Vista Use Grows as Mac OS X Stays Flat 387
jdelator writes to mention ComputerWorld is reporting that Microsoft's Windows Vista has increased their market share steadily every month while their main opponent, Mac OS X, has remained essentially flat. "According to Net Applications, in June Windows Vista accounted for 4.52% of all systems that browsed the Web, up from January's 0.18%. Vista has grown its usage share each month since its release to consumers Jan. 30, hitting 0.93% in February, 2.04% in March, 3.02% in April and 3.74% in May. Apple Inc.'s Mac OS X, meanwhile, accounted for 6.22% in January and hit its high point of 6.46% in May, but it slipped back to 6% in June. If Vista's uptake trend continues, it should pass Mac OS X in Web usage share by the end of August."
Wow, what news, MS outsells Apple! (Score:3, Insightful)
Vista Numbers Suggest Poor Adoption (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Vista Numbers Suggest Poor Adoption (Score:5, Interesting)
Give it another year and then I think you can legitimately say that Vista adoption is seriously lagging the growth of the market.
Re:Vista Numbers Suggest Poor Adoption... BtoS... (Score:2)
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I don't know about you, but I'm not shy about telling people that waiting until Vista SP1 has been tried and tested is a prudent move.
Re:Vista Numbers Suggest Poor Adoption (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't want to need anyone's "permission" to use software I bought. PERIOD.
And yes, it's more a matter of principle than any inconvenience suffered.
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The (Not Windows + Not Mac) has dropped from more than 5 to around 3% for the period which means that actually the numbers should read:
Mac on PPC dwindles, but does not convert fully to Mac on Intel. Quite clearly people switch to Winhoze instead.
Mac on Intel looks like generated from a mix of Linux, BSD, Solaris converts and some conversions from Mac PPC.
The real losers are actually the desktop Unixes. By far.
Very silly statistic! (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, many predicted otherwise (Score:2)
forced? more like encouraged (Score:2)
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That said, you are 100% correct that it's EASY to buy a XP loaded Dell. XP is a standard option.
The same is NOT the case at the local Bad Buy, Officemax, etc. where the only option is Vista, preloaded on all machines.
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Re:Very silly statistic! (Score:4, Insightful)
On the other hand, the absolute market share figures are still interesting. With Apple selling 15% of new laptops this year, it is slightly surprising that they only have a 6-7% market share.
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Also, among potential Mac switchers, it is probably common knowledge that now is not the time to buy. Let's wait until this time next year, after Leopard has started to settle in and more people have gotten frustrated by Vista. We could see a very different picture.
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Oh pull the stick out of your ass and relax. I don't think that was meant as a personal attack. It is true that most people don't really know or care much about the differences between XP and Vista. This doesn't imply that they're
"ignorant" in a pejorative sense. It just means they don't care or
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http://www.macobserver.com/article/2004/01/15.15.
In three years they have doubled their share. If they can keep this pace they may be able to hit 10% in another three years.
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Re:Very silly statistic! (Score:4, Insightful)
I run windows from time to time... but I run it in a sandbox on my Mac. Linux too. So every time someone counts my windows or my linux, it's really counting a Mac anyway. :-)
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And Windows users buy PCs more often (Score:5, Interesting)
Macs, on the other hand, tend to be kept a lot longer. There are a good number of folks with 5-6 year old Macs that are still happily using them. Every one of those six-year-old macs means that Apple has 1/2 the OS sales (per user) as Windows.
That's why I'm baffled by the spurrious price comparisons between Macs and Windows PCs. Sure my PowerBook cost 25% more than your Dell. But in three years, when you send your Dell off to laptop heaven (or more likely, if it's Dell, laptop hell) my PowerBook will still have at least three years of useful life left. Making your 25% "savings" actually a loss.
Re:And Windows users buy PCs more often (Score:4, Insightful)
The point is that I don't see how a Mac laptop inherently has three more years of life. From what I hear anecdotally the internal hardware is pretty much the same these days. As far as the software goes, my laptop will run Vista adequately if not well, and you could say the same of a three-year-old Apple laptop and Leopard.
Re:And Windows users buy PCs more often (Score:5, Informative)
MacBook midrange white @ $1,299
Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger
2.16GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
1GB 667 DDR2 SDRAM - 2x512
120GB Serial ATA @ 5400 rpm
XGA 1280 by 800 (native) TFT display with built-in iSight
SuperDrive 8x (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW)
Dell XPS M1330 white @ $1,474
Intel Core 2 Duo 2.0GHz/800Mhz FSB, 4MB Cache
Windows Vista Home Premium Edition
XGA Standard Display with 2.0 Megapixel Webcam
1GB Shared Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 667MHz
120GB SATA Hard Drive (5400RPM)
CD/DVD burner (DVD+/-RW Drive)
The Dell has slightly better graphics capability and the Mac has a slight CPU advantage, but the point is the old bunk argument about how expensive Macs are is indeed just bunk. It doesn't matter if PC users chuck their rigs sooner or not- the Macs are less expensive than their brand name PC counterparts nowadays.
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I think, though, that he meant upgrade the box, not the OS.
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I suggest that any mac user that has thought about upgrading their OS in the last six months is probably holding off until later this year when Apple releases a shinny new OS to upgrade to. Unless you bought a new mac, I can't think of a reason why you'd go buy a copy of OS X right now.
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In other news more Mac users upgraded from MacOS 9 to MacOS X, while Windows users didn't bother.
What a silly comparison (Score:5, Insightful)
OSX has been around for a long while now, so it is hard to expect sudden changes.
What would make far more sense would be to compare Vista + XP vs OSX. That would give a far better MS vs OSX comparison.
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What, like, they stay pretty much constant?
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You must be new here.
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Microsoft need not worry about OS X, they need to worry about Windows ME all over again. Maybe users don't like DRM, spyware, and inequitable licensing terms after all, but I suspect Microsoft will end up blaming multiple versions co
Misleading sensationalism, as usual (Score:5, Insightful)
There is, really, nothing to see here. Yawn.
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1. Apple is consistently top-5 against all other brands sold. It varied from 3-to-5 when I saw the numbers.
2. #1 in laptop sales in the U.S.
What would be *far* more interesting to track is the financial performance PC brands like Dell and HP do as Vista ramps up. I predict they will do very badly as mi
There is a story here and the Register got it. (Score:5, Interesting)
We were just talking about how browser stats are useless [slashdot.org]. The only hard use number so far comes from disappointing memory sales [slashdot.org], and M$'s bottom line [slashdot.org] which show Vista is not being used much.
The real story is that the upgrade train is out of steam. M$ introduced both a new OS and a new office suit without a real change their bottom line [theregister.co.uk]. Their market is stagnant and will only decline as people get sick of XP and see Vista as even worse. The tipping point has arrived.
AC inverse logic strikes again. (Score:2)
you're trying to dispute the trend with a single data point.
Au contraire, the fine article is trying to establish a trend with a single botched number. I've disputed that number and given you two others, M$'s bottom line and RAM sales, which both make the same point.
Until somebody can show hard numbers indicating that Linux is displacing XP installs at a greater rate than Vista, however, I'm afraid the inevitable Year of Linux will have to be postponed. Again.
As more PC makers start pushing out $200 [engadget.com]
Re:Misleading sensationalism, as usual (Score:4, Interesting)
<code>
Month XP+2K+Vista MacOS + Intel
July, 2006 90.39% 4.29%
August, 2006 90.72% 4.33%
September, 2006 90.70% 4.72%
October, 2006 90.50% 5.21%
November, 2006 90.52% 5.39%
December, 2006 90.46% 5.67%
January, 2007 90.13% 6.22%
February, 2007 90.01% 6.38%
March, 2007 90.32% 6.08%
April, 2007 90.09% 6.21%
May, 2007 90.07% 6.46%
June, 2007 90.46% 6.00%
<code>
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oh damnit
Re:Misleading sensationalism, as usual (Score:5, Interesting)
"Likewise, Vista's increases have come at the expense of Windows XP and Windows 2000, both of which have dropped in usage since January. Windows XP, for instance, accounted for 85.02% of all machines that month but was down to 81.94% in June. Windows overall total has remained flat, ranging between 90.01% and 90.46% through the first six months of the year."
You DID read the article before posting didn't you? Oh wait, I almost forgot, this is Slashdot.
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They all have ipods and couldn't wait for the iphone to come out. They'd rather scratch their eyes out than use a wintel
computer. Apple should just kiss them all goodbye and make ipods and phones. That makes a whole lot of sense.
Lets alienate our core consumers that are willing to pay ABOVE MARKET prices for our hardware!
D
forced purchases? (Score:3, Insightful)
Exactly (Score:2)
Subtract the OEM numbers and then let's compare Vista growth. I want to know how Vista stacks up with people who have a choice. If all OEM's offered Ubuntu machines and those machines reflected the true price difference, then how does MSFT do?
I don't doubt Vista will turn out to be a pretty good OS. I believe MSFT will sort out the driver issues and some of the early troubles. My question is not if it will be better, my question is whether it's so much better that it justifies the price difference?
My
Re:forced purchases? (Score:5, Informative)
Maybe you just [sun.com] aren't [system76.com] looking [dell.com] hard enough.
Re:forced purchases? (Score:4, Insightful)
If you can't see the problem of paying $5000 for a desktop from someone you've never really heard of before then you're way out of touch with the common man.
At least the $2000+ Apple desktops benefit from the long track record (for better or worse) that Apple has in consumer computing.
Sun might as well be LG. Actually, LG would at least be a name people might recognize.
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This is hardly a valid analysis (Score:4, Informative)
I got news for you. (Score:2)
Neither Vista nor Office 2007 made a difference to M$'s bottom line. They have nowhere to go but down to the market share their third rate software and bad attitude deserve.
Why is this even news? (Score:4, Insightful)
Back to School, Beyotches (Score:5, Funny)
Not that I care. I've given up advocating Mac OS X. Let Windows keep its monopoly so all the virus writer's choice remains clear. The rest of us can enjoy an easier existence. It's like going into the mosquito swarm with a fat, naked friend. Go get'em! Have fun downloading your latest virus definition file, suckers.
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I'd just add that I've got all the people who call me for tech support running OS X.
misleading (Score:4, Interesting)
Gee I wonder why (Score:2, Insightful)
Naturally (Score:4, Funny)
Apples and Elephants (Score:3, Informative)
They cannot be directly and meaningfully compared on a month-to-month basis.
If Vista's uptake trend continues... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm curious to see how the release of Leopard will change these numbers, I know I'm waiting to buy a mac (replacing my PC, I already have an ibook, not that you care.) until after Leopard.
Isn't this a bit of a stupid comparison? (Score:2, Insightful)
Does not show all OS X users (Score:2, Interesting)
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Come on, Firefox has 15 percent market share among the general internet population and much much more among even halfway tech literate people - if you shut these out, you can shut down your site as well.
Face it: only the stupidest dork webmasters still shut out Firefox a
I call BS (Score:3, Insightful)
To further skew the results, some users are upgrading from Windows XP, there isn't a new version of OS X out yet, so why would people be upgrading to it? It just doesn't make any sense. MS isn't gaining any new users here, while Linux and Mac obviously are. Whats with the BS?
Could this be due to the fact that (Score:2)
Not news (Score:2)
read that again. TFA states early on the rate of conversion to Apple's new format, but fails to classify this as growth, only classifying growth as ne
Duh. (Score:2)
Any new brand will rapidly increase market share compared to any other long standing one... well except maybe the Zune.
So? (Score:4, Insightful)
Also, "percent of web pages browsed" sucks balls as a statistic, since it only covers select websites, doesn't take into account some blocking and privacy techniques, ignores user-agent spoofing, and assumes everyone browses the web at the same rate of pages/machine/day. Now some of that (not a lot of UA spoofing really, and web-browsing rates are probably similar) is not a huge deal, but some of it (which web pages are covered) really is.
Interesting numbers (Score:2)
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I'm sure there's a decent number of raindrops hitting the ocean, but i don't think that they matter much when measuring how much water is already in the ocean..
Oops (Score:5, Funny)
Duh? (Score:2, Insightful)
iPhone (Score:2, Interesting)
but I doubt anyone using that would ever go back to windows. I wouldn't.
And it wouldn't really have an impact unfortunately.
I would however change my Tiger for a Leopard when it comes out, and add a notebook to boot. Can someone
give me the sites which are being watched; I'll just add some script visiting every one of those
sites with my Linux and OS X machines. Bye bye windows
I also wonder whether the iPhon
Umm, wha? (Score:2)
I'm sure this has already been said... (Score:2, Insightful)
Obligatory Ubuntu Comment (Score:2)
Leopard (Score:2)
I'm waiting until Leopard to get a new Mac, and would expect others to also intentionally NOT buy a new Mac soon. on the other hand, I'm already a Mac user and would not count as growth when I do upgrade (except that I'll then have 2 instead of 1). but I think a lot of people
Statistic: IQ average is 100 (Score:2)
Leopard (Score:2)
Good grief (Score:3, Interesting)
Mac fanboy and proud of it (It dual boots Gentoo so phtsssst!)
Is this what passes for windows FUD these days? (Score:3, Funny)
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Kids today get all worked up about stepping in a little cowpat. We didn't take any notice of anything until we had to wave our hat over our heads to keep it clean.
Err... Explains a lot about the way things are today, I guess.
So the ACTUAL news is... (Score:5, Funny)
I'm no anti-MS crusader at all (death to the tyranny of Unix is more my motto) but to be fair, now, that's the real news.
Also I am SO DRUNK you would not believe it. Really, it's disgusting and even a bit scary. To give you some idea I drank a bottle of wine using ond of those 'shooter' things. And that was the start of the evening.
And yet, even *I* can see that Vista uptake, while not disastrous, is notable more for its slowness than for anything else. Maybe it will work out for MS, maybe not, but either way this aricle is bekeeen fearmongering and outright trolling.
Also, and I lie to you not, my
God this post is embarrassing.
Re:So the ACTUAL news is... (Score:5, Funny)
Mac Market Reached Its Growth Limit (Score:2)
who knew? (Score:3, Insightful)
Linux share grows 60% from July 2006 to June 2007 (Score:3, Funny)
It's also worth noting (Score:3, Insightful)
Finally, starting this month through December, Apple is rolling out new mini-apple stores inside of 1/3 of the US's Best Buy stores(over 300 stores in total), which is dramatically going to increase their market exposure. Anyway, I agree, it's silly to compare the two because at no time in the near to foreseeable future is Apple going to post higher marketshare numbers than Windows. That said, I'd expect between this august and the first part of next year to see a steady, if not dramatic, increase in Mac marketshare.
In other news... (Score:3, Insightful)
Sheesh. This is "news" now?
Also, the methodology used for this statistic is telling: "web visitors." The user's OS is becoming so inconsequential that it is measured in terms of people using said operating systems merely to access cross-platform, web-based applications.
New computer sales and MOLPS (Score:4, Informative)
1 - New pcs come with vista, more pcs are sold then mac.
2 - molp holders need to start upgrading per their agreement. ( and even if they havent yet, when they renew its considerd a 'vista sale' on microsofts books )
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Dont be too sure. If my parents bought a new PC with Vista on it, You bet the first thing they would do is phone me to "fix" it - meaning reinstall Win2k - so they can get it to work..
Of course, if they asked me first, I would tell them to get a Mac to avoid those irritating unpaid support calls.
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Your assumption is that a significant number of people change the headers sent by thier browser of choice. Somehow, I seriously doubt that those people are significate in this study.
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Math challenged FA (Score:5, Insightful)
The whole thing is based on brain damage anyway. Growth isn't measurable by percentage of systems in a dynamic market.
For instance, in a given month say there were 100x systems in use, 75x of which ran windows, and 25x of which ran OSX. Next month, there were 200x systems in use, 150x of which run windows, and 50x of which ran OSX. In both cases, using the article's flawed reasoning, windows is 75% and OSX is 25% so there is no growth for either platform; but the fact is that both systems grew 100%, as there are twice as many of both types of systems in use by month two. Both manufacturers and their investors, etc., would have every reason to celebrate.
That's why using percentages of market is a bankrupt strategy to measure product growth in a dynamic market (which PC's certainly are), and always will be. The question is, are there more systems using the product in question now, than there were the last time one looked? If there is, then the product is growing. If not, it isn't. Doesn't have squat to do with shared percentage as measured against another product.
Nothing to see here.... (Score:5, Interesting)
Yup, just like they have for the last twenty years. 95% +/- a point or two of new machines sold have been preloaded with whatever Microsoft wants and that isn't likely to change until the Redmond Empire falls. This slow uptake of Vista looks like it is almost entirely being driven by the hardware replacement cycle. Actually this sounds slower than that cycle, makes me wonder just what percentage of new hardware is still being shipped with XP. That should be the headline but the author/publication is obviously a Microsoft Media Whore and they spun it into something positive.
Seriously, ALMOST beating OS X's 6% market share when you are a predatory monopolist who has been cramming Vista down vendor's throats for six+ months now isn't something to be proud of.
Nothing to see here, move along.
Re:Nothing to see here.... (Score:4, Insightful)
No doubt. It's a given that Vista's use will increase, duh. And when the summery says this:
"[OS X] hit its high point of 6.46% in May, but it slipped back to 6% in June."
What are they implying? That OSX users suddenly abandoned their Macs and switched to Vista or other?
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I think all this shows is that when the summer comes, OS X users tend to spend more time outside, and less in front of a web browser.
Re:Nothing to see here.... (Score:4, Insightful)
This sort of story should not be on slashdot, even as a 'look how stupid they are' type thing.
Re:Nothing to see here.... (Score:4, Insightful)
Here's a better comparison for you - MS hasn't entered a new market sector profitably in YEARS, Apple has done so repeatedly.
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And that's just me. If HP, Asus or anyone sold OSX machines (for the usual price of equivalent Mac minus 50%) they'd be selling so many OSX licenses that it would more than make up for the loss of Mac sales. Apple does not sell enough ma
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