edition for £325.00 (it's now been pulled
from the site). But PC World have it for pre-order on their site for the
absolute bargain (!) price of £369.00!! That's over $700!

At this price, I can't see many UK buyers getting it

 

[Alias]

Well, Amazon UK had Full Ultimate edition for £325.00 (it's now been
pulled from the site). But PC World have it for pre-order on their site
for the absolute bargain (!) price of £369.00!! That's over $700!

At this price, I can't see many UK buyers getting it

Check this out: http://www.ubuntu.com/ I ran the Live CD on an old HP
with an AMD Athlon 800 Mhz with 512MB PC-133 RAM and it recognized all
the hardware and, best of all, they ship the CD to you free and you can
install it on as many computers as you like.

Alias

 

[Nero]

You can buy the"upgrade"and install it as "full" or upgrade XP to Vista.
In the past I have always used the "upgrade" disk to install as full using
an existing licenced Windows cd as proof.
Even the upgrade of Ultimate will cost around £200 or so.
Do you really need Ultimate?
XP Home = Vista Premium version.
All Ultimate is is Premium with networking bits and some other stuff from
Vista Business.
Premium has all that a home user would need.
I tried RC2 Premium and Ultimate and for me there is nothing in Ultimate
that I cannot use in Premium.
Check the side by side comparison list on Vista webpage.
If you use XP Pro then Vista Business is a replacement.
If XP Home then Vista Premium.

 

[Mike Brannigan]

Well, Amazon UK had Full Ultimate edition for £325.00 (it's now been
pulled from the site). But PC World have it for pre-order on their
site for the absolute bargain (!) price of £369.00!! That's over
$700!

At this price, I can't see many UK buyers getting it

The actual retail market for operating systems is tiny.

The vast majority of end users either receive the OS with the PC (an
OEM copy) or are technically savvy enough to purchase their OS for a
machine they build themselves as an OEM (usually with a piece of
hardware) or those users will a current OS may buy the upgrade (again
a small market)

So the actual market for full retail product is low.
Effectively that purchaser is either:
*buying an OS less machine and buying an OS for it (unlikely and
costly/pointless)
*building a new machine and thinking they need to buy a retail copy
instead of an OEM
*upgrading from an existing Windows OS and forgetting about the
upgrade pricing being cheaper.

 

[Mike Hall - MS MVP Windows Shell/User]

Linux is not the answer for the majority of home users..

 

[Kai-Uwe v. d. Ohe]

Well, Amazon UK had Full Ultimate edition for £325.00 (it's now been
pulled from the site). But PC World have it for pre-order on their site
for the absolute bargain (!) price of £369.00!! That's over $700!

At this price, I can't see many UK buyers getting it

Don't you have the so called "System-Builder"-versions over
there? Here in Germany, you can buy XP for instance either
as a "full" product in a retail box including manual and - IIRC -
two support calls or you get the System-Builder version which
is without those features but still a fully functional product that
is hardware indipendent (i.e. not locked to a specific computer
hardware). The difference in price is ~220,- Euro vs. ~80,-
Euro for XP Home. The full retail version of Vista Ultimate is
an astonishing ~500,- Euro if you were to preorder it now.

Regrads,

Kai-Uwe

 

[Synapse Syndrome]

You can buy the"upgrade"and install it as "full" or upgrade XP to Vista.
In the past I have always used the "upgrade" disk to install as full using
an existing licenced Windows cd as proof.
Even the upgrade of Ultimate will cost around £200 or so.
Do you really need Ultimate?
XP Home = Vista Premium version.
All Ultimate is is Premium with networking bits and some other stuff from
Vista Business.
Premium has all that a home user would need.
I tried RC2 Premium and Ultimate and for me there is nothing in Ultimate
that I cannot use in Premium.
Check the side by side comparison list on Vista webpage.
If you use XP Pro then Vista Business is a replacement.
If XP Home then Vista Premium.

I want all the Media stuff obviously, and I need the Remote Desktop and
networking for my server and work, so Ultimate is will have to be.

ss.

 

[Nero]

We have "OEM" over here as well

Don't you have the so called "System-Builder"-versions over
there? Here in Germany, you can buy XP for instance either
as a "full" product in a retail box including manual and - IIRC -
two support calls or you get the System-Builder version which
is without those features but still a fully functional product that
is hardware indipendent (i.e. not locked to a specific computer
hardware). The difference in price is ~220,- Euro vs. ~80,-
Euro for XP Home. The full retail version of Vista Ultimate is
an astonishing ~500,- Euro if you were to preorder it now.

Regrads,

Kai-Uwe

 

[MICHAEL]

And Microsoft knows this. They are, for the time being,
a de facto monopoly.

Certain Linux flavors are coming along nicely...
it won't be too much longer before more users
start to take notice.

I believe Vista will be Microsoft's last big
hurrah. The turning point will begin, soon.


-Michael

 

[Adds]

*upgrading from an existing Windows OS and forgetting about the upgrade

pricing being cheaper.

While I agree with most of your comments, I, for one, and in a tricky
situation...

I originally ran XP Pro at home. The reason for running Pro is that I run a
domain server and Exchange at home (both of which are paid for of course).
I needed Pro in order to connect to the domian.

Then along came Media Center, which, at first was simply Pro with Media
Center onto. So I upgraded to that and got used to all the MCE extras.

Then along came Media Center 2005. At this point MS decided to remove
domian support, although if you were upgrading from a previous version (as I
was) it still worked, although you couldn't change domains (not a biggy for
me).

Now we've got Vista, and although I (will) have a licenced copy of Premium
thanks to a new Dell I bought a couple of weeks ago, I actually need
Ultimate just so I can join my domain (and still run Media Center).

I'm not really complaining, except that domain support has been slowly
removed for me over the last few years. I don't really know whats different
between Premium and Ultimate except for domain support, but whatever it is,
I don't need it - I simply need to conect to my domain.

What irks me (slightly - I'm not generally one to get wound up by these
things), is that MS have been telling us for years that a domain server is
the way to go, and although I fully understand that most home users aren't
running one, I find it slightly irritating that I have to spend significatly
more to do something I originally could do with Media Center 2002 (and
2004)... Especially when I've already paid for Server 2003... Couldn't their
pricing for domain connections be based at the server end rather than the
client end? Server 2003 cost me *a lot*, and now I have to spend more to
use it!

Ho hum.

A.

 

[Mike Hall - MS MVP Windows Shell/User]

Computer users run the OS on which their chosen applications will run.. most
don't care what OS is running as long as they can basically work it, it is
relatively stable, and can run their favourite game, greeting card app etc..

If you want Linux to be more mainstream than it is, get the Linux producers
to drop all of the technical crap that scrolls by at start-up, make it less
generally technical, and write to software authors and complain about the
general lack of Linux support re. applications.. for Linux to succeed in the
mass home market, it has to be as easy as Windows is, and offer all of what
Windows and supporting software does..

Until that time, suggesting that home users switch to Linux is not a good
idea.. all it will serve to do is appease your general dislike of MS..

 

[Brian Wescombe]

Yes, OEM are available but for people like me who like to upgrade quite
often, it's better/necessary to have a retail copy.

 

[MICHAEL]

While agree with most of your sentiments, as I stated,
some Linux distros are finally starting to recognize the
absolute need to be more "user friendly". Progress is
being made. And, for the average user, I would not
suggest totally going the Linux route, not right now.

Also, I have no "general dislike of Microsoft".

-Michael

 

[Alias]

Linux is not the answer for the majority of home users..

Have tried out Ubuntu or are you speaking from your experience years ago?

I found it to be more user friendly than Windows.

Alias

 

[Tim Draper]

yeah, linux is alright for drivers etc. especially with the new 6.10
release.
if your using just desktop (web, email, media etc) then i too would
sugest ubuntu. it even allows network filesharing from cd install, with
no setup!! pretty sure it also allows the use of netbios names too,
which has generally been a windows-only kinda thing.
however, if there are any gamers around here (like me) then linux is
practically useless. yes theres cedega and wine, but they dont always
support the latest games, and even when they do, they can be glitchy.

untill game producers support linux natively, then windows will always
be the gamers choice.
i personally think that the truce MS and novell (who develop SuSe) will
bring things just a little bit closer to gaming on linux.
less linux restrictions with windows-type things = more people
developing/moving to linux. game dev's see more people moving to linux
and produce it for linux too. UT2k3 & ut2k4 have it. as do all
IDsoftware games from Q3 afaik - it's getting there, just not quite yet.

who is really gonna buy FULL RETAIL of vista? i bet 99.9% of people here
are on XP, so all you need is the upgrade. that caters for 98% of the
home pc builders. anyone who doesnt have the knowledge to build their
own rig will buy from dell etc, pre-assembled with an OS already
installed (presumably vista).

tim

 

[Brian Wescombe]

who is really gonna buy FULL RETAIL of vista? i bet 99.9% of people here
are on XP, so all you need is the upgrade. that caters for 98% of the home
pc builders. anyone who doesnt have the knowledge to build their own rig
will buy from dell etc, pre-assembled with an OS already installed
(presumably vista).

Yes, I'll be able to buy an Upgrade copy as I have an XP disc (well, two
actually). But even that's more expensive here than a Full Ultimate licence
in the US!

 

[PaulM]

Ubuntu does not work with digital monitors.. It will not install with a DVI
connection.

 

[Alias]

Ubuntu does not work with digital monitors.. It will not install with a DVI
connection.

I wouldn't know as I don't have a digital monitor. When was the last
time your tried it? New versions of Ubuntu come out all the time.

Alias

 

[Eric Furness]

Ubuntu does not work with digital monitors.. It will not install with a DVI
connection.

NOT true. Works fine for me. Nvidia 6800gt card.

 

[Mike Hall - MS MVP Windows Shell/User]

No, not Ubuntu, but Suse Linux 10.1 which offers no more advantages than any
Windows counterpart, and certainly less with regard to what other software
applications one can run..

FWIW, I do you Knoppix live to check intransigent systems on occasion..