Windows 7 Pricing

[KeypoX]

http://www.neowin.net/news/mai...dows-7-upgrade-pricing

"According to the image above, Best Buy will offer customers to order a Windows 7 Home Premium Upgrade for $49.99 and Windows 7 Professional Upgrade for $99.99."

Doesnt seem to bad to me, but maybe should give vista users for free.

 

[Rhonda the Sly]

Usually upgrade SKUs are 50% retail pricing, so... $99.99 for Windows 7 Home Premium
and $199.99 for Windows 7 Professional? I must admit, Home Premium looks pretty damn attractive at that price, as an upgrade.

Vista prices (current, which is lower than release pricing):
OEM - $99.99
Upgrade - $129.99
Retail - $224.99

If 7 were to follow this pattern we'd see retail at $99.99 but I doubt that OEM pricing would be significantly lower (or lower period) than upgrade. Hell, Home Basic upgrade is $88.99 so this new price range is crazy. They are really going for value here, to the point where I'm beginning to wonder if they are only dropping prices for upgraders and leaving OEM/Retail pricing at levels that are not so drastically cut.

...or this could just be a fake leaked memo.

I'm still peeved there is no family pack.

 

[RebateMonger]

Not a big surprise here:

1) The "average" Vista PC is probably no more than 1 or 1.5 years old. People would be upset having to pay a lot for the upgrade to the new OS.

2) Vista==>W7 is like Win98==>Win98SE, where the upgrade prices were also in the $60 range.

 

[BD2003]

I'm actually quite surprised. The upgrade is much bigger than 98 to 98 SE...this is 3 years of development here, not 1.

No one has to upgrade, but at these prices, I'm definitely considering it.

All they need now is a multi-license pack, and I'm set.

 

[IamDavid]

I'm in for sure, even if it cost a bit more... Curious though, how will the upgrades work? I mean if I'm using home basic can I upgrade to Professional?

 

[KeypoX]

I wont be buying windows 7, i already own vista and i dont see enough difference in 7. Though I have been using 7 for a while now.

Upgrades are like oem, can only install on machine and cannot change machine later (upgrade mobo). If i can keep chaning they i would pay 50...

 

[Athena]

Originally posted by: BD2003
No one has to upgrade, but at these prices, I'm definitely considering it.

That's what Microsoft wants. They aren't really targeting Vista users, what they want is to make it attractive for the millions of XP users who have not found it attractive to move to Vista.

All they need now is a multi-license pack, and I'm set.

I'm waiting for that too. The new "homegroup" feature is better than the Windows 3.1 workgroup networking that home users have now and it works ten times better than home networking in Vista.

 

[corkyg]

It is fully covered by my TechNet subscription . . . not a problem.

 

[guyver01]

Windows Vista can be upgraded to Windows 7 in-place upgrade if the processor architecture, comparable edition, and language version are the same. Windows XP can't be upgraded to Windows 7 - a clean install of Windows 7 is required. Windows 7 will support in-place upgrades from a lower edition to a higher one using the Windows Anytime Upgrade tool.

 

[Skott]

Originally posted by: Athena

Originally posted by: BD2003
No one has to upgrade, but at these prices, I'm definitely considering it.

That's what Microsoft wants. They aren't really targeting Vista users, what they want is to make it attractive for the millions of XP users who have not found it attractive to move to Vista.

All they need now is a multi-license pack, and I'm set.

I'm waiting for that too. The new "homegroup" feature is better than the Windows 3.1 workgroup networking that home users have now and it works ten times better than home networking in Vista.

Yep, they are going to have to come up with something much better than Vista to get XP users to move. When your home users and business users are refusing to upgrade that tells you your product (vista in this case) isnt all that great and not worth the effort. I hope Windows 7 is really good like XP is or MS will be shooting their other foot.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Originally posted by: KeypoX
I wont be buying windows 7, i already own vista and i dont see enough difference in 7. Though I have been using 7 for a while now.

Upgrades are like oem, can only install on machine and cannot change machine later (upgrade mobo). If i can keep chaning they i would pay 50...

No, retail upgrades are retail license, you can change motherboards and re-activate. (Unless MS has changed their licensing policy drastically for the W7 release)

 

[Raduque]

I'll be buying at least two copies of 7, but I'll wait for pricing to be confirmed first. I still have 2 unactivated copied of Vista Ultimate retail to use in the meantime.

I do love W7, though.

 

[RebateMonger]

Originally posted by: VirtualLarry
No, retail upgrades are retail license, you can change motherboards and re-activate. (Unless MS has changed their licensing policy drastically for the W7 release)

Yeah, there's no such thing as an "OEM Upgrade" disk. Only Retail Upgrades. Those come with a Retail Key, which sorta' makes it into a Retail installation. Unless Microsoft has updated its record keeping, the only Activation Key that Windows (and Microsoft) stores is the current Key.

Originally posted by: Raduque
I still have 2 unactivated copied of Vista Ultimate retail to use in the meantime.

I probably have seven or eight Vista licenses that I've never even Activated. Two (Vista Home Premium) were from the original $50 "Family Pack" upgrade offer and most are Vista Ultimate licenses that I've accumulated. Nothing's more useless than an obsolete OS license.

 

[MichaelD]

Any word on the pricing for Ultimate? I'm running the RC which is Ultimate and have gotten used to it. I'd hate to have to do without any of the nifty features I'm using now.

Also, a family pack or tiered licensing structure sure would be nice. I have two PCs and a laptop I'd like to put 7 on; but I'm not shelling out $300 x 3 for it.

I'm one of the XP holdouts; I saw ZERO reason to move to Vista. Granted it got a lot better with SP1, but my free copy of XP (home use from work) was a powerful motivator to not spend money on something I didn't like anyway (Vista).

W7 is a completely different story. I like it a lot and will upgrade.

 

[yinan]

Originally posted by: MichaelD
Any word on the pricing for Ultimate? I'm running the RC which is Ultimate and have gotten used to it. I'd hate to have to do without any of the nifty features I'm using now.

Just buy a TechNet subscription

 

[MichaelD]

Originally posted by: yinan

Originally posted by: MichaelD
Any word on the pricing for Ultimate? I'm running the RC which is Ultimate and have gotten used to it. I'd hate to have to do without any of the nifty features I'm using now.

Just buy a TechNet subscription

We have a Technet subscription at work for years, but I've never actually had to buy one...the subscription was active when I started there. How do you buy one? Cost?

*edit*
Google works wonders. If I'm reading correctly, the only diff b/t the Direct and Direct Single User is that with the latter you get DVDs in the mail. Is that correct? With the cheaper plan I just have to download the software myself? Are the "trial versions" really full versions with no time limits? Is there a huge "TRIAL VERSION!!!!!!111!!!" popup every 4 minutes or something like that? The few Technet CDs I've used at work have all been expiring evaluation copies or had certain features disabled.

 

[Athena]

Originally posted by: RebateMonger
Nothing's more useless than an obsolete OS license.

I use them in VMs.

 

[Rhonda the Sly]

Apple is being gracious lately, too.

 

[RebateMonger]

Originally posted by: Rhonda the Sly
Apple is being gracious lately, too.

Both Microsoft and Apple are looking for constant revenue streams.

As it is, Microsoft makes most of its money from their Windows OS and from MS Office. Microsoft would like to offer (paid) upgrades as frequently as possible while MOST consumers would like to upgrade as seldom as possible.

With more and more computers out there, the potential revenue from new OSes gets larger. That means the development cost per-sale gets smaller. So you'd expect that the price of the OS could come down a bit while still supporting product R&D.

 

[Griffinhart]

Originally posted by: MichaelD
Any word on the pricing for Ultimate? I'm running the RC which is Ultimate and have gotten used to it. I'd hate to have to do without any of the nifty features I'm using now.

Also, a family pack or tiered licensing structure sure would be nice. I have two PCs and a laptop I'd like to put 7 on; but I'm not shelling out $300 x 3 for it.

I'm one of the XP holdouts; I saw ZERO reason to move to Vista. Granted it got a lot better with SP1, but my free copy of XP (home use from work) was a powerful motivator to not spend money on something I didn't like anyway (Vista).

W7 is a completely different story. I like it a lot and will upgrade.

Out of curiousity... What "nifty features" are you worried about?

Ultimate will not be widely available though. For the most part you'll have two choices. Home and Professional.

Home will have all the media center stuff and previous versions. Professional will have all that, plus domain support and remote desktop.

Ultimate and enterprise editions will have a few more features. Bit Locker, App Locker, and one or two more minor features for enterprise level installations. If you are using XP home today, you should probably go with Win 7 Home. If you are using XP pro go with Win 7 Pro. Anyone using the Home editions of Vista should stick to home, and Business and Ultimate editions will find Professional meets their needs.

 

[Mem]

Originally posted by: RebateMonger
Not a big surprise here:

1) The "average" Vista PC is probably no more than 1 or 1.5 years old. People would be upset having to pay a lot for the upgrade to the new OS.

2) Vista==>W7 is like Win98==>Win98SE, where the upgrade prices were also in the $60 range.

Thats the way I feel about Win7 over Vista, does not seem like 3 years development to me, I'll be buying it because my OEM Vista version won't cover motherboard upgrade (nothing wrong however with my Vista PCs or Win7 for that matter)plus I'm long overdue for full hardware upgrade anyway on my main PC, the rest of my PCs will stay with Vista until Win8 arrives.

I think we'll see a real upgrade from Win7 to Win8 in three years time or so ,only time will tell.

 

[XZeroII]

So I'm reading about Win7 pricing on Anandtech about an article that Neowin did about a report from someone who claims to have inside information from Best Buy. Can someone link to this thread from another location?

 

[Bozo Galora]

http://www.computerworld.com/a...asic&articleId=9134078

should would could
nobody will know till next week
why worry about it?
What will be will be