Windows 8 cut-price offers coming to a close
Microsoft's cut-price Windows 8 offers are coming to a close, with the price of an upgrade to jump five-fold starting next month.
Currently, it's possible to upgrade to Windows 8 for just £14.99 if you bought a new Windows 7 desktop or laptop after the 2nd of June 2012. For those who want to upgrade existing systems that don't meet that requirement Microsoft is charging a reasonable £25 for the download-only version of Windows 8 Pro, valid for users of Windows XP or newer. Non-upgrade releases and physical media copies, naturally, cost significantly more - but with most machines coming with a Windows licence attached, the vast majority of the computing populace can upgrade cheaply should they so choose.
At least, they can if they do so by the end of the month - after which the cost to upgrade to Windows 8, the divisive touch-centric operating system which may have been to blame for ending a man's career, takes a significant upward turn.
Starting in February, the cost of a Windows 8 Pro upgrade package in the US will jump from $39.99 as a digital download to a whopping $199.99, while those opting for the less-capable Windows 8 'standard' release will be expected to pay $119.99 - plus a further $99.99 if they change their mind at a later date and want to unlock the features of Pro. The Media Centre Pack, meanwhile, will cost $9.99 to add back functionality, including DVD playback, that exists in prior versions of Windows - a small price, to be sure, but infinitely larger than its current price of 'free.'
Microsoft has always been upfront about the fact that its cut-price offers on Windows 8 upgrades would be coming to a close in Feburary, but the company's recently-released pricing shows a stark contrast between the company's approach and that of rival Apple which charges a mere $19.99 to upgrade to the latest version of its OS X operating system.
Thus far, Microsoft has not released post-offer pricing for the UK, but should it follow the same leap as the US price buyers can expect to see the £25 upgrade cost to Windows 8 Pro hit at least £125. While that's in-line with previous Windows releases, it will still come as a disappointment to those who had thought Microsoft might be reconsidering the high pricing of its operating system products - particularly in the face of reports from the like of HP's executive Vice President Todd Bradley, who told Bloomberg that Windows 8 has experienced 'a slower start than many people expected.'
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Discuss in the forums ReplyFill your boots while you can!
The only windows install I have that I wouldn't remove is my bootcamp partition for occasional gaming. It's running windows 7 and will stay like that. It certainly wouldn't benefit from windows 8.
while you're at it, throw a $bn at developing a free dx alternative
Oh, fark! I was going to buy another copy on payday, three days too late!
Thanks Gareth.
Someone will correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the upgrade is not restricted to upgrading Windows 7; it will also upgrade XP/Vista.
The sales figures are already low with the reduced price so it's going to be even harder to sell to people when the price has just shot up by such a stupid amount.
Then again, I'll be going for Win7 anyway
(unless there's a "Win8-SP1" that makes working desktop only possible)
At the moment I really dislike W8 but might get tempted to try it again later in the year, anyone know if I can buy this offer now as a cheap option to try later in the year?
Eagerly awaiting that to happen with W7 so I can get a copy that actually uses both my processors.
OK, it was my own fault for not researching SMP compatibility before I bought, but still spending $70 for an "upgrade" that gives me less performance just to get the free add-on I actually needed doesn't give me a warm fuzzy feeling. That and the fact that I keep pulling XP programs onto my W7 because the 7 flavored versions suck. :'(
Yeah, just me whining.
Might well take this up then, I'll no doubt want to try W8 again sometime before W9 comes out and this saves doing it the "alternative" way.
I get the interface and I can navigate around it quite well; I just don't like it. I keep wanting to poke the screen, even though I know full well that I don't have a touchscreen. Installing all the hacks/patches to restore a "proper" Start menu and make the desktop the default holds little appeal for me; I just can't see any practical benefits to making Win8 look like Win7 and paying for the privilege to do so, as opposed to just sticking to Win7. It's not like the move from XP to 7, as there would have been a definite impediment in me continuing to use XP: the latest version of DirectX would was not compatible with XP. If that happens again with DirectX 12 not being supported outside of Win8 then I'll have to re-evaluate at that point; I don't really want to shell out money at this point on pure speculation, even if it is only £25.
They already have: ChromeOS. And there's also a free alternative to DirectX which, incidentally, was around before ChromeOS: OpenGL.
Google aren't going to drop their efforts with ChromeOS overnight, so I can't see them building any other type of "traditional" desktop OS any time soon. Even if they did it would likely be based on Linux anyway (even if only a forked kernel), so there'd be little incentive to use that over A.N. Other Linux distro. Other than having Google's Chrome-centric UI, of course (the functionality of which can largely be replicated with apps for the Chrome browser - at least from what I've seen). I quite like ChromeOS, but there are other lightweight Linux distros out there that do the job just as well and offer more functionality.
I tried the beta and pretty much hated the Metro UI, but I have bought the upgrade version because I'll figure out a way to make it work for me. I still don't like the UI, and would rather do without it, but I'm persevering for now; if only to show friends and family a way around it in the future.
Having used Windows 8 for a little while, I can't shake the feeling that it's just a re-skinned Windows 7 - it does use windows 7 drivers. So, with that in mind, the upgrade is a cheap way to get Win7; sort of.
Then it seems that I have a decision to make, and soon - cheers for the heads up! :)
To be honest, I don't even know if any of the games I regularly play are even using DX11. What I'm really waiting to see is what Valve can do with OpenGL and Linux.
That's my point; I already own Win7, so - aside from DX11.1 support, which is as-yet unreleased - what advantage is there to pay for Win8 if all I'm going to do is hack/patch the desktop to make it look like Win7? DX11.1 support is the only thing that's tempting me, but even that is only based on the pure speculation that game devs start regularly using DX11.1. To be honest most of the games I play these days are indie titles which probably aren't even at DX10 levels of graphical complexity (FTL and Torchlight being my current time-sinks).
However, in my case, half the machines in the house are still running XP; so £25 a pop is probably a bargain.
I echo your sentiments BLC, unless I took a major shine to the UI, which is unlikely.
Two weeks later and I've re-installed W7. I tried to give it a chance, and I'm no beginner with adapting to unintuitive/intrusive OS UIs, but I never thought that Windows could sink so low. Horrific doesn't even cover how borked the Modern UI is for a touchscreen-less computer.
Massive waste of time, no matter how low the price.
You're not kidding; you certainly couldn't get an XP to Win7 upgrade for that price!
This.
Windows 8 with the default UI is obviously completely unusable for anything other than mucking about on a tablet. I'm extremely cautious about buying it for a video editing station such as this one I'm currently whacking with my fingers. I need, well, you know. The usual stuff. Windows and icons and menus and pointers, and some sort of file manager. Not a bunch of squares. I presume you can somehow get back to a normal desktop?
Nonetheless it's possible that some day someone will find a way to run After Effects under Windows 8. I presume I can buy it now, but stay with SaneOS until such time as I'm absolutely forced to go to 8.
OEMs own more copys of windows 8 than the Consumer does at this present moment.
All this is going to do is stop sales totally in there tracks in the consumer market.
I think you're missing the fact that the Metro (or whatever they renamed it) UI is just the front end. With one click you can have your normal looking desktop sans start button.
I have no problem with the looks of the UI - not my idea of pretty, but not exactly dreadful - what annoys me is the clumsy nature of it - look at the steps you have to take to shut it down with a mouse. It just feels unnecessary.
Sure I can mangle it and change bits to get it to do what I want but, straight out of the box, it's flawed.
Exactly, my start screen consists of a shortcut to the desktop and thats it. After that its an improved version of win7, and if I do get a win8 tablet down the line, I can re-enable all the metro cross platform stuff then.
You can, once i downloaded it and burnt it to disc i started a clean install and it works fine. Just make sure you have your serial number ready during install
I wont, because I am not buying it. Ever. (Well, until I build a whole new rig and have no choice).
Waiting for windows 9, or I may just give in an get a huge tablet.
Win 7 works perfectly well....before i bought that i used XP for maybe around a decade. Why do people feel the need to continually upgrade and pay micro$haft an amount of bucks that just is not necessary?
They supported XP for a number of years and in some circles still continue to support it until next year.
13 years folks.
On one OS.
What that means to me is that my operating system will be supported by M$ for at LEAST another 5-8 YEARS. This "upgrading for upgradings sake" is horrendously typical of the throwaway culture that we live in nowadays. They're relying on idiots being told that if something is newer, it is therefore better and they must buy it.
Personally, i am GLAD that windows 8 is not selling well because its about time we, as consumers, sent a message to
MomCorpMicro$haft about buying unfinished and unfit for purpose software.An operating system that feels like i am playing the bubbly offspring from an early 1990's tetris rip off?
yuk.
And I presume you are either kidding, trolling, or have been living under a rock for quite some time.
Seriously, though, yes, you can. Ars Technica had an article up the other day about alternative Win8 file managers.
Too bad to see MS is raising the price, but let's see if they stick to it when sales tank. I thought they were wising up and following Apple's lead. Like a few others here, I might have shelled out for it when it was cheap. There's not a chance in hell I'll buy a license when it jumps to $200
Like watching a PDF.
Or a Picture.
Or writing Email.
You can change the default programs just like in win7.
Pdf: desktop version of acrobat reader
Picutre: desktop version of Microsoft photo viewer (built in)
Email: I use outlook.com
The only time I ever notice metro is when I accidentally move my mouse to the edge of the screen.
Yes it's flawed. No, I'm not a huge fan. Yes, I bought the upgrade.
As I have previously mentioned, it is a flawed concept but essentially a re-skinned Win7. Calm down.
I suppose they'll earn, heck even Vista functioned.......ok at the end of it's lifetime.;)
You either buy the £25 upgrade or you don't. Simple? or do you need to get your tinfoil hat on first?
There is nothing wrong with the Surface RT either. I have one, and I love it. Some people just hate because it's trendy to, not because they have actually used the product.
W8. Not my cup of tea. I would perhaps consider it on a tablet though.
I don't even notice that metro is there! do people realize that they can chose to practically never interact with it? if all the complaining is because of that micro second it takes to go from metro to desktop on startup, then i'm surprised some of you did not commit suicide after using vista.
So far, I quite like it. It does run quicker than 7 I think.
Pretty much summed it up right there.
I'm not going to say that Windows 8 is perfect, it is a new product after all. I find it irritating however that people are slating the OS purely based on the opinion of others, in an attempt to sound vaguely intelligent. I keep seeing the word 'touch-centric' in forums and article comments (including this article in fact), but I don't see how this has offended so many people.
"THEY'VE REMOVED THE DESKTOP AND REPLACED IT WITH TILES"
...Wrong. The desktop is still there, nothing has changed in that respect. I can still see desktop icons (though I hide mine), and I can still right-click and see options, just like I did in older versions. They haven't removed the Start menu either, they've just removed the Start menu as we know it. As soon as you get your head around that fact that the Modern UI thing is just a full-screen start menu, the sooner you can get on with using it. I think the fact that it appears as soon as you log on is what stumps people. Just hit the Windows key or escape... no big deal.
"MICRO$OFT ARE FORCING US TO DOWNLOAD APPS FROM THEIR MARKET. I FEEL SO VIOLATED"
...Wrong again. As mentioned in the previous point, the desktop is still there. Therefore, there is no reason why desktop programs shouldn't work right? The 'apps' in the MS store are totally optional. The selection is pretty bad at the moment, granted, but we are in a chicken and egg situation here: Devs wont build because people won't use. People don't use because Devs aren't building. Like most people on Windows 8, I mostly use my desktop programs, and I have not come across a single program that does not work in Windows 8 so far. An exception is my Corsair headset drivers, where I had to run the installer in W7 compatibility mode to install the utility. Drivers installed fine without this however. If I want to get to a traditional desktop program, say for example Sketchup, I go to the Start menu and click on the Sketchup tile. The Start menu disappears and Sketchup opens.
"THE UI IS UGLY AND UNINTUITIVE"
...Well that's just a matter of opinion really. Unintuitive is a bit dismissive, though I agree that the shutdown process is more hassle that it should be. I fixed that in about 2 minutes with a shortcut to the shutdown command and pinned that to the Start menu. Honestly though, I don't see what is so difficult to comprehend when you are presented with a screen with squares which you click to open programs. Also, whilst I agree that the UI is good for tablets, I don't believe for a second that it is only good for tablets and other touch devices. My Windows 8 installation is on a home theater system, connected to a 42" screen. The start menu is perfect because I can see things easily without having to squint, or change the text sizes in accessibility settings. Before that I was also using this on a standard 19" monitor, and again I had no difficulties getting around.
Anyway, I'm too much of a neophile for my own good - must buy shiny!
I'm on XP...:D So I need to get 7 or 8 anyway for a new computer.
And I pay full price anyway as I cannot upgrade*, they cost the same, and Win8 has the newer DirectX.
*errrrr my XP copy seems to be somehow...invalid ;)