Print - And Perception Becomes Reality: Vista Negativity Will Harm Microsoft, Analysts Say

I've been warning Microsoft for months that it needs to counter the unending swell of negativity around its Windows Vista operating system. But the company has responded in only a lukewarm fashion thus far, issuing the occasional whitepaper and carting out research and sales figures that say everything is just fine. Well, Apple's Switcher ads, know-nothing tech pundits and bloggers, and a growing consensus that Vista is just plain awful may just finally be having an effect on Microsoft: This week, analysts at Sanford C. Bernstein lowered their financial estimates for Microsoft's 2008 and 2009 fiscal years. The reason? Windows Vista.

"Support for Vista has been battered across all enterprise sizes and corporate constituencies," the report notes. "As a consequence, the Vista cycle looks likely to be materially less robust than indicated in our prior survey."

The Sanford C. Bernstein analysts lowered their fiscal 2008 revenue estimates for Microsoft by $49 million and 2009 revenue estimates by $395 million. Neither of these are dramatic numbers for a company the size of Microsoft. But the analysts believe that Microsoft's earnings per share will fall from a previous estimate of $2.20 to $2.17, which should be a bit troubling.

The analysts blame Vista's "overwhelmingly bad publicity," which, while undeserved, has certainly done much to form widely-held opinions with both individuals and businesses. Anecdotally, I'm often asked by friends and acquaintances about new computer purchases, and its striking how often I've been told that they're aware of how "bad" Vista is as they ask what they can do to avoid it or at least mitigate the problems.

The problem is pure perception, and the analysts note at one point in the report that "almost no feature of the new OS is now seen as a meaningful positive driver for adoption." Further exacerbating the issue is that Vista is a major Windows upgrade, one that typically requires new PC hardware, an added expensive that's hitting right in the middle of the worst economic climate of the past two decades.

Sanford C. Bernstein expects Microsoft to ship the successor to Windows Vista, called Windows 7, in the second quarter of 2010, about two years from now. Fortunately, they say that Microsoft is "well-positioned strategically versus its traditional competitors and in a reasonably solid position to fight off its newer rivals" during this time period. They expect Microsoft to bounce back when Windows 7 hits, and Sanford C. Bernstein has raised its fiscal 2010 revenue projection for Microsoft by $429 million as a result.

"undeserved" bad publicity my arse. The Apple ads are only effective because they ring true. Only the most radical WinJihadist would argue that Vista has been everything it could be, or should have been. And as far as "know-nothing tech pundits" are concerned, I'm sure the folks at PCWorld (who called Vista "the Biggest Tech Disappointment of 2007) would like a word with you. The report you're reporting on hits the nail on the head, though: "almost no feature of the new OS is now seen as a meaningful positive driver for adoption." Or to paraphrase Paul Thurrott: "Vista is awesome. There's just one problem: You don't need it."

Vista - wot a bag of bollocks! To say that Vista was a huge milestone was complete s***!Although saying that the idiots at Microsoft Arabia think its great - they are completely blinded by the dogma which is espoused by Microsoft Redmond!

Use Vista. Or don't use it. But bashing it simply is not fair. Strictly on its own merits, there's nothing wrong with Windows Vista. There's nothing that "doesn't work right." But in the shadow of all the promises and all the hoopla (most of it generated by Microsoft), Vista pales. It's like expecting a brilliant child and then persecuting that poor child when he or she is born ... normal.

Vista's negatvie publicity is NOT "undeserved" or unmerited. I have many laptops running Windows XP beautifully on 256 or 512 MB of RAM. I have had to up our Vista laptops, out of the box, to 4 GB RAM to get similar performance. Furthermore, our primary software vendor says their software is still not Vista-certified and it results in documents being mis-printed or not printed at all! Is that Vista's fault? I don't know, but I do know the app runs in IE 6 or IE 7 on Windows XP without any of those issues. So I ask, why would I upgrade any working machine to a platform that may or may not work correctly with our third party software AND will no doubt force me to upgrade at least the RAM of every machine if not also the processor?

If you buy new hardware with at least three GB of RAM, dual core CPU, 256MB or higher video card, Vista will out perform most XP boxes. Vista was not designed to run on the same hardware as XP... period. The computer industry does not want you putting Vista on old hardware any more than the auto industry wants you to put a new engine in your car. Think about it.

"the worst economic climate of the past two decades"??? Are you kidding? It was much worse in 2002 and 1990.

Give me a break! While there are some annoyances with Vista on occasion, it’s not a bad OS and since SP1 it has improved greatly. Give it a rest people, it does work, it’s solid and is not that bad on resources (if you have a boat anchor, it’s probably not a good Vista machine to start). My mid-range Toshiba laptop with 2GB RAM works just fine and I do dev work on it (VS2008, SQL2005, IIS, all the other Office apps and browsers). I restart once every few weeks and I don’t have any issues outside of crappy Toshiba drivers. My Dell 1720 works like a dream with Vista, no issues at all since SP1. I also do dev and Photoshop work on this machine and it only has a meager 2GB RAM. Vista is not for everyone especially corporate with custom apps that are a little long in the tooth. If I can run without issues with my power hungry apps, I don’t see how someone surfing the web or pounding out a few Emails would have any stability or performance issues as long as you have a current mid-range system with good drivers. So.. Please enough already. Perception will become reality as Paul wrote, because there are many gullible and uninformed people out there. Vista needs tweaking that’s not shocking but it does work and it is stable. If you like Apple products.. Good for you and enjoy them. I get my work done very efficiently on my Vista systems.

@lotsatrolling: ""undeserved" bad publicity my arse. The Apple ads are only effective because they ring true. They're effective because they're aimed at people who know little about technology and simply believe what the people in their little television boxes tell them. In reality each ad has a shred of validity to it at best. "Only the most radical WinJihadist would argue that Vista has been everything it could be, or should have been." Is it perfect? No. Is it a bad operating system? Not at all. Is it an improvement over XP? Yes. How's Leopard doing, anyway? "And as far as "know-nothing tech pundits" are concerned, I'm sure the folks at PCWorld (who called Vista "the Biggest Tech Disappointment of 2007) would like a word with you. " It's funny. For someone who's a self-proclaimed marketing and tech genius you really don't know much. PC World is a magazine put out by a publisher. Publishers are businesses. Businesses are around for one reason - to make money. Bashing Vista became the popular thing to do, including by people (such as a certain troll here) who never actually used the OS or went in with a pre-conceived notion about their experience. PC World's review of Vista means nothing more than PC World wanting to sell magazines. I know zero people who actually work in the technology field who read PC World or take it seriously. It's a rag that's designed for, well, people such as yourself who know very little about technology but think they know everything.

What can I say? This article simply hits the nail on the head. Who am I? I am the IT guy that has to live and deal with exactly this on a daily basis. My years in IT have now hit the two decade mark. My credentials to mention a few are: MCP, MCDST, MCSA, MCSE, MCDBA, ACDT, ACPT, ACHDS, ACTC, ACSA, A+, Network+, CCNA, HP APS, ...well I am sure you get the point. Vista has indeed failed in my personal opinion not only in delivering its promises, but as a feasible and usable OS in the industry. Back in the early days of the Apple OS, lets say v7, ...8, and ...9, I was whole heartedly a die hard Microsoft promoter. But then OS X came about, and the world began to change. Now with OS X a mature OS, and Vista reminding us that Microsoft never learned anything from its ME endeavors, Apple is indeed seizing the day. I have personally switched numerous friends, colleagues, businesses, etc., over to the Apple platform primarily, with merely a few Windows Servers and XP systems remaining for legacy software. I would personally recommend anyone today looking to simplify their computing lifestyle, to switch to the Mac platform. And what about Windows 7? Well, I am curious to see what Microsoft will be able to do in their efforts to win someone like myself, and those of you out there with me back over to anything related to Vista in any way whatsoever.

Vista is OK, but XP has been around so long now (almost seven years!) that there's no way it will ever live up to the hype that had been slowly building up to its release. Then there was lots of press about features being cut, questionable decisions to include Aero glass on old, limited integrated video chipsets from Intel, etc. My guess is that MS is trying to have more modest updates of Windows come out every 1-2 years, which is what Apple does, and frankly it's what they used to do back in the Win95/98/ME days. Good luck seeing Vista in the market for 7 years like XP!

jersey (isn't that the name of a cow?): "For someone who's a self-proclaimed marketing and tech genius you really don't know much." Nice argumentative technique, but it doesn't hold water. I have NEVER proclaimed myself a "marketing and tech genius". Don't put words in my mouth. The only self-aggrandizing jerk here is you, cutting down others as no-nothing sheep. However, your argument was nicely refuted by "tomhuff" above, who apparently IS a tech genius of sorts. You ask, "How's Leopard doing, anyway?" I'll give you your answer: "s it perfect? No. Is it a bad operating system? Not at all. Is it an improvement over XP? Yes." I should just ignore your ignorant rants, but really, you don't know me at all. Vista has been a disappointment, and it's not just perception or poor marketing. Sometimes the truth hurts, "jersey". Suck it up and deal.

@"lotsamystuff" - What. Waethorn is not around, so you decided to jump on jersey and use juvenile remarks after posting utter crap like the first post in this thread...Get over yourself and find something useful to do. --tayme

Oh, and before you ask what juvenile comments try this - "jersey (isn't that the name of a cow?):" or "The only self-aggrandizing jerk here is you" Enough with the "my d1ck is bigger than yours" idiocy...oh, and your comment about tomhuff and all of his supposed certs does not qualify as genius...certs only mean that a person is book smart...they have nothing to do with real world knowledge. That "Vista has been a disappointment" is your opinion...nobody asked you for it. --tayme

Numerous problems with Vista Home Premium 64-bit are not simply a matter of perception. For instance, in preparation for Vista I purchased all new components to be ready for Vista. Well over two-thousand dollars in components. Vista loaded nicely, but after that the ongoing, numerous, problems started. Everything from peripherals to wireless to ongoing USB disconnects. I worked with Vist for one year, finally gave up and removed the hard drive, put it on a shelf to wait until MS can get their stuff together and make it work like it should. Of course, this is just my 2c worth, and btw I have been a MS fan since MS Dos-3 and still remain a MS fan. Even though I have SuSE on another box, and XP on yet another, neither is a prime work computer. Someday Vista will get the kinks out and I'll reinstall the Vista drive back into my main box. In the meanwhile my main work box houses W-2000Pro.

I have a computer shop. My rule is that the customer has always right. Customers vote with they money for a product. If Microsoft estimates lower income because of Vista that means for me that they have understood that the result of their Vista project is far from a success. For a long a time I have a bad feeling that leaders at M$ has forgot that their primary target should be to satisfy their customers. Satisfied customers (users and admins) will bring more profit to the company. Monopoly position in the market is not enough today to be successful and monopoly position can erode because of unsatisfied customers.

I may not have over 20 years of IT experience but I am at the 15 year mark so, I’ve also been there (I started in the days of DOS and Windows 3.1). I have managed an IT department in a pressure cooker of a company for almost 10 years working with fortune 100 daily and now work in a gov organization with lots of public stations. I also see the development side of Windows and how it has progressed in the past 10 years. I’ve seen the ugly days of VC++ Windows dev (very ugly) and the massive steps with .NET over the years. Managed code applications are such a huge win for users even if they never even know what this is but the problem is that it’s all in the plumbing. What about the quality or suitability of Vista? The plumbing in this OS is better, the framework is better, the dev environment is better basically, the underpinnings are better than XP. The UI and the shinny wrapper, needs some tweaking. Has Vista failed? Not as a platform but yes in the sense that it did not win the hearts of users. It just is not the slam dunk it could be mainly because Microsoft should have kept quiet about the mountain of features until it knew it could add them to the OS and held back on the release until a few of the SP1 fixes were ready at product RTM. In the end, Vista was packaged incorrectly, it is an OS that has too much of the improvements under the hood. It’s the OS with brass plumbing and almost nobody ever sees it even most IT professionals. It should have been rolled out as incremental upgrades to XP (just like Apple did). By the way, Apple is seizing on the halo effect from iPod and grabbing mind share and successfully turning it into market share (that’s just good business). Microsoft needs to whip its Windows project managers and get a new marketing VP. Letting a competitor define your product never really worked in business, I don’t know what Microsoft has not realised that (is it nap time in Redmond?). Paul

I am curious.. Anyone out there that does dev on the OS X platform, can you tell me what framework is used? Is it managed code? Is it a C style language? Is Cocoa the main dev tool? Paul

Windows Vista is not broke. It works just fine and even better since SP1. I have been using Vista for close to 3 years. I participated in the beta and got the bits in Sept. 2005 @ the Microsoft Professional Developers Conference. What is broke are the poorly written applications that require a local admin. account to run. So it isn't about Vista it is about the applications that are broke. If developers had followed best practices for writing their applications for standard user, most of the issues would already be resolved. And for those waiting for Windows 7 - although Micosoft has not communicated much about the next OS, I think it is fair to say that the security model introduced in Vista will be carried forward and most likely enhanced. Paul is right, it is the perception.

OK... I am also a Windows Tech guy. MCSE working as a network engineer for 10+ years. I too built a PC just for Vista, and I too have had many little problems that have made me regret my decision to move away from XP. User account control is a pain in the neck. And please don't tell me that you get used to it... Every try to copy or move some files over another set a files? Vista presents you with a dialog box with a TON of text to read. You then have to click on one of these paragraphs, oh, and don't forget to click that TINY checkbox at the bottom of the window telling it to repeat this for the next 100 occurences!.... But don't walk away from the PC yet!!! (This copying takes about 10x longer than it did on XP, even WITH SP1) You will get at least one more of these idiotic dialogboxes when it asks you about directory replacement! Yes, I know these dialogs are needed, but they are WAY confusing for a non-computer person (My parents/In-Laws/Friends/Co-Workers)... I also use a Mac at home as my main family PC. I have accounts for the Wife and kids on there... AND I LOVE IT ! ! ! ! For a home user, I whole-heartedly believe that the Mac is the way to go, especially if you are a person who is not "into" computers... If you just want to to work, with no issues, easily, quickly, and logically... If it weren't for me playing games, (Which I am doing more and more on consoles... (I wish they would port WOW to a console!)), and for Media Center, I would switch to Macs exclusivly.

@"lotsamystuff" - Before you call me on it...you are right...By allowing posting on this site. Paul is asking for your opinion...sorry about htat... --tayme

Lets be honest the standard of coding in Microsoft products (except Server 2008) has gone right down the tubes. And yet those salesman (or should that be Microsoft consultants) still bang on about how brilliant Vista is! Even these consultants have told me that Vista was not MS best effort. I concur!

What;s most troubling about this article is tthat Paul, a journalist specializing in this subject, would take such a one-sided view of things. Evidently, those of us in the IT trenches can see there is more that just perception to this, Take your pick - lack of compelling enterprise features, poor marketing, heavy hardware requirements, or actual problems, Yes, Vista offers improvements and for those that can hanlde the above issues it's OK. That's just the point. Vista is at best "OK". And that is not just a perception jusding by the responses to this article, if nothing else. Sorry, Paul, but you really missed the boat on this one.

A sobering thought on this...there are more than 40% of companies / organisations who have downgraded back to Windows XP from Vista in Saudi Arabia. Another one..just attended a technology day with Microsoft - and there wasn't a single mention of Vista. Win2008, Exchange 2007, Windows XP, System Center 2007, Office 2007 and a plethora of other Microsoft products were discussed - but VIsta - didn't even get 1 mention - it seems that this product has been well and truly canned by MS. I would certainly put Steve Ballmer (who people don't realise - pushed to get VIsta out of the door with his usual gusto) and the developers of this product on trial for such a hopeless Operating System! Saying that Windows XP SP3 hasn't had the best of starts with it's numerous bugs! But that's for another day!

"Vista has been a disappointment, and it's not just perception or poor marketing. Sometimes the truth hurts, "jersey". Suck it up and deal." No. It's not just perception and poor marketing. It's also good marketing on Apple's part. And OEMs selling previous generation hardware with Vista preloaded. Have you ever tried running XP on mid-priced to low end hardware even from 2000? The performance is pretty bad. I replaced XP MCE on my main PC with Vista Ultimate some time last year. I did have some problems initially, but after SP1, almost all of them have been solved. There is no way I'm going back to XP now. So, lotsastuff, bonch is waiting for you. Go back to the basement so that you can admire your Macs together.

I'm tired with this "Vista is just fine" crap. Everywhere you read -- a blog, a newsgroup, sites, "social networks", etc -- you see people complaining about Vista. Talks with friends. Colleagues. Real people using it, not "just know-nothing tech pundits and bloggers". The positive comments comes from Microsoft and, uhm, Paul Thurrott. Maybe they know something that the rest of the world don't?

Microsoft will be permitted to supply their 85% market share with crap as long as consumers continue to support them, and the consumer protection in the USA remains as weak as it is. I need to run Vista Ultimate to support some of my customers. I also run Xp and 98 for others who have chosen to not upgrade. Ebay in Australia have attempted to force sellers to offer PayPay as the only online payment option on their site, and our ACCC (Australian Competition and Consumer Commission) has taken them to court under a restraint of trade order. Just because you are big, doesn't mean you are right.

'I replaced XP MCE on my main PC with Vista Ultimate some time last year. I did have some problems initially, but after SP1, almost all of them have been solved." WOW, there's a ringing endorsement. You should get Microsoft to do a testimonial ad featuring those comments. Great headline: "I had some problems; almost all of them have been solved!"

"You should get Microsoft to do a testimonial ad featuring those comments. Great headline: "I had some problems; almost all of them have been solved!"" you can't say that about OS X's security model though.... XP