Microsoft's Windows 7 pretzel takes fresh twist
Europe liberated with upgrade prices
Ensure Ease of Recovery with Asigra’s Agentless Software
Microsoft's tortured stance on Windows 7 in Europe continues, with the company circling back on packaging and pricing.
Having killed the planned Windows 7 E spoiler edition it unveiled for Europe, Microsoft's announced packaging and pricing in line with other worldwide markets.
Windows 7 E was the version of Microsoft's planned operating system it devised, and then strangled ahead of birth, that would have shipped without Internet Explorer 8.
The idea was, according to Microsoft, that doing so would let it stay within European Union anti-trust law.
However, PC-buying customers in EU countries would only have been eligible for new copies of Windows 7 E and would not have been able to buy upgrade versions from Windows Vista.
On Monday, though, Microsoft said pricing, upgrades, and the planned Family Pack would all be made available in EU countries as per other markets.
That means that customers in the UK and other EU states can place pre-orders for the upgrade edition of Windows 7 from September 1 on, at the price announced in June of £79.99. That price was announced after Microsoft said it would ship Windows 7 E.
Also, Microsoft said customers could get full copies of Windows 7 - not upgrade editions that rely on the fact that you have Windows Vista or XP on your machine - at that upgrade price. The price of Windows 7 Home Premium, for example, is £149.99 new.
It's not entirely clear why Microsoft couldn't have made the offer of full copies of Windows 7 at upgrade prices before Monday's announcement.
This offer runs from today until next Monday, August 31.
If you want to upgrade from Windows Vista Home Premium to Windows 7 Home Premium between September 1 and December 31 you can get the upgrade at £79.99.
If you already pre-ordered the full version of Windows 7 E in the EU as part of special pre-order offers or some other offer - you will get a full version of Windows 7. ®
COMMENTS
@censored
"At £80 I'd probably have bought it. At £150 there's no chance, so if I need it I'll get a cracked copy."
It's £64.99 on Amazon until the end of the month - link on the homepage of Amazon.co.uk. According to Amazon: "This version of Windows 7 ships as a full edition, suitable for both new Windows users and Windows Vista users looking to upgrade."
There you go - a full copy for £15 cheaper than you would "probably have bought it" - go get it! I have; it's a lot less hassle than trying to find every way round the inevitable "you're using an illegal copy of windows" annoyances.
1%
@AC14:28
Its a tech magazine
generally the more advanced a user - the more likely they have tried multiple os's and therefore you do tend to get a lot of linux users on tech sites
(NOT that all advanced users are linux users mind)
so although it may only be 1% of all desktops run linux
linux users usally make up high numbers on tech sites
BTW the ps3 allready runs yellow dog linux
even as a gnu/linux user I do often find the fanboyism irratating as hell but frankly
I consider most ,if not all "my os is better than yours" purile dick waving.
==============================================
The price of win7 doesnt appear too bad and despite my freetardidness Im going to have to buy a copy so I can support my family , friends + neighbours when their problems will inevitebly occur - pity about the IE-free version - Its usailly the first thing I get rid of on a fresh XP install
as my wife once quipped : whats the one use for IE? - downloading firefox!
I hate these comment pages
honestly, why of why oh why does every single article's comment section end up about linux? why is there always some tosser saying something about linux? No-one cares! Linux is completely irrelevant - 1% of desktops use it, yet every comment section I seem to read has some loser going on about linux! The other day there was an article about the PS3, and lo and behold, some gimp was spouting on about how linux can't be installed on it and how that is a huge "FAIL" for sony. As if anyone gives a shit! I really wish there was a filter on the word linux, honestly. I might even make a Firefox add-on that blocks comments with the word "linux", "GNU", or "dildo". How much noise can 1% of the people who visit this site make?!?!?
Linux - you can't give it away.
IT infrastructure monitoring strategies
Agentless Backup is Not a Myth
Top 10 SIEM implementer’s checklist
Steps to Take Before Choosing a Business Continuity Partner
Enabling efficient data center monitoring
