7 ms·

Windows 8 now up to 3.31% market share as Vista finally falls below the 5% mark

24 points by Avalaxy 14y ago

deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
mtgx 14y ago
I'm missing the point of these articles. Are we supposed to "celebrate" every single percentage increase in Windows 8 market share? The number still seems incredibly small to me. I doubt Windows 8 will even reach 20% by the time Windows 9 comes out in 2 and a half years.
- Lightning 14y ago
  You have to remember that every percentage point is about 10 million people. This is the whole computer market we're talking about.
  - melling 14y ago
    Did you just make up that number? I think there are a lot more than 100 million Windows users. Windows has 90% market share. I'd guess that there are 1 billion Windows PCs, so you'd be off by an order of magnitude.
    - Lightning 14y ago
      Yep, sorry. That was a typo; fixed.
- scholia 14y ago
  There are some Windows 8 haters out there who are desperately trying to make it fail. And it's not just pointlessly stupid Linux fanboys. It includes real Windows users are are digging in their heels and vowing never to upgrade from Windows 95, Windows XP, Windows 7 or whatever. (You can easily recognise them by their intemperate language.) Having a group that abandons logic to promote something's failure naturally creates a counter-movement and therefore a market for blog posts that confirm or deny its success or failure. This has publishers laughing all the way to the bank. It looks unlikely to develop into the sort of mass conflict that helped publishers make pots of money from Windows vs OS/2, PS3 vs Xbox 360 and similar battles, but it will do. Obviously whether someone uses Windows 7 or Windows 8 is much more important than rape in India, mass starvation in Africa, war in the Middle East or the fact that the whole planet is melting down. One has to maintain a sense of priorities.
  - pixl97 14y ago
    WTF does anything going on outside of the computer industry have to with Windows? Lets setup some straw men and light them on fire. The biggest issue with 8 is that there is enough interface change that people feel they have to relearn it. In business this takes time and money to teach the employees, or for them to learn themselves. Most people don't want to spend time learning something new when there is little to no benefit from doing so. Real computer users want to get a task done, not to spend half their life learning interface changes. From the tone of your reply, I'm going to assume you are one of those designers that says "My interface is right, and you are too dumb to understand it's awesomeness", and then are shocked and amazed when no one uses it.
    - scholia 14y ago
      > WTF does anything going on outside of the > computer industry have to with Windows? If you restrict your attention only to what's going on in the computer industry you are likely to lose your sense of proportion, as well as leading an impoverished life. Otherwise, my view is that if you don't like Windows 8, carry on using Windows 7, or else install a Stardock or other program that makes it work the way you like. Windows 7 will be around for the rest of the decade at least. However, people are capable of learning new interfaces, the real issue is the size of the benefits. With Windows 8, the long term benefits are that the new UI works well with touch screens, it provides access to a new category of WinRT apps, and it gives you much the same UI across mobile phones, tablets, laptops, and desktops (as well as common files and common services). In the long run, this means having to cope with fewer new interfaces, and it reduces your total learning time. This is obviously a work in progress, and it's a long-term play. None of us knows how it's going to turn out. It's far too soon to say whether it's right or not.
  - nailer 14y ago
    That's an interesting perspective. I honestly think it's Windows people desperately trying to make Microsoft seem relevant. Here's why: Their tablet OS hardly runs on any tablets. Desktops are no longer the primary computer device and there Windows 8 isn't well loved. Personally I use Windows 8 on my TV. The first time I set it up I looked for the screen resolution change thing in the Windows 8 style control panel equivalent. It wasn't there, and I ended up having to find it in the ancient and bloated Old School Windows Control Panel. I use Media Center, and that's not Windows 8-ized either. I also hear MS Office doesn't have a Windows 8 version. None of these things, to me, make Windows 8 seem like a massive success. Microsoft made kick ass phones, desktop OS and tablets in the early 2000s. But that period is over. We have Google and Apple now, Windows is that crappy thing you use at work.
- bluedino 14y ago
  The scary part is how high the XP userbase still is.
  - alan_cx 14y ago
    In my humble, XP (Pro) is the best OS MS have made. I was quite happy to see how many still use it. I still wish I could revert to it.
- benologist 14y ago
  The point of these articles: - leverage bias to get easy upvotes on social news sites - reinforce SEO, imagine being the #2 or #3 google result for 'microsoft' and 'windows 8' - stay relevant on sites like Google News etc by churning out 'new' 'news' Saddest part is this crap is probably the best $ per word for the tech news industry after plagiarism.
- Spooky23 14y ago
  I don't know about celebration, but since Windows sales are highly correlated to PC sales, it is useful information. Growth in Windows 8 desktop shipments gives you a good litmus test about veracity of the "death of the PC" concept. Windows 7 share is a completely different animal. Big enterprises are still in the middle of rolling out Windows 7, so you should see shifting from XP to 7. Deceleration there is bad news for Microsoft/PCs.
recoiledsnake 14y ago
Stats from Steam show Windows 8 to be close to 11%: Windows 7 64 bit 55.11% -0.37% Windows 7 13.40% -0.43% Windows 8 64 bit 9.92% +1.03% Windows XP 32 bit 8.35% -0.62% Windows Vista 64 bit 3.87% +0.57% Windows Vista 32 bit 2.72% +0.18% MacOS 10.8.2 64 bit 1.68% -0.03% MacOS 10.7.5 64 bit 0.82% +0.08% Windows 8 0.75% +0.01% MacOS 10.6.8 64 bit 0.64% +0.02% http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey
- unavoidable 14y ago
  Of course, Steam users tend to be power users and early adopters who need the latest and greatest. It's also still somewhat surprising to see how low OSX is on that list. I guess the games on offer are still not very good.
  - bluedino 14y ago
    Most OS X users are probably either dual-booting to Windows to play games, or have a dedicated Windows machine for games. Mac hardware really isn't orientated towards high-end gaming.
    - ripter 14y ago
      I won't buy a game that doesn't support OSX.
- Zr40 14y ago
  I can't believe XP is still being used as primary gaming OS by 8.35% of Steam users. Are so many gamers still using ancient hardware incapable of running Windows 7 or 8? Or are they unwilling or afraid to upgrade? At least, XP usage has dropped by 0.62 percentage points since the month before. Since this rate will likely decrease, XP will not be gone in less than 14 months.
  - archon 14y ago
    I'm not all that surprised. Steam carries bleeding-edge games, sure, but it also has a large catalog of older and indie games that don't require much hardware horsepower. Newer indie games like Faster than Light or Dungeons of Dredmor could easily run on an old machine.
abind 14y ago
yawn
melling 14y ago
What's really worth celebrating is that IE10 is around 4%. http://gs.statcounter.com/#browser_version-ww-daily-20130302-20130331 http://gs.statcounter.com/#browser_version-ww-daily-20130302... Now get everyone on Windows 7 to upgrade to IE10 then we've practically got an "HTML5" ready web.
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
Ologn 14y ago
Net Applications clearly marks this as desktop data, but TNW obscures this. With desktops, laptops, netbooks and tablets being so fluid nowadays, TNW should at least mention somewhere that this is desktop only market share. Wikipedia, the 6th most popular web site in the world (according to Alexa), has Windows as less than 58% of the clients hitting it for February 2013 ( http://stats.wikimedia.org/wikimedia/squids/SquidReportOperatingSystems.htm http://stats.wikimedia.org/wikimedia/squids/SquidReportOpera... ). Mac/iPhone/iPad is over 30%, Linux (Android, Ubuntu etc.) is over 7%. The rise of iOS and Android is the real breaking news story in my book. Windows controls its form factor niche, but that becomes more irrelevant every day. Boasting of Windows 90+% share of the desktop would be like DEC boasting of its market share of minicomputers in the 1970s/1980s.
davidroberts 14y ago
In a few hours, I'm going to a client's site to downgrade his newly purchased notebook to Windows 7. He's an average user, director of a small nonprofit who uses his computer mainly for email, Web browsing, and word processing. He used Windows 8 for a week and this is what he wrote : I need your assistance. I did go ahead an buy a new laptop. I like the machine but am suffering on account of Windows 8! Still, he'll still show up as Windows 8 in the market share statistics.
- Mahn 14y ago
  I always imagine this as the average case for everyone buying a new laptop now. I don't know, I really don't want to hate, but I have yet to hear of someone happy with W8 as their main OS.
  - Avalaxy 14y ago
    I am _very_ happy with Windows 8 on my tablet (Surface). Does that count? On my PC it's ok... I uninstalled all metro-apps and installed normal software instead. I just see the start screen as a new kind of start menu. To me it looks just like Windows 7 because I don't spend any time in the new UI environment.
    - jagermo 14y ago
      same here. I like Win 8 on my main System (Desktop, dual Monitor, no touch), especially the new Features in the file manager, the taskmanager and the fast boot. I took me around 10 minutes to optimize the modern ui menu - i now use it as a full screen start menu, I don't use any apps at all.
  - rm445 14y ago
    I think the hubbub will die down. It takes about ten minutes to make a Windows 8 machine usable - putting the things you want on the start screen and setting the program defaults so nothing runs with the slow pastel apps. Sure, doing so is rejecting many of the new 'features' of the OS. But once set up it is no less usable than Windows 7.
  - 14y ago

24 points by Avalaxy 14y ago

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

mtgx 14y ago

I'm missing the point of these articles. Are we supposed to "celebrate" every single percentage increase in Windows 8 market share? The number still seems incredibly small to me. I doubt Windows 8 will even reach 20% by the time Windows 9 comes out in 2 and a half years.

Lightning 14y ago
You have to remember that every percentage point is about 10 million people. This is the whole computer market we're talking about.
- melling 14y ago
  Did you just make up that number? I think there are a lot more than 100 million Windows users. Windows has 90% market share. I'd guess that there are 1 billion Windows PCs, so you'd be off by an order of magnitude.
  - Lightning 14y ago
    Yep, sorry. That was a typo; fixed.
scholia 14y ago
There are some Windows 8 haters out there who are desperately trying to make it fail. And it's not just pointlessly stupid Linux fanboys. It includes real Windows users are are digging in their heels and vowing never to upgrade from Windows 95, Windows XP, Windows 7 or whatever. (You can easily recognise them by their intemperate language.) Having a group that abandons logic to promote something's failure naturally creates a counter-movement and therefore a market for blog posts that confirm or deny its success or failure. This has publishers laughing all the way to the bank. It looks unlikely to develop into the sort of mass conflict that helped publishers make pots of money from Windows vs OS/2, PS3 vs Xbox 360 and similar battles, but it will do. Obviously whether someone uses Windows 7 or Windows 8 is much more important than rape in India, mass starvation in Africa, war in the Middle East or the fact that the whole planet is melting down. One has to maintain a sense of priorities.
- pixl97 14y ago
  WTF does anything going on outside of the computer industry have to with Windows? Lets setup some straw men and light them on fire. The biggest issue with 8 is that there is enough interface change that people feel they have to relearn it. In business this takes time and money to teach the employees, or for them to learn themselves. Most people don't want to spend time learning something new when there is little to no benefit from doing so. Real computer users want to get a task done, not to spend half their life learning interface changes. From the tone of your reply, I'm going to assume you are one of those designers that says "My interface is right, and you are too dumb to understand it's awesomeness", and then are shocked and amazed when no one uses it.
  - scholia 14y ago
    > WTF does anything going on outside of the > computer industry have to with Windows? If you restrict your attention only to what's going on in the computer industry you are likely to lose your sense of proportion, as well as leading an impoverished life. Otherwise, my view is that if you don't like Windows 8, carry on using Windows 7, or else install a Stardock or other program that makes it work the way you like. Windows 7 will be around for the rest of the decade at least. However, people are capable of learning new interfaces, the real issue is the size of the benefits. With Windows 8, the long term benefits are that the new UI works well with touch screens, it provides access to a new category of WinRT apps, and it gives you much the same UI across mobile phones, tablets, laptops, and desktops (as well as common files and common services). In the long run, this means having to cope with fewer new interfaces, and it reduces your total learning time. This is obviously a work in progress, and it's a long-term play. None of us knows how it's going to turn out. It's far too soon to say whether it's right or not.
- nailer 14y ago
  That's an interesting perspective. I honestly think it's Windows people desperately trying to make Microsoft seem relevant. Here's why: Their tablet OS hardly runs on any tablets. Desktops are no longer the primary computer device and there Windows 8 isn't well loved. Personally I use Windows 8 on my TV. The first time I set it up I looked for the screen resolution change thing in the Windows 8 style control panel equivalent. It wasn't there, and I ended up having to find it in the ancient and bloated Old School Windows Control Panel. I use Media Center, and that's not Windows 8-ized either. I also hear MS Office doesn't have a Windows 8 version. None of these things, to me, make Windows 8 seem like a massive success. Microsoft made kick ass phones, desktop OS and tablets in the early 2000s. But that period is over. We have Google and Apple now, Windows is that crappy thing you use at work.
bluedino 14y ago
The scary part is how high the XP userbase still is.
- alan_cx 14y ago
  In my humble, XP (Pro) is the best OS MS have made. I was quite happy to see how many still use it. I still wish I could revert to it.
benologist 14y ago
The point of these articles: - leverage bias to get easy upvotes on social news sites - reinforce SEO, imagine being the #2 or #3 google result for 'microsoft' and 'windows 8' - stay relevant on sites like Google News etc by churning out 'new' 'news' Saddest part is this crap is probably the best $ per word for the tech news industry after plagiarism.
Spooky23 14y ago
I don't know about celebration, but since Windows sales are highly correlated to PC sales, it is useful information. Growth in Windows 8 desktop shipments gives you a good litmus test about veracity of the "death of the PC" concept. Windows 7 share is a completely different animal. Big enterprises are still in the middle of rolling out Windows 7, so you should see shifting from XP to 7. Deceleration there is bad news for Microsoft/PCs.

recoiledsnake 14y ago

Stats from Steam show Windows 8 to be close to 11%: Windows 7 64 bit 55.11% -0.37% Windows 7 13.40% -0.43% Windows 8 64 bit 9.92% +1.03% Windows XP 32 bit 8.35% -0.62% Windows Vista 64 bit 3.87% +0.57% Windows Vista 32 bit 2.72% +0.18% MacOS 10.8.2 64 bit 1.68% -0.03% MacOS 10.7.5 64 bit 0.82% +0.08% Windows 8 0.75% +0.01% MacOS 10.6.8 64 bit 0.64% +0.02% http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey

unavoidable 14y ago
Of course, Steam users tend to be power users and early adopters who need the latest and greatest. It's also still somewhat surprising to see how low OSX is on that list. I guess the games on offer are still not very good.
- bluedino 14y ago
  Most OS X users are probably either dual-booting to Windows to play games, or have a dedicated Windows machine for games. Mac hardware really isn't orientated towards high-end gaming.
  - ripter 14y ago
    I won't buy a game that doesn't support OSX.
Zr40 14y ago
I can't believe XP is still being used as primary gaming OS by 8.35% of Steam users. Are so many gamers still using ancient hardware incapable of running Windows 7 or 8? Or are they unwilling or afraid to upgrade? At least, XP usage has dropped by 0.62 percentage points since the month before. Since this rate will likely decrease, XP will not be gone in less than 14 months.
- archon 14y ago
  I'm not all that surprised. Steam carries bleeding-edge games, sure, but it also has a large catalog of older and indie games that don't require much hardware horsepower. Newer indie games like Faster than Light or Dungeons of Dredmor could easily run on an old machine.

abind 14y ago

yawn

melling 14y ago

What's really worth celebrating is that IE10 is around 4%. http://gs.statcounter.com/#browser_version-ww-daily-20130302-20130331 http://gs.statcounter.com/#browser_version-ww-daily-20130302... Now get everyone on Windows 7 to upgrade to IE10 then we've practically got an "HTML5" ready web.

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

Ologn 14y ago

Net Applications clearly marks this as desktop data, but TNW obscures this. With desktops, laptops, netbooks and tablets being so fluid nowadays, TNW should at least mention somewhere that this is desktop only market share. Wikipedia, the 6th most popular web site in the world (according to Alexa), has Windows as less than 58% of the clients hitting it for February 2013 ( http://stats.wikimedia.org/wikimedia/squids/SquidReportOperatingSystems.htm http://stats.wikimedia.org/wikimedia/squids/SquidReportOpera... ). Mac/iPhone/iPad is over 30%, Linux (Android, Ubuntu etc.) is over 7%. The rise of iOS and Android is the real breaking news story in my book. Windows controls its form factor niche, but that becomes more irrelevant every day. Boasting of Windows 90+% share of the desktop would be like DEC boasting of its market share of minicomputers in the 1970s/1980s.

davidroberts 14y ago

In a few hours, I'm going to a client's site to downgrade his newly purchased notebook to Windows 7. He's an average user, director of a small nonprofit who uses his computer mainly for email, Web browsing, and word processing. He used Windows 8 for a week and this is what he wrote : I need your assistance. I did go ahead an buy a new laptop. I like the machine but am suffering on account of Windows 8! Still, he'll still show up as Windows 8 in the market share statistics.

Mahn 14y ago
I always imagine this as the average case for everyone buying a new laptop now. I don't know, I really don't want to hate, but I have yet to hear of someone happy with W8 as their main OS.
- Avalaxy 14y ago
  I am _very_ happy with Windows 8 on my tablet (Surface). Does that count? On my PC it's ok... I uninstalled all metro-apps and installed normal software instead. I just see the start screen as a new kind of start menu. To me it looks just like Windows 7 because I don't spend any time in the new UI environment.
  - jagermo 14y ago
    same here. I like Win 8 on my main System (Desktop, dual Monitor, no touch), especially the new Features in the file manager, the taskmanager and the fast boot. I took me around 10 minutes to optimize the modern ui menu - i now use it as a full screen start menu, I don't use any apps at all.
- rm445 14y ago
  I think the hubbub will die down. It takes about ten minutes to make a Windows 8 machine usable - putting the things you want on the start screen and setting the program defaults so nothing runs with the slow pastel apps. Sure, doing so is rejecting many of the new 'features' of the OS. But once set up it is no less usable than Windows 7.
- 14y ago