Microsoft Sends a "Dear John" Letter to XP

It's not over yet - not completely - but it might as well be. On Monday Microsoft sent out a letter to its customers dashing any hopes of a stay of execution for Windows XP.

The letter (.PDF), from Bill Veghte, senior vice president of the Online Services & Windows Business group, re-affirms that after June 30th Microsoft will suspend OEM distribution of Windows XP.

Of course, we know that low-cost desktops and laptops (nettops and netbooks) will continue to be shipped with Windows XP. We also know that buyers of Windows Vista Ultimate and Business will continue to get "downgrade rights," which gives them a copy of XP that they can downgrade their PCs to.

We also know that some OEMs, such as HP and Dell, will allow customers to exercise those rights prior to acquiring the computer. Veghte's letter even outlined those programs (though I'm sure Microsoft wishes they would go away):

In addition, some of our OEM partners are planning to offer services designed to help business customers that buy these versions of Windows Vista on new PCs to exercise their downgrade rights. This is a great value because it lets you use Windows XP on new PCs today if you need it and then make the move to take advantage of the additional capabilities of Windows Vista when you are ready, without having to pay for an upgrade.

Naturally, many businesses have custom images for their PCs and laptops anyway, and re-image any they purchase, so you can expect corporations to keep rolling out XP computers for some time to come - perhaps until Windows 7.

The letter also outlines one of the biggest issues with Windows Vista: compatibility - in two different places.

... some small business customers may have applications that aren’t compatible with Windows Vista. In most cases, your software vendor should have an updated version of these applications. In the case that you still need Windows XP Professional as noted above, you can purchase Windows Vista Business or Windows Vista Ultimate on a new PC and then use downgrade rights until you are ready to upgrade to Windows Vista.

and

The architectural changes that improved security and resilience in Windows Vista led to compatibility issues with existing hardware and applications. Many hardware drivers and applications needed to be updated, and while the majority worked well when we launched Windows Vista, some key applications and drivers were not yet available. Since then, Microsoft and its industry partners have been hard at work to address compatibility issues and now the situation is fundamentally different.

If you say so, yeah.

One week to go until the XP era comes to an end (more or less).