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Will Windows 7 Have a Big Uptake?
I've been using the Windows 7 beta for a while now, and so far I've really liked it. The new Taskbar is a huge improvement over the one that has existed up until this point and is a joy to use. And the various other enhancements all make it easier to do things.
I've also been reading a few articles about how Windows 7 will be the best OS ever (not necessarily my opinion), will beat Mac OSX and various flavours of Linux into the ground, and that there will be a wild upgrade from old Windows users.
However, in my opinion, I don't think that will be the case. Windows 7 does deliver a much better product than Vista, and certainly enhances the 'Windows Experience'. But if I was still using XP, I would still have the same reservations about upgrading to Windows 7 that I had before (grudgingly) upgrading to Vista.
Before I moved to Vista, and that was only due to buying a new laptop, my old XP machine worked flawlessly. All the programs I used worked without any problems. All the hardware I had worked without any problems. So when I read about all the issues Vista had, and that you had to buy new programs to get them to work, along with the machine spec needed to get Vista running, I decided at the time to stick with what I had. Even when I was looking to buy a new laptop, I seriously considered moving to Ubuntu 8, or getting a 'bare bones' laptop and re-installing XP.
Users still on XP will still be in the same boat as they were when Vista was released. If they want to upgrade to Windows 7, they'll still need a decent machine spec. They'll need to check that all their hardware will work with Vista, and that all the programs they use will work with Windows 7. It still won't be that easy a choice to make. And that's only referring to the Home users.
Businesses still using Win XP will still have all the same expenses involved in moving to Vista as they would moving to Windows 7. And given the current economic climate, I don't think they'll want to be forking out huge amounts just to have the latest OS.
There may also be other reasons apart from cost that mean businesses won't consider moving, for example, in-house software that won't work on Vista let alone Windows 7 without huge amounts of development work.
I think all of this means that we won't see a rush of users upgrading to Windows 7, at least not if they're using XP at the moment. The best thing to come out of Vista is that a lot of ground work for hardware drivers , and compatibility issues have been resolved. But I don't think we'll see the death of old Windows just yet.
