Business Bytes
Renee Oricchio

Lessons From Windows XP

 

A new survey from Forrester Research shows that 75% of all business-owned computers in the U.S. are running Windows XP. Compare that to Windows 7, which is running on only 10% a year now after its release.

Not bad for an operating system that's been around for nine years now (an enternity in the software business).

It's so easy to say this is more about the bellyflop that is Windows Vista and less about the quality of Windows XP itself.

For those that do, I ask...

- if computer users didn't have the patience to endure Windows Vista, how could they have endured XP this long unless its a perfectly fine operating system? Mind you, it's not Secretariat. It's not fast, sleek or trendy. But, it does get the job done.

- A lot of people have switched to Macs, true enough. But actually only one percent in the same Forrester survey show that companies are considering alternate operating systems. Windows XP has not only held the fort down, it's protected the company brand. In business, it goes without saying that one bad product can take down the whole franchise. Windows Vista was a fiasco. Windows XP has been a port in the storm for those that don't want to update.

 

 

Renee Oricchio is a technology writer and former supervising news producer for CNN Financial News. She has been covering the computer industry since 1987. @oricchio