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Windows 8 blamed as PC sales slide

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jmyrlefuller:
http://m.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/windows-8-blamed-as-pc-sales-slide/2013/04/11/02a0d740-a2a0-11e2-82bc-511538ae90a4_story.html

By Hayley Tsukayama,  Published: THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 10:42 AM ET

Since the start of the year, the PC market has seen its steepest quarterly decline ever — 13.9 percent, according to a report from International Data Corp. That news comes on the heels of a Gartner report predicting the PC market will shrink as much as 3.5 percent over 2013 in favor of ultra-light notebooks and tablets.

It’s not necessarily that users are dropping PC use altogether, but rather that they aren’t interested in replacing their PCs because tablets are becoming the center of their tech lives. As Gartner analyst Carolina Milanesi said in the firm’s press release, “As consumers shift their time away from their PC to tablets and smartphones, they will no longer see their PC as a device that they need to replace on a regular basis.”

None of this is particularly surprising. But it is bad news for Microsoft, whose new Windows 8 system is being partly blamed for the market’s poor performance. When the company introduced Windows 8 in October, the operating system was supposed to help a flagging PC market gain — or at least lose less — ground against tablets, with a new touch-based interface. Instead, sales of PCs have dropped faster, and analysts are saying that sales aren’t coming back.

(excerpted)

Rapunzel:
I've looked at Windows 8 units at Staples and Walmart... problem is I need a keyboard for what I use the computer for, not a touch screen where I have to reach across the paperwork on my desk to operate........

Atomic Cow:
Windows 8 is crap, pure and simple.  It is great for a tablet but that's it.

Microsoft knows it which it why most computer makers still have the ability to downgrade you to Windows 7 upon request.

We'll see what happens when "Windows Blue," as it is currently referred to, is officially announced.  It may be nothing but Windows 8 SP1, a total revamp of the system to fix all of the failings, or even Windows 9.

As Windows 7 is what Vista should have been, Windows 9 will probably be the same for 8.

jmyrlefuller:
They'd be better off going back to XP-- you know, the one that was a rousing success for them for nine whole years-- and tweaking a few things. The problem is, when you deal with Windows, you have certain expectations. It has had the same basic format since the early 1990s. It wasn't broken, so why fix it? Tablets could use a start menu just as much as any desktop.

From what I understand, with Windows 8 they have tried to change too much, too fast, and they confused people.

So now we have Android slowly becoming more familiar and more viable, first with tablets, and now slowly with laptops, while Microsoft begins its decline. As for me, if I could put Linux on this laptop (it's currently on Android), I would, but quite frankly I haven't figured out how yet.

Atomic Cow:
The problem with XP is the kernel is obsolete and there really isn't much they can do with it.

Everyone now is pretty much running the 64-bit versions of Windows because those can handle more than 3.5gb of RAM.  While XP 64-bit does exist, it is crap and always has been which is why few people have ever heard of it much less used it.

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