Windows 8.1 box art, and price (for non Win8 users)

[rashdanml]

Personally, I see touchscreen ultrabook convertible laptops being the main goto option, combined with a dock to get the desktop experience. If hardware advances to the point where ultrabooks and desktop workstations are essentially identical (not exactly, but close enough for professional use), then that's likely to happen: you get the mobility of an ultrabook with the power of a workstation through the dock. 

 

PC gaming will probably be the only market to stick to a traditional desktop - until components are successfully miniaturized into small form factors. Odds are, ultrabook convertibles will come in two flavours: gaming and workstation. Meaning, even custom built PCs might become a niche market. 

 

Touch is definitely the future (hence why touchscreen ultrabooks would become the goto choice since it has the best of both worlds). Sure, mouse and keyboard is nice, and is great for productivity. However, with creative touch gestures, a lot of time can be saved. Touch interfaces haven't matured yet though, but it's coming. 

 

I'd expect ordinary laptops (thick, non-touch), and perhaps pure tablets, to disappear entirely. With the exception of niche devices like e-readers (dedicated for the sole task of reading). Rugged toughbooks would be another niche market. 

 

Desktop workstations might take on another form: Thin clients with the OS running on a datacenter (cloud/grid computing, basically). Minimal hardware on the consumer side, taking full advantage of cloud services for much higher computing power. Gaming could end up going that way too. 'Course, a requirement for that is Google fiber-esque services on a much larger scale. 

 

On the OS side of things, Windows is ahead. They've successfully unified the experience across all devices (well, not yet with PC, but hardware needs to catch up). OS X and iOS are heavily tied together - Apple claims OS X will remain for the foreseeable future, but I'm willing to bet no more than 5-10 years before it'll just be iOS. Android/Linux are in an interesting, and perhaps more powerful, position. Google isn't tied to any one platform, so the logical option is to release Google play services (as a software package) across all platforms: Android, Linux, OS X and Windows, perhaps even iOS - integrating all of your devices regardless of their platform through Google Drive. They've already started it with Android, where Android is largely the kernel and GUI and other major components, and everything else (apps, play services) are removed and replaced with applications - which are easily ported to various platforms. 

[Beskamir]

friend, friend, friend. the money is not funneling up to Bill Gates. Bill Gates is rich because he founded the company and he has maybe a 1% share in the profits of the company now. He is also rich because he invests wisely.

Oh sorry then my mistake.

Bill Gates drives a Ford, his kids don't have everything, and need to work for their money. Bill Gates and his wife is spending huge amount of money in helping people in desperate needs, including eradicating malaria and HIV

http://www.gatesfoundation.org/

More than 32.6 billion$ as of September 2012 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_%26_Melinda_Gates_Foundation) has been donated, mainly by Bill with 28 billion dollars.

Let not forget the grants that the foundation has given also: http://www.gatesfoundation.org/How-We-Work/Quick-Links/Grants-Database#q/sort=amount

 

And as you can see on this graph, Windows is not the main revenue of Microsoft:

http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2011/09/29/guess-who-generates-more-revenue-apple-or-microsoft/

Apple does overprice their hardware and it is the hardware that usaully makes money for them while Microsoft is mostly just a software company but windows and windows live are getting them about 5000million which equals about 5billion. So they effectivily made back vista's development costs in about 2 quarters (I could be wrong witht the time the X axis is a pain to read) however if they retailed windows for cheaper more people would be willing to upgrade each time. Why are people still using windows XP since it works, they might be lazy, and most importanly installing windows for a bunch of computers is costly and small busniesses can't afford to pay a 150-200 bucks per windows copy which means they get stuck with an old version. Also if your building a budget build an expensive os is the last thing you want. I'm sure that if there was competition, say google made a decent os that would be comparable to windows 7 and charged 70 bucks for it, Microsoft would have to decrease the price for windows.

[obsidian1200]

Aside from making more money, I don't see the point of singling out media center from the OS package.

 

I do like the new boxes, though. Nice and simple, just like the office 2013 packages.

[threadysparrow]

I don't think the average consumer could care less about a 2 grand display with 2048 levels of pen pressure. Unless this is some iMacesque pro-sumer device from Wacom, I can't see such a device existing for the average Joe Schmoe.

WAIT! Did you say 2048 levels of pen pressure? Well shit!!! If it's not at least 2049 levels of pen pressure then I'm out

[gauvinic]

October 18th

My birthday?!!? Not sure how to feel about this gift...

[silencerbob]

Keep in mind if u go from an old mobo with win 7 to a new mobo with win 8 you will have to format anyway due to UEFI BIOS changes.

[GoodBytes]

Apple does overprice their hardware and it is the hardware that usaully makes money for them while Microsoft is mostly just a software company but windows and windows live are getting them about 5000million which equals about 5billion.

Well the focus was on Microsoft.. the picture came with both chart. It was not for comparing it with Apple.

That in mind, this is revenue, not profit.

Microsoft has about 10 000 engineers working on Windows (the overall Windows package, but just the core OS, of course) with an average wage of 100k per year, without counting all the bonuses, health care, etc. that employees get, all payed by the company. A GPU, such as a new GeForce, you have about 1000 to 2000 engineer working, depending if it's new architecture or just an evolution (600 series to 700 series, for example, where both are Kepler architecture). Of course, the wages are also 100k per year average per engineer. Don't forget, HR, IT, building maintenance, marketing, etc, on both Microsoft and a GPU manufacture side.

Don't get me wrong, Microsoft still makes a lot of money, but that is what a business is. If you can sale a product at high profits, then why not?

You think the cables that you buy at the store, you are not being ripped off? The cable manufacture produces the cables for pennies, and sales it to you with high profits. Even if you go Monoprice in the state, which is, like the cheapest place to get cable, the company is making massive amount of profits. That's business.

If you have no profits, then it's a co-op.

But what I am trying to say, is that Windows isn't a free thing, and actually does cost a lot to produce.

So they effectivily made back vista's development costs in about 2 quarters (I could be wrong witht the time the X axis is a pain to read) however if they retailed windows for cheaper more people would be willing to upgrade each time. Why are people still using windows XP since it works, they might be lazy, and most importanly installing windows for a bunch of computers is costly and small busniesses can't afford to pay a 150-200 bucks per windows copy which means they get stuck with an old version. Also if your building a budget build an expensive os is the last thing you want. I'm sure that if there was competition, say google made a decent os that would be comparable to windows 7 and charged 70 bucks for it, Microsoft would have to decrease the price for windows.

Microsoft has already drop the price of Windows with Win8. It's cheapest Windows since a long time. People that have XP and not upgrade to 7 or 8, is not because of price. They just don't want to. They see is as complicated procedure. People simply buy a new computer and use the Windows it comes with. The percentage of people buying the upgrade is small. Plus, Windows XP machine today, isn't really Win8 compatible, if we are honest, and assume that we want a perfectly smooth experience, the system will have to be upgraded in some fashion (more RAM? new GPU (due to the GPU rendered interface)?).

Businesses can afford Windows, including Small businesses. That is not the problem. Heck they get Visual Studio, a 3000$ to 13 000$ software per computer, no problem. http://msdn.microsoft.com/subscriptions/hh442902.aspx

Small businesses are usually the first to upgrade to a new Windows. The problem is the large one, which have custom software solution which are specially made to not run on a new Windows, because they hired a software company (which are usually fired after the software is done), to make it, and wants to be contracted back, instead of developing the software in house, and maintain it. Plus you have training.

In small business environment, you can define as a requirement for people you hire, that you expect them to be on top the technology, and be able to essentially be your own IT to some extent, even if you work in HR, or finance, department that have no relation with computers. You don't have this on a large company (unless you are a tech company, and even then, HR, finance, marketing, etc... are excluded from this). Meaning, you have training cost, and that is significant. Also as they are public companies, usually, they need to assure that each quarterly results show higher and higher number.. basically always above expectation, else the stock goes at the bin. Look at OEMs, on how they make peace of crap now, desperate to maximize profit, with a market that is changing. Basically selling out their name, destroying the little reputation they had left. Dell did a smart move going private. Anyway, off topic.

 

Aside from making more money, I don't see the point of singling out media center from the OS package.

 

I do like the new boxes, though. Nice and simple, just like the office 2013 packages.

1- It actually drop the price of Windows 8

2- Its a 10$ add-on, which Microsoft makes no money on it (well absolutely minimal, maybe 1-2$ per sales)

3- Microsoft telemetry data showed that less than 1% of users used Media Center at least once, let alone playing DVD's

4- More and more system don't have optical drive, rendering the fact of paying for DVD codec pack license, a waste

5- 10$ to get DVD codec pack + Media Center (and the codecs to record/playback the format that Media Center uses), is still cheaper than other DVD codec packs from third party. Much cheaper.