The Death Knell for XP?

January 21st, 2008 Posted in News

When Windows Vista was released it was hailed as the future of computer software. It would be more user friendly, have more features and claimed to be more stable than its predecessor, Windows XP. The newest offering however has not proved popular with the thousands of computer users worldwide; subsequently its sales have been disappointing.

XP has become a favourite with many users, it has proved to be reliable, efficient and ultimately user friendly. Sadly for Microsoft chiefs, it has proved too popular with the technological public. The result has been that the majority of computer users have felt no urgency to switch to the new operating software.

On the 30^th June this year however, Microsoft have decided to cease the production of XP so it will become unavailable as either a shrink wrapped product or as the OS that comes with a new computer. This move has not gone down well with the computing fraternity who in a direct response have started an online petition.

The petition has been labelled ‘Save XP’ and is the brainchild of ‘InfoWorld’; so far it is believed that over 50,000 signatories have joined the cause. There are almost one hundred and sixty days to go until the planned ceasing of XP availability, meaning that the petition will no doubt grow into the hundreds of thousands. The question is; will it have any impact?

The purpose of the petition is to ask Microsoft to abandon its plans to stop sales of XP; the rather hopeful aim is that Microsoft will make the software available indefinitely. Unfortunately for the die hard fans of XP this seems unlikely to happen.

Microsoft has already extended the deadline once and the chances of this happening again are unlikely. With the service pack for Vista looming on the horizon Microsoft will hope that the problems with Vista can be remedied and it can finally take its place as the next generation of Windows software.