“I don’t think Microsoft will ship another Operating System after Vista launches. I believe that a combination of technical difficulties and changing markets will prevent it from creating a product that is relevant in the market. Consider this, if the latest shipping dates are to be believed, it will have taken Microsoft over six years to get Windows Vista out the door and to its consumers. And based on past events, it is safe to assume that Vista will require at least one service pack before it is truly ready for use. Of course, factoring in the normal Microsoft delays for producing patches, such a comprehensive service pack will probably take another year before it can be released to users. That would mean that it will have taken Microsoft 7+ years to make a usable operating system,” James R. Stoup writes for Apple Matters. “Now consider how long it could take Microsoft to produce Vista’s successor.”
“With Google threatening to release a web-based OS, and Apple potentially using virtualization to run all Windows applications, Microsoft might find that by the time it can cobble something together, it no longer has a market interested in its product,” Stoup writes.
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Not as far-fetched as some might believe.
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Be that as it may unfold, it would behoove Mac users that Vista successful. I love the Mac OS but if a better product came along, I would consider it. Also, Apple needs competition to remain at the top of it’s game.
I don’t care who wins the OS war. I just want to have the best system.
The post-vista operating system will be a brand new operating system. It will not work with pre-xp software. I might not work with XP software at all. I hate to say it, but with vista so bloated in what it can do, it is just a transitional operating system.
Seriously though, who uses programs from 10+ years ago? I have machines with that operating system to run those programs.
After Vista, Microsoft wil drop the entire Windows codebase and start anew from scratch. In 5 years they’ll have a new and modern OS. They will still call it Windows, but it will be totally new.
The irony of this is that it will be a copycat strategy. Hilarious.
If you want to look at OSX in a different way… Technically, we have not had a new operating system since the debut of OSX. Each release is just a different “service pack”. Apple just markets the name differently, more efficent, and quicker to release.
Of course it’s going to be the last one. Mac OS X (with name changed, perhaps) will be the next, because Apple is going to sell out to Microsoft
Vista will probably not be the last MS OS.
But it COULD be. It’s very POSSIBLE. That’s a point worth taking to heart!
Now, I don’t think there will be just a service pack, there will be multiple new Vista versions. Vista ME or whatever. Baby steps, like Panther to Tiger.
But will there ever be another BIG new OS version from MS?
Maybe in 5 to 8 years. Maybe, just maybe… never.
MS will survive either way, they’ll just transition into Office and other software, plus keep selling the final version of Vista to businesses for a good long while.
Look at Apple’s Mac OS X Tiger banner again shown in http://macdailynews.com/index.php/weblog/comments/9308/. Looking at banner, one first assume Apple is taking crack at MS’ delayed OS. However, could it also mean “Introducing Longhorn (Vista). Mac OS X Tiger”
May be there is no Vista. May be Leopard is the replacement OS that will save MS. May be what Cringley talked about in his article is not Apple’s WinAPI, but it is MS WinAPI running on OSX. Come January, may be we will see Bill and Steve on same stage again (or was Bill on screen) to announce the common OS.
Well…considering Apple bought their last operating system and there hasn’t really been a new operating system since Mac OS X, one could make the same prediction about Apple. Why mess w/ perfection will be used to many times to erroneously describe Vista. MS just needs to use the Apple scheme.
Release an OS, then add a .1, .2 , .3 , .4 to the name every 12-16 months so you can charge for a service pack.
There will probably be something like windows core # and it will have a nifty identifier like wc#, which all the drones will rename to something with marketability. A simple set of the high level APIs at their most advanced AND most abstracted (ex kernel extension extensions/plug-ins aka tiger) once they get developers hooked on wc# (cocoa for windows) and give it a few unique features (full support for transparency etc), then everyone will want new wc# apps. Finally, with their third part base transitioned they will be able to release the new windows + classic emulation system. Dropping classic emulation five years later and creating a few peaks in hardware sales. Every year it will be buzzword compliant for hi-def, HDMI+HDCP, they’ll even have HGPRSHSCSEDGE for wireless.
You know that’s what will come out of MS at the very least, so why pretend vista is it?
Fat chance.
http://musobs.blogspot.com/
I may be a bitch, but I can buy and sell all you dinks a hundred times over.
<warble> My Cash Will Go On… </warble>
I would bet 5 years of my salary that they are ALREADY working on the next version. Thinking otherwise SERIOUSLY underestimates Microsfot. They’re not #1 because they’re stupid.
Im offended that MDN deleted the Celine Dion post. If ever any truer words were spoken on this forum it were those.
is there any reason why Vista couldn’t have virtualitation? It may dealay the launch a couple more years. But since MS is already in the habit of following Apple’s lead, they may as well do it.
MDN Magic sarcastic word: Ahead
MS Vista: ahead of its time, ahead of schedule.
Windows rules… I will crush Apple
I think this has reality.
MS will either license the Apple OS or a Linux variant and build with that. They have to.
Or, copy Google in some Web-based OS (which I don’t get, but it could be the NEXT BIG THING, from what I read…)
Spark-Eat It
“MS will either license the Apple OS or a Linux variant”
MS cannot license Linux variant (I doubt MS will use anything with GNU license), but they could use FreeBSD (as Apple has done for Mac OS X).
I use http://ajaxwrite.com/ to write a Word doc the other day on a computer that had a hosed MS Word. Worked great!
“Why put out another (product) for 7+ years when you can milk your user base for the same crap for 7+ years and spend nothing but the initial development cost. Sit back and ride that cash cow.
That’s an old move from the Detroit auto makers. It hasn’t exactly been good for their market share.
What if MS had decided Windows 3.1 was all they could do & gave up then? Where would MS be today?
Any company that lazily milks the cash cow deserves to die.
MW: soviet?!?
This article falsely assumes we’ll still be using “computers” by the time Microsoft could release a successor to Vista.
My great grandchildren are going to find this article very amusing when they do an iBrainscan on it.
Hi kids!
Microsoft doesn’t have to come up with a viable successor to Vista. We already know that, in all likelihood, Vista will not be a worthy successor to Windows XP, nor is Windows XP a worthy successor to whatever flavor of Windows it replaced. 95% of the personal computer market is already buying Microsoft’s sub-standard products. Why should they stop now? Is someone suggesting that Microsoft’s next offering needs to be excellent in order to keep their customers? HAH!!!
Maybe Microsoft should switch to actually making windows. Though when they crash someone could really get hurt, all that flying glass!
It’s always funny to go through some ‘Tech’-sites on the web – it’s really shocking how few is actually known about OS alternatives.
Just read through a post on tech crunch that stated that the ‘new’ Windows Live web storage system’s gonna be the ‘first on the planet’.
Hello … iTools? Hello … .mac? We were there before. Who cares? Yes, you’re right – no one.
They don’t even know a thing about the whole picture, that there’s something out there that’s not Windows.
This means, on the other side, that Microsoft could literally sell these people anything, it’s going to be bought, it’s thought of as ‘the greatest stuff’ and it was, of course, invented by Microsoft.
Sadly, these people don’t have a clue about the whole picture.
And it will gurantee a super survival of any stuff Microsoft places in the market. I mean, every other company would have been kicked out of the market if they couldn’t develop any major releases for 5+ years.
These guys have ressources, and this will make them survive.
“Windows Vista to be Microsoft’s last operating system?”
….first they have to have Vista.
And that sarcastic comment came not from me, but was chimed in by my significant other who is a PC user. (Well, half the time these days.)
Anyone know what the hell is with those links?
It looks like an advertisement comes up. Boy, it is annoying.