Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Monday, 08 June 2009 16:25
Opinion and Analysis
Page 1 of 3
News of Best Buy’s Win 7 upgrade pricing leak, analysts suggesting a
$100 upgrade price for Win 7 Home Premium and Microsoft sometime soon
to confirm actual pricing lead us to wonder – what will Microsoft
charge for its shiny new OS?
The widespread retail availability and consumer adoption of Windows 7 is close, and even here now for anyone prepared to run the freely downloadable release candidate (RC), yet still around 5 months from actual in-store availability.
Although the beta and RC versions have been free for anyone to download, Microsoft isn’t going to make Windows available freely – or at least, not yet.
Computerworld’s Gregg Keizer
quotes analysts making educated guesses that Microsoft could price Windows 7 Home Premium from $104 to $117, Win 7 Professional from $160 to $180 and Win 7 Ultimate from $176 to $198.
These are, of course, “upgrade only” prices, which means that full versions would still cost more, be it 50% more, double in price or some other price Microsoft sets – and they could be much less than Microsoft is planning. It’s also in US dollars, which makes Australian and other worldwide pricing that much more expensive still.
But are these the prices that most people buying Windows 7 will really pay? OEM prices you pay for a version of Windows 7 when buying a desktop, notebook, CULV system or netbook from a mass market manufacturer will be much cheaper than retail pricing.
And what about “in OS” upgrade pricing through the “Windows Anytime Upgrade” system? How much will it cost to upgrade Windows 7 Starter Edition to Home Premium, Professional or Ultimate online? And between other versions of the OS to other levels?
Will it be the same as retail pricing, or much cheaper? If cheaper, a user could buy Home Premium at retail and upgrade to Professional or Ultimate at a cheaper price than their retail equivalents.
This time, Windows Anytime Upgrade will actually work worldwide instead of US only, and will start performing the upgrade right away, if desired, rather than forcing users to wait for upgrade discs to arrive in the mail first.
Talk regarding special upgrade pricing for all Vista users, let alone those who paid extra for Vista Ultimate and received a sub-standard set of Ultimate extras?
So far, it’s just talk, with conflicting reports ensuring Microsoft’s upcoming Windows 7 pricing announcement will definitely be a surprise, but only truly welcome if genuinely generously low pricing is announced.
For example, Apple has its family pack of OS X at a greatly reduced price. Why can’t Microsoft do this, right from the word go, at retail level even if desired, with Windows 7?
Why indeed?
Continued on page 2…
