Exclusive: Windows Vista Product Editions Revealed

8 SKUs for a Desktop OS?!?!

I wish someone would take that sniper and go after Thurrott. He needs to *zip it*

javamaker wrote:

what about Media Center,Tablet?

If you actually read the article, you'd know.

Media Center functionality is now included in "Home Premium", and Tablet PC functionality is included on all SKUs of Vista (above Home Premium)

Mr. LameJavaMaker, one word - RTFA!

Thoese 7 versions are indeed different, i agree it's probably  too much, but given the recent court cases against MS, its in their best interest to release a separate version for each market.

Also, no one tells you to buy all 7 (if you got cash, sure do that !) - so just buy one (or get your free linux cd) which suits your need.

As Andre said, I'd too should start saving for the "ultimate" version ... 

Btw, why do I get a feeling that the "orbit" experiment is started again ?

The names of the editions is meaningless at the moment, what is important is seeing what each contains on some kind of table... My guess is I will end up with the professional or Ultimate but in either case I know I am going to be paying a LOT more for Vista than I did for XP.

The only reason for creating more editions is so you can increase the price... I mean look at the following:

Starter - £40
Home - £80
Pro - £120

or

Starter - £40
Home - £60
Home Premium - £80
Pro - £100
Small Business - £100
Enterprise - £120 (per single copy)
Ultimate - £150

Now if you are a geek, what are you going to spend £100 or £150 for the ultimate?

W3bbo wrote:

javamaker wrote: what about Media Center,Tablet?

If you actually read the article, you'd know.

Well considering the OP quoted without linking that isn't all that easy now is it?

Manip wrote:

Now if you are a geek, what are you going to spend £100 or £150 for the ultimate?

A true geek would spend £0.0p0.5 on the bandwidth bill to 'torrent the ISO

People, remember, it is divided into 2 branches, Home and Business:

Home Stuff:
Starter Edition
Home Basic
Home Premium
Ultimate Edition

Business:
Small Business Edition
Professional
Enterprise Edition

javamaker wrote:

blah blah keeron..

so basically MS cripples one OS and raises the prices on the other OS.. like the starter edition can only open 3 programs at once..

javamaker = Orbit86

Andre Da Costa wrote:

People, remember, it is divided into 2 branches, Home and Business:

Home Stuff:
Starter Edition
Home Basic
Home Premium
Ultimate Edition

Business:
Small Business Edition
Professional
Enterprise Edition

That's not entirely accurate.

There are plenty of "Proper Power" users who don't want condescending "Home User" software talking down to them in that rediciously patronising tone.

Of course they'd buy the "Professional" editions because it means they don't have to put up with the software telling them about "Pictures" and "Talking to friends".

I, am one such individual.

...and I'm boycotting Windows Vista, for 3 reasons:

• POP/PVP is EVIL, there is no justification for it
• I feel insulted by their condescending user interface design, even on the Pro edition of Windows 5.1
• Windows XP does everything I need it to right now, there is no reason for me to upgrade, especilly with XAML, Avalon, WFS, and .NET2.0 being made available for Windows NT 5.1 and 5.2
  

I read the description and based on what I read it sounds like Ultimate Edition will be identical to Home Premium except with a bunch of web-addons like access to the MSN Music store and such...

If that is the case naturally I would not give the Ultimate Edition the time of day, I want actual improvements in the OS and any "Game Tweaker" will be reverse engineered within a minute and shoved on the internet for all to use (and completely legally too).

PS - Yes JavaMaker is obviously Orbit86, he joined the same day Orbit86 got banned and uses English very similar and, well if I don't to look at their username's I forget that it doesn't say Orbit86.

Manip wrote:

I read the description and based on what I read it sounds like Ultimate Edition will be identical to Home Premium except with a bunch of web-addons like access to the MSN Music store and such...

If that is the case naturally I would not give the Ultimate Edition the time of day, I want actual improvements in the OS and any "Game Tweaker" will be reverse engineered within a minute and shoved on the internet for all to use (and completely legally too).

PS - Yes JavaMaker is obviously Orbit86, he joined the same day Orbit86 got banned and uses English very similar and, well if I don't to look at their username's I forget that it doesn't say Orbit86.

I just hope the Ultimate Edition supports Domain Join.

javamaker wrote:

you know how many people join in a day?

that's like catching a ID Thief on Amazon.com and saying out of the thousands of people who bought something you pick someone out of the hat..

The fact he's now denying it and trying to "explain away" our claims is yet more evidence that this "Javamaker" is Orbit86.

Not need to fear, I have alerted the authorities, they'll be making a full investigation in the next few hours. (i.e: when Adam Kinney wakes up)

Looks like a good lineup to me. Starter Edition is for folk who only need the most basic of basic, and can't afford to pay anything more. This is already available on XP, and is selling well, so there's no reason to think they wouldn't have it on Vista. This will NOT be sold with standard desktop OS systems, so no reason to fear people will buy "the wrong OS".

Ultimate is the "every bell and whistle" SKU we've also known was coming. Think XP + both Plus! packs + membership to every MSN service. It's a no-brainer.

All the others are basically versions of current OS's, except Small Business (likely that you buy packs of these for cheaper than Professional) and Home Premium (likely allow you to connect to a home server)?

I see the reasoning behind this as fairly clear: Microsoft is trying to offer a product to each of their major markets.

All you SHOULD need to do to figure out which SKU you need is ask yourself which you are. Are you a Basic home user, or a Premium one? Are you a Small Business or an Enterprise? Are you a Professional or an Ultimate?

It should be noted that I haven't RTFA, but the SKU titles make perfect sense to me.

javamaker wrote:

maybe you forgot but the Operating System doesn't matter, it's the software that runs on it that does.

This is one of the stupidest statements I've heard all day (and I was taking care of my 2 year old today).

The OS doesn't matter? So, you can choose any one you want and get the features, functionality, connectivity, foundational infrastructure, applications, etc that you need?

The OS's that are distributed today are, themselves, massive sets of applications. They DO matter.

Sure, the millions of other apps that run on them matter more, but the OS's do inherently matter.

And the SKU's matter as well. SKU's aren't actually designed to make money, they're designed to make it clear to people what they're buying and which version they need.

"Home" and "Professional" simply isn't enough of a distinction, never was.

javamaker wrote:

where do I fit in? I'm a home user but a power user at the same time..

I almost wrote a snarky response to this, but realized that was stupid.

To be honest, I don't know. I would expect most people who currently have Professional on XP will go for similar on Vista, as I expect it's the "gray area" SKU: for people who are home users, but often need more extensive features.

That said, again, I haven't RTFA so I should probably shut up now

Jeremy W. wrote:

Ultimate is the "every bell and whistle" SKU we've also known was coming. Think XP + both Plus! packs + membership to every MSN service. It's a no-brainer.

Yep, "no brainer" in that I'm not going to go anywhere near that.

Both "Plus!" packs were just pure gimmick bloat. Unlike Plus! for Windows 95 or 98, there weren't any useful features included (such as AntiVirus, Additional "proper" themes, Shell Zip support, etc)

When I heard that "Plus!" (the first) was going to add more themes, I thought they'd finally add some proper themes, an alternative to the horrid Luna), but no... it was just a color scheme, not even an icon set!

"Plus!" and MSN Services are targeted at the clueless-but-likes-to-think-they're-savvy user.

When I want adverts shoved in my face, asked if I want to "buy" something, or want some crudely rendered "actor" dancing on my desktop I'll probably be tripping LSD.

These additional features do nothing to improve the functionality of windows beyond gimmickry. Whatever happened to "classy" operating systems like Mac OS-X. There is little bad things I have to say about Mac-OS-X (spare Apple's double-standards on their own HCI guidelines).

So question:

Why can't Microsoft make an OS like OSX?

javamaker wrote:

where do I fit in? I'm a home user but a power user at the same time..

Considering your OS comment I would say Starter Edition...

But in all fairness only you can answer that comment. It depends on what SKU will even apply to what you do. I hate the home/professional distinction however realize why it exist. This is one thing Linux is good for...you select what kind of setup are you going to use and it installs the applicable packages...excellent feature. Sadly Windows would then be a few thousand dollars and then you would maybe only be selecting Professional Edition in most instances. Good for Linux/Bad for Windows.