“Microsoft has informed some of its partners that it has had to delay Windows Mobile 7,” Ina Fried reports for CNET News.
“Although Microsoft has not publicly said when to expect Windows Mobile 7, partners who had expected to have a final release in their hands by early next year have been told now that it won’t be ready until the second half of next year, sources told ZDNet.com.au sister site CNET News,” Fried reports.
“The delay is a significant blow for the software maker, which has been counting on the next version of Windows Mobile to enable devices that better rival Apple’s iPhone,” Fried reports.
About “Windows Mobile 7, Microsoft has said very little publicly. Ballmer did make reference to it in a speech to enthusiasts in April,” Fried reports. “During the speech, he talked about how Windows Mobile would outsell Apple and RIM during 2008.”
Full article here.
Typical. Send out the clown to boast publicly, then fail dismally. It’s the Microsoft way.
In Microsoft, “late 2009,” translates into, “right around the same time as Ballmer’s retirement!”
Ha!
Obviously none could ever pretent that it could be a surprise…
You couldn’t make this up could you?
This first of many delays I guarantee it.
Why does their stock price never go down when they constantly disappoint?
With the iPhone eating market share like Pacman on a good run and RIM working like dogs to preserve their market share and Google Android stealing whatever crumbs are left, I’d say by the time Windows 7 Mobile is released, Ballmer is going to wish it had at least a Zune-size market share for Windows Mobile.
Say bye, bye. Windows, in all forms, is fading into the sunset.
The share price doesn’t go down on such news because most Windows purchases are made irrespective of any future technology promise or feature.
They are bought as a corporate license agreement by a company buyer that is purely looking to get the best short term financial deal they can. The licenses often include other technologies such as SQL, exchange etc. to hide the poor value that windows presents. These deals will go ahead no matter how many times MS f***s up or delays, because the deals have to be done on a certain date, not to a technology release timescale.
And if you don’t buy the licenses, suddenly you have to refresh the 10,000 or so PC’s with something else. No buyer would be brave enough to say…” do you know what, I am going to quadruple this years spend, on this perceived commodity and buy Macs”. They make short term decisions to meet their own ends, not looking at the overall perceived value and maintenance costs as a whole!
Mac sales on the other hand are more consumer confidence sensitive.
In the meantime the marketshare of windows mobile will drop to 5 % and below and with every day of delay Microsoft will loose more and more its opportunity to become a major player in the mobile space. It looks the same way like with the ipod, Microsoft try to copy Apple, but never can catch up, and so the software giant become and irrelevant niche player for all markets exept of desktop.
@Macintosh,
You said, “Why bother releasing it at all?
It’s just going to be Vista with another layer of “Touch” capabilities added to it. That will just bog down the already bogged down Windows boxes while tiring out the arms of all the poor saps that buy it and sit there poking around at their laptop monitors as if it’s some new amazing technology (in 2011).”
Actually its looking to be a lot more interesting.
1) Windows 7 will basically be Vista II but cleaned up a little.
2) They are going to dress up the Aero with touch screen capacity. Why, no one knows.
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3) They are going to take out e-mail, browser, etc and make that part of their “new” “.NET” experience. This will be the thing to watch. While it sounds interesting and could make the OS faster to load, less trouble, etc, I believe the real reason they are doing it is to try and make it seem like they are being more open while trying to tie everyone into their “web” future.
I would expect more lock-in hooks hidden in the software so while you think you can hook up on line, only MIcrosoft connections will work well. They can then blame the rest of the world for their hidden “hooks”. Hmmmm, sounds familiar.
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Just a thought.
en
Microsoft: Approaching infinity.
Magic word: looked, as in “It looked fool-proof when we started out.”
And so it begins – the inexorable slide into oblivion.
Let us not forget that Apple recently delayed Leopard for about 6 months.
Why do half of the people who comment on this article think it’s all about Vista’s replacement?
Windows Mobile 7 will not run on a PC.
RTFA
Just in time to compete wiith the next Symbian OS.
Their partners are quite clearly idiots. Why would they possibly believe that MS would release it when they said they would? What has have given them cause to think that it would be a remotely realistic target?
by second half they mean december 2009… or they will then announce when it should, hopefully, possibly and/or potentially be released.
Reading some of the vapor reviews on the PC websites says they are going to make 7 100% backward compatible.
Why do they persist with this crap. All their versions of windows has compatibility problems with the others. It is all a myth and a waste of time! They just perpetuate the idea that computing has to be hard and a challenge.
I am using VM Fusion and have a copy of Vista Business 64bit and yesterday they released SP1 and it came in at over 700mb. Took a year to download and install. My 40 gig for Vista is filling up fast!!
“I like our strategy; I like it a lot.” — Steve Ballmer on the iPhone
Keep up the good work, MSFT!