Serpentegena's Journal: HP facilitates Windows downgrade to XP

For a while rumors were circulated that because of the Vista (adoption rate) disappointment, Microsoft was quietly preparing to simplify the downgrade process to XP.

Well, today it turns out the rumors were pretty accurate, since HP announced, through a "field communiqué" to select partners that effective June 2007 through July 2008 they would be including an "optional" XP Pro restore media in the box for machines with Windows Vista Business pre-installed. HP/Vista Biz machines previously purchased will qualify for the same treatment by requesting the XP media from HP service.

They insistently advise you to create a Vista restore CD prior to downgrading, since "Most customers will want to restore Windows Vista(TM) Business in the future". KTHX. But according to a Microsoft downgrade rights FAQ, the "re-grade"(sic) to Vista is conditioned by the complete wipe-out of XP. Wai soe c0unt3r-in2itive, d00dz? Can't the user get a dual-boot system and gradually accomodate to Vista while maintaining day-to-day productivity under XP? Wouldn't that help your cause, which is ultimately shoving Vista down XP userbase's throats? -1 to Microsoft for getting hardware vendors like HP to actually roll this out for them - now good luck calling HP-INVENT and spending 45 minutes explaining the program to the customer service rep who didn't get the memo.

I wouldn't mind getting Vista just to try out - according to David Pogue, it would make great "training" for MAC OS which I only briefly used in the past. But in light of our (household's) recent migration to Ubuntu, it seems like a waste of time and CPU cycles when we should really be taking our new Edgy friend out for a spin. Wait a minute - MAC OS??WTF could this be a pathetic attempt from M$ to bid on the Apple userbase out there??

The whole Vista adoption saga reads like a tabloid column: the trashy, over-exposed bimbo(Vista) goes out to party and is booed all the way to the door. We have to wait for the post-rehab phase(SP 2?) to see something minimally put together. But really, do we have to bother with this sub-par POC "just because" it was churned out by Microsoft? Seemingly switching to Vista is akin to switching platforms altogether. I think now's the time to make a change, y'all.

Finally, just as a warning - HP customers patient enough to go through the "old" downgrade process have encountered the unpleasant surprise that newer, designed-for-Vista hardware may lack the appropriate XP device drivers, one of HP's NX7300's being the first example.

Hope this made some sense.
Legend: bold text - information regular text - commentary italic text - I'm just thinking out loud