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Operating Systems Software

$50 to Get XP On a New Dell 616

CWmike writes "Dell will charge customers up to $50 for factory-installed Windows XP on some PCs after Wednesday, according to the company's Web site. Buyers of the low-priced Vostro line of desktops and notebooks will pay $20 to $50 more for Windows XP Professional installed as a 'downgrade' from Windows Vista Business or Vista Ultimate than they would for Vista only."
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$50 to Get XP On a New Dell

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  • by Trigun ( 685027 ) <evil.evilempire@ath@cx> on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:01PM (#23840329)
    it's expensive, but it's worth it.
    • by memojuez ( 910304 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:09PM (#23840479)
      It's a pretty sad statement about a product when people are willing to pay MORE not to use it.


      Forget about Apple Mr. Gates, you're doing a good job of self-destructing.

      • by CastrTroy ( 595695 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:25PM (#23840765)
        It's only sad because MS spent 5+ years working on Vista, and now people want to pay not to use it. It's not sad in the more general sense, that people want to pay more to use a better product.
        • Re:It's like divorce (Score:5, Interesting)

          by Jhon ( 241832 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:34PM (#23840941) Homepage Journal
          I would have paid $50 to have Win98 installed over ME a number of years ago. It's somehow comforting to know that the more things change, the more they stay the same.
          • Re:It's like divorce (Score:4, Interesting)

            by Phroggy ( 441 ) <slashdot3 AT phroggy DOT com> on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @01:59PM (#23842295) Homepage
            The difference is, nobody was offering Win98 for $50 more back then.
          • by Kjella ( 173770 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @03:05PM (#23843311) Homepage
            WinME is just the wierdest release Microsoft ever did, only one year after 98SE and a year before XP Home, both technically and marketwise. In retrospect I think it was the Golgafrincham B Ark of Microsoft developers, where all the good brainpower was transferred to the 2k/XP line while those too incompetent to bring on and yet not incompetent enough to outright fire were left on the 98/ME line. The bean counters wanted some ROI so instead of releasing a service pack to 98 and so WinME came to be. I don't think Vista can be described in much the same way.

            That said, many people would use XP because it's XP and for no other reason. It has all the buttons in the right places and works exactly the same as it's "supposed to" work. Let others figure out the funny stuff for you, then you migrate when you need to. I migrated from 2000 SP4 to XP SP2, now I run XP in a virtualbox under Linux but maybe someday I'll upgrade to a Vista version too. Not today though, not tomorrow either.
            • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

              by jobsagoodun ( 669748 )
              >In retrospect I think it was the Golgafrincham B Ark of Microsoft developers,

              Thank-you. I just laughed maltesers all over my monitor.
        • by g0bshiTe ( 596213 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:42PM (#23841077)
          MS business model

          1. Write software that works 90% of the time and crashes randomly 10% of the time (who cares the 10% is during critical computing)
          2. Wait, release patches.
          3. Release new version of OS so crappy the public will be happy to use the 90% ware and pay to downgrade
          4. Profit
        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by BigJClark ( 1226554 )

          This is because of the requirement of having a fscking graphics card to run an OS.

          Historically, its been the other way around :/
        • 5+ Years (Score:5, Insightful)

          by Kozar_The_Malignant ( 738483 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:56PM (#23841299)
          I think this is a big part of the problem. When you have that kind of time line, the project loses focus. Remember all of the things that were supposed to be in Vista but were dropped along the way? There never seemed to be a clear vision of what it was supposed to be. It doesn't have to be that way. NASA certainly has shown that long term projects can have spectacular results.
          • Re:5+ Years (Score:5, Insightful)

            by timeOday ( 582209 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @02:02PM (#23842335)

            It doesn't have to be that way. NASA certainly has shown that long term projects can have spectacular results.
            Linux has shown that OS development doesn't have to be phased in huge long-term projects in the first place. The kernel changes continuously, often supporting both the current "best" way of doing something as well as the previous "deprecated" interface that will disappear after a few years.

            Now, you could say "you can't leap a chasm two inches at a time," but where is the great leap forward with Vista?

          • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

            Do you also remember Microsoft dropping work on Vista to heavily invest in XP.SP2? Do you remember the significant changes that went into security training and code analysis to finally work on securing Windows?

            The ship took a massive course change during the product cycle for Vista - which changed what the priorities were for the final release. This should not be overlooked.

            Don't get me wrong, the Vista that did ship was a huge piece of junk - but SP1 has fixed many of the significant problems peop
        • by Peet42 ( 904274 ) <Peet42@Ne[ ]ape.net ['tsc' in gap]> on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:58PM (#23841343)

          It's not sad in the more general sense, that people want to pay more to use a better product.


          Indeed, but for my $50 I would rather have a properly supported version of Windows 2000. It's all been downhill since there.
        • by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @01:00PM (#23841381)
          Look folks, the reason for the extra $50 is simple. You get both Vista AND XP.

          I know it's a lot more fun to misinterpret the summary, then comment on your misinterpretation. But if you actually RTFA, it's not so sensational.
      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        It's a pretty sad statement about a product when people are willing to pay MORE not to use it.
        More like a pretty sad statement about people's susceptibility to FUD about a product. The vast majority of Vista hate I hear is FUD.
        • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

          by ckaminski ( 82854 )
          Sorry, I used it, on brand new hardware with shit-gobs of memory. Vista is a dog. I like what they were trying to do with it, and liked a lot of the UI enhancements, but I bought a fast laptop to get work done, not wait for windows to pop open.

    • by Vectronic ( 1221470 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:10PM (#23840501)
      Yeah, and the reason for the divorce?

      She's gaining weight and trying to control you.
    • by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:15PM (#23840581)

      This story is a cut and paste job from Twitter's journal [slashdot.org], made within two hours of the twitter post. CWMike must be another Twitter sock puppet and this story is just more hysterical FUD about Vista [slashdot.org].

      • by eln ( 21727 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @01:13PM (#23841573)
        Who cares who posted it, it's a legitimate news story from a fairly reliable source (computer world). This story is of interest to the tech world in general.

        And no, I'm not a twitter sock puppet, and I generally think he's kind of over the top, but this article looks like a pretty straightforward summary of the article it links to. This particular piece is not in any way "hysterical FUD." Do you add anyone who responds to twitter's posts or reads his journal to his list of sock puppets?
    • And just like divorce, the one you switch to is lighter weight, less nag-y, and easier to use. In this case it is older but it also has more experience.
    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by tepples ( 727027 )

      Then how much would you pay for Ubuntu, which causes even fewer headaches than Windows XP as long as GNU/Linux supports your hardware?

      • by KiltedKnight ( 171132 ) * on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:07PM (#23840457) Homepage Journal

        Then how much would you pay for Ubuntu, which causes even fewer headaches than Windows XP as long as GNU/Linux supports your hardware?

        Why, nothing of course. :)
      • Well, I guess it depends on what you do with that computer. If Ubuntu does the trick for you, more power to you.

        On the other hand, while I _am_ writing this on a SuSE 10.0 machine, I wouldn't really want Linux on my gaming rig. I know, Wine, bla, bla, bla. Tried that route some time ago, wasn't worth the effort. Does it even work with most games' copy-protection these days, or do you still need a crack just to run your legitimately purchased game in Wine?

        So, well, different tools for different folks.
        • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

          by Anonymous Coward
          Didn't you hear? There are now 42 games for Linux.
          • A respectable number (Score:3, Informative)

            by tepples ( 727027 )

            Didn't you hear? There are now 42 games for Linux.

            And once you include all the free-and-Free games in Ubuntu's repository, you have more games than were released for the Atari 7800 (60 titles) [wikipedia.org] and Virtual Boy (22) [wikipedia.org] put together. And no, not all of them are just Tetris clones [pineight.com] either.

            • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

              by Jasonjk74 ( 1104789 )
              And most of those games are still on an Atari 7800 level in 2008. And before I'm told that I don't understand Linux/FOSS; I use Linux every day, but the Linux gaming situation is pitiful. Now, I'll expect one of the following responses from someone here: 1. "But it runs World of Warcraft (in Wine)!" 2. "Linux users aren't worried about games, buy an XBox 360. Lack of games is a feature of Linux!"
              • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

                by Hatta ( 162192 )
                An Atari 7800 still provides some of the best home arcade experiences short of a MAME cabinet.

                If you focus on how much fun you can have, instead of whether you're pushing the most polygons through your video card, then linux is a nice option for gaming. No matter what genre of game you like most, there's something for you on linux.
            • And once you include all the free-and-Free games in Ubuntu's repository, you have more games than were released for the Atari 7800 (60 titles) and Virtual Boy (22) put together. And no, not all of them are just Tetris clones either.

              Look, I'm not trying to dis Linux or anything. It's great for work or casual browsing any email.

              But for games, umm, how do I say this tactfully?

              1. the "you have more games than were released for the Atari 7800 (60 titles) and Virtual Boy (22) put together" doesn't say much. Both

      • by Penguinisto ( 415985 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:18PM (#23840631) Journal


        Then how much would you pay for Ubuntu, which causes even fewer headaches than Windows XP as long as GNU/Linux supports your hardware?

        ...as much free tech support for it (Ubuntu, or any Linux distro, really) as my friends and relatives can stand.

        ...time and effort in teaching others (including random strangers) how to use it if they ask.

        ...time and effort in explaining in detail how I manage to get neat stuff to happen on it (e.g. getting the Windows version of the 3D app Poser to work in OpenSuSE).

        ...any and all code modifications that I make to customize and/or bugfix any open-source component of it - even if I don't distribute the binaries or project source code myself.


        (there are many more ways, but yeah - it's worth paying-back that way, if not in other ways as well).

        /P

  • by El_Muerte_TDS ( 592157 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:02PM (#23840347) Homepage
    why else would you pay more.
  • Downgrade? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by sconeu ( 64226 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:03PM (#23840357) Homepage Journal
    If it's a "Downgrade", shouldn't it be *CHEAPER*?????
    • Re:Downgrade? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by indifferent children ( 842621 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:04PM (#23840397)
      XP is smaller, faster, less buggy, and doesn't come encumbered with a ton of DRM crap. How is that a "downgrade"?
      • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

        by Anonymous Coward

        XP is smaller, faster, less buggy, and doesn't come encumbered with a ton of DRM crap. How is that a "downgrade"?
        The box art isn't as nice.
      • Re:Downgrade? (Score:5, Interesting)

        by TheGratefulNet ( 143330 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:29PM (#23840847)
        and doesn't come encumbered with a ton of DRM crap

        its all relative, isn't it?

        compare win2k that had NO activation and you could copy the system disk from one box to another and it would work fine (if the hardware/kernel were compatible).

        I am forced to use an acronis (or similar) tool to dupe my system disk. that hurdle should NOT exist but XP sure does like to stop you doing things you need to, at the system level.

        not to mention activation, which kept a lot of people OFF xp and made win2k the last 'great' os from MS.

        the only useful xp is a corp edition (non activation), sp2, pre-WGA. all others are bolloxed-up. (fwiw, at least SP3 on xp didn't turn on WGA on the corp version I tested it with. so a corp SP2 with SP3 update still seems 'mostly safe' to use).

    • Re:Downgrade? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by tambo ( 310170 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:10PM (#23840497)
      If it's a "Downgrade", shouldn't it be *CHEAPER*?????

      It's a "downgrade" only because Microsoft wants to preserve the illusion that Vista is better, and the pricing is set to discourage people from buying it.

      But, yes... a significant share of the consumer market, and practically *all* of the informed market, consider XP a vastly improved upgrade [dotnet.org.za] over Vista.

      I've been using Microsoft OSes since MS-DOS 3.2 (circa 1988), and I've never been nearly as frustrated, disappointed, and often outraged by an OS as I am with Vista. I've been using it for two months, and it's horrid in many, many aspects.

      I have been making a list of irritations that are novel to Vista. Every time I run across some new irritant, I pop open this text file and add a line to it. I am also making a list of Vista features that I have turned off because they are buggy, poorly implemented, resource hogs, unsecure, frustrating to use, etc., etc. They are both very long lists, and they continue to grow.
      • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

        by Stormwatch ( 703920 )

        I've been using Microsoft OSes since MS-DOS 3.2 (circa 1988), and I've never been nearly as frustrated, disappointed, and often outraged by an OS as I am with Vista.
        I assume you have skipped WindowsMe.
      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by sm62704 ( 957197 )
        have been making a list of irritations that are novel to Vista.

        Please post it in your as-yet nonexistant slashdot journal!
  • Look, I know xp is what everyone wants, but it should be obvious that the days are numbered for this OS.
    • by gfxguy ( 98788 )
      I bought XP Pro last year (January 07), and as a "special" got Vista Pro upgrade for "free" (plus $10 shipping and handling), so I went ahead and got it simply because I knew eventually I'd be using it. It's been sitting in my drawer since then.

      So the question is, from what I understand, if you turn off all the extras, Vista is not that bad. I don't suppose I can get an unbiased assessment on slashdot, though. Is it really that buggy? More than XP?
      • Re:Wasting money (Score:5, Informative)

        by LWATCDR ( 28044 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:24PM (#23840745) Homepage Journal
        How bad is Vista? Well that depends. The UAC does break a good amount of software that works just fine on XP.
        Also the journal playback doesn't work with the UAC turned on. It was a security issue but it is also how some programs did simple macros and allowed you to create applications that pushed text into other windows apps.
        Also the USB system seems to have some bugs in it.
        Also the sound system can be really odd at times. Some computers produce really crappy sound if you record at less than 16 bit 22 khz stereo. That shouldn't be an issue for just recording voice.
        It does use more disk space and memory than XP.
        It is also different and often it seems like it is different not to be better but to just be different.
        So as you have put it if you turn off all the extras then it isn't that bad.
        But if you turn off all the extras is it any better than XP?
        That is what makes Vista so bad. It really is a lot to some pain for little to no gain.
        XP works as well as Vista, uses less resources, and everybody knows most of it's quirks and problems. I feel that Vista is a case of not worth it. And what I find shocking is that most of the normal users out there feel the same way.
         
      • Re:Wasting money (Score:5, Informative)

        by Rary ( 566291 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:29PM (#23840857)

        So the question is, from what I understand, if you turn off all the extras, Vista is not that bad. I don't suppose I can get an unbiased assessment on slashdot, though. Is it really that buggy? More than XP?

        There are a handful of people here on Slashdot who actually like Vista and admit it. I'm one of them.

        I haven't turned off any of the extras. Regarding the eye candy, they did an awesome job. It's a slick looking user interface. Regarding performance, it runs beautifully on my Acer laptop (1.6 GHz dual core, 2 GB RAM, GeForce Go7300).

        The biggest annoyance for me is the automatic horizontal scrolling in the folder pane of Windows Explorer. I absolutely hate it and want to turn it off, but there is no option.

        I've only encountered two actual bugs, and they were both extremely minor. One of them I only encountered once, and can't actually remember what it is right now. The other is just a small bug that occurs when you create a new folder and then try to rename it too quickly.

        Overall, I'm happy with it.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      its supported until 2011 or something really crazy like that.

      by then, if the world is STILL on MS platforms, well, we have worse things to worry about than xp running out of support..

      there's no compelling reason at all to embrace vista. none. xp won't stop working all of a sudden (well, not any more than usual) and its supported via patches for quite a while to go.

      after that, its linux, freebsd, mac. MS is losing share every month. I know NO ONE in the corp world who wants vista and even home users are
  • All of the business and workstation class machines (OptiPlex, Latitude, Precision) will have downgrade rights for no premium over Vista Business.
  • Or... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by oodaloop ( 1229816 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:03PM (#23840377)
    you could just get Ubuntu from Dell. Hell, I'd take one of their DOS machines before buying Vista.
  • by night_flyer ( 453866 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:09PM (#23840473) Homepage
    As opposed to buying a copy of XP from someone else for $150?
    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by merreborn ( 853723 )

      As opposed to buying a copy of XP from someone else for $150?
      It's $99 if you buy OEM.
  • What about refunds? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by MarcoG42 ( 1087205 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:09PM (#23840481) Homepage
    So, when I get the PC home do I get to not accept the EULA, and call for a rebate of the cost of Vista + the $20-$50 more I payed for my "downgrade?"
  • Better idea: (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Penguinisto ( 415985 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:11PM (#23840517) Journal
    How much would they add as a surcharge to ship any model I choose WITHOUT a Microsoft operating system on it?


    As in: "...can you just send me the laptop with nothing at all installed on the hard disk? I intend to install (Ubuntu/Fedora/OpenSuSE) on it. No, I really don't want anything in the way of tech support outside of parts and labor."


    /P

  • I say we all call Dell Sales lines right now and complain about this crap. The Slashdotting of their call center will get their attention.
  • For some classes of customers, they have to expect a certain number of calls over most other customers. Small Business customers are likely one of those classes, as they tend to not have their own IT staff. Charging them a premium for a near EOL (again) OS, allows Dell to recoup some of the costs associated with testing multiple flavors of XP on a continuing basis on systems that don't already have that cost built in (yes, I'm making the assumption they build that in to their different other classes of PC
  • Microsoft Monopoly (Score:5, Insightful)

    by mlwmohawk ( 801821 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:21PM (#23840691)
    Yet again we see proof that Microsoft has a monopoly. If there were real competition in the market, people would not be forced to bend over and pay more. There would be competition, Dell would have to offer it at the same price or another operating system would win.

    Also, if there were competition, Microsoft would not have the economic ability to decide to drop a product that people wanted and force them into something they didn't. If I was a share holder and there was actual competition in the market place, I'd have the board and CEO fired for failing their fiduciary responsibilities.

    But since they have a monopoly, there is no economic feedback.
  • by Animats ( 122034 ) on Wednesday June 18, 2008 @12:41PM (#23841049) Homepage

    I'm still running Windows 2000 on the last Windows machine. It's so drama-free. No pushed updates, no annoying popups from Microsoft, no crashes in years.

    You run Windows 2000. XP is tied to the mothership in Redmond. With Vista, Microsoft runs you.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      The only problem to run Win2k is on a laptop with Wifi. There's no coherent Wifi subsystem to do what one can do in WinXP. XP's system pales in comparison to Ubuntu though. Nothing can beat iwconfig/ifconfig/iptables combo... except for pf.

      If one has a Linux-liked wifi card, switch to Ubuntu. Its worth the trouble.
  • Considering NVIDIA is too lazy to put in a simple entry in their driver's .INF file so their newer mobile cards would work in XP [slashdot.org] I want to see how many of the newer model laptops could POSSIBLY downgrade without doing what I had to do - hack the .INF and get the deviceid in there so XP would see the hardware (8600M GS).

    Seriously, people at NVIDIA must be REALLY LAZY to not include one line of code into an .INF file so their card would work under XP (since they ARE using a unified driver architecture and all for the very purpose of keeping things compatible across the board)

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