Windows 8 Sales

Microsoft have announced the first month's sales figures for Windows 8. 40 million - Windows 7 sold 60 million in the first 10 weeks. And, to put those figues into perspective, the total sales of its only commercial competitor on the desktop, OS X, are 66 million. So in another month or so we can expect there to be more Windows 8 users than OS X ones.

Not bad for an OS that some are writing off as a failure.

I got windows 8, but got fed up of it after 2 weeks, so now gone back to windows 7, I have stored windows 8 on a DVD and the external drive just in case I go back to it one day.


40 million? um, i have my doubts to be honest and even if it is, would they have sold that many if the Os was at the same price was windows 7 was?

My windows 8 cost me, well not me, but cost someone £25, windows 7 was a lot more than that.

40 million? um, i have my doubts to be honest

There are laws about this sort of thing. A company official wouldn't be allowed to make that statement if it were untrue.

In reply to a post by AEP:

So in another month or so we can expect there to be more Windows 8 users than OS X ones.

Not bad for an OS that some are writing off as a failure.

A somewhat disingenuous comment... PCs have a much larger user base than the Mac.

Well yes, Bill. That's the point that I am trying to make. PCs, which almost exclusively run Windows, have a far larger user base than Macs. So it is very difficult for any version of Windows to fail. It's all a question of TCO.

But that an OS that has been out for only a month, and is being labelled a "failure" by some, has sold nearly 2/3 as many copies as the highly successful OS X ever has is significant.

In reply to a post by AEP:

40 million? um, i have my doubts to be honest

There are laws about this sort of thing. A company official wouldn't be allowed to make that statement if it were untrue.

Maybe so, but there are ways to manipulate the figures.

A article here may be interesting.

There'll always be a fair-sized initial take-up of pretty much any "improved" OS (whether the adjective is justified or not), it's staying power that matters.

I agree that it's too early to call Win8 a failure (and like you, I don't really suppose it will be), but by the same token it's also too early to call it a success...

Post deleted by flippery

it's staying power that matters

That's not really an issue with Windows. Most sales are with new PCs and it is only a small percentage of users who have the inclination to downgrade to a previous version or install an alternative OS.

As long as the desktop exists (and I think predictions of its demise are very much exaggerated) Microsoft have a captive audience. Now if Apple were to make OS X available for conventional PCs there would be real competition. But that isn't going to happen; they just don't have the resources or experience to support the OS on anything but a very restricted range of hardware. Let's face it, you can't even install Mountain Lion on Macs more than 5 years old. I would be very surprised if you couldn't install Windows 8 on any PC less than 10 years old, and probably on older ones too.

Edited by deleted (Wed 28-Nov-12 09:37:27)

Windows 8 is aimed not just at desktop systems, where sales are falling, but the mobile system such as Ipad as well
It is therefore unfair to compare windows 8 with OS X unless you bring the Apple IOS into the equation.