Windows 7 has sold more than 350 million licenses

[xxMATTGxx]

Microsoft revealed on Friday that the company has now sold over 350 million licences of Windows 7.

The software giant marked 18 months since Windows 7′s release by announcing its new milestone of 350 million licences sold. “The momentum we’ve seen and continue to see with Windows 7 is incredible,” said Microsoft’s Brandon LeBlanc in a blog posting. Windows 7 has been a huge success for Microsoft and recently passed Windows XP usage in the United States.

As of today, over 20% of Internet-connected PCs worldwide are running Windows 7 according to Net Applications. It was an incredibly successful year for Windows 7 in 2010. Microsoft’s success with Windows 7 began before the product was even widely available. Released in October 2009, the operating system has received praise from consumers, businesses and the media. In November 2009, Windows 7 managed to surpass Apple’s Snow Leopard market share in just two weeks. In early February 2010 it was revealed that Windows 7 had reached 10% market share in just three months.

Windows 7 has also driven an uptake of 64-bit computing. According to ChangeBASE research, conducted with senior IT decision makers, more than 65% of businesses hoped to migrate to Windows 7 within 12 months of its release. Over 50% of those migrating will be choosing the 64-bit route. Microsoft confirmed in July that nearly half of all Windows 7 PCs run 64-bit versions. Forrester Research revealed in November that 1 in 10 PCs within North America and European companies are powered by Windows 7.

Windows 7 celebrated its first birthday after selling over 240 million licenses in the first year of sales. Windows 7′s first Service Pack was made available in February and the company is currently working on SP2 and the next-generation version of Windows.


Link: http://www.winrumors.com/windows-7-has-now-sold-over-350-million-licences/


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Congratulations to Microsoft then! Windows 7 is one great operating system so not really surprised that it has sold so many.

[paddy140]

Yes well done to Microsoft!

[Michael]

Wow, what alot. Brandon LeBlanc having a nap in the money?

[AgnesIO]

Fantastic news.

Hopefully MS can be just as successful with many more operating systems, that will surely come in due course.

[Andy-]

Not surprised with over half of a people in one school have microsoft computers, and prefer them over apple due to it's softwares like Microsoft Word and PowerPoint etc. Good on them I hope they reach more sales.

[AgnesIO]

Not surprised with over half of a people in one school have microsoft computers, and prefer them over apple due to it's softwares like Microsoft Word and PowerPoint etc. Good on them I hope they reach more sales.

But the the majority of schools etc use XP, it is still hugely impressive.

[Recursion]

Awesome :O Will be moving work's network over to 2k8R2/W7 when we get our new server hardware in >=]

[Firehorse]

Nice one ms ;D A nice earner there too. (Whatsit they earn on average per license, something like £50 right?)

[Andy-]

But the the majority of schools etc use XP, it is still hugely impressive.

That's true the children may use Windows 7 but the schools use XP such as mine. Though when you think about how many schools their are in the country then per class etc it is still quite alot.

[Mr-Trainor]

Well done Microsoft :D. I really like Windows 7 :).


But the the majority of schools etc use XP, it is still hugely impressive.
Yea, my school uses XP. They have a lot of new laptops and computers which came with Windows 7, but they downgrade them to XP :P.

[Andy-]

Well done Microsoft :D. I really like Windows 7 :).


Yea, my school uses XP. They have a lot of new laptops and computers which came with Windows 7, but they downgrade them to XP :P.

I think they do this because most of the teachers won't be able to understand Windows 7 and it is really frustrating since when you type work you have to remember to save it as a 2003 file or it won't open as most people have 2007.

[AgnesIO]

I think they do this because most of the teachers won't be able to understand Windows 7 and it is really frustrating since when you type work you have to remember to save it as a 2003 file or it won't open as most people have 2007.

Most of my teachers can't understand Windows XP :rolleyes:

---------- Post added 22-04-2011 at 07:20 PM ----------


I think they do this because most of the teachers won't be able to understand Windows 7 and it is really frustrating since when you type work you have to remember to save it as a 2003 file or it won't open as most people have 2007.

Your school should get Office 2007 at least... that isn't because of your operating system.

[Firehorse]

My school is the worst, not only do we use outdated software (xp, office 2003 etc) but we also use RM. We don't even have photoshop :( (well we did for a day and then they decided to get rid of it for some ******ed reason).

[AgnesIO]

My school is the worst, not only do we use outdated software (xp, office 2003 etc) but we also use RM. We don't even have photoshop :( (well we did for a day and then they decided to get rid of it for some ******ed reason).

We had CS3 photoshop :l AND RM COMPUTERS WOO

[Suspective]

Well Done Microsoft :P

My School has both XP and Windows 7. The teacher's desk computers are all Windows 7, but the rest are XP. Hopefully they will upgrade them all soon. Even though we are still on Office 2000. LOL.

[GommeInc]

That's pretty impressive, but it is a pretty damn good OS so it's to be expected :P It's weird how Universities mostly use Windows 7 Enterprise (or one of those variants), yet schools still use XP. I think my college used Vista, but I can't quite remember :/

[xxMATTGxx]

That's pretty impressive, but it is a pretty damn good OS so it's to be expected :P It's weird how Universities mostly use Windows 7 Enterprise (or one of those variants), yet schools still use XP. I think my college used Vista, but I can't quite remember :/

My college seems to mainly use Windows XP at the moment but the machines the tutors have are Windows 7. I would rather ditch XP any day!

[Jack!]

My college uses XP, but is slowly changing over to 7 thank god, Office 2003 though :(

Think how many people have illegal versions of 7 too!

[AgnesIO]

My college uses XP, but is slowly changing over to 7 thank god, Office 2003 though :(

Think how many people have illegal versions of 7 too!

That would be equal to the same amount of *****.

Pirating an OS always seems quite bizarre. Not sure why

[The Professor]

My 6th form upgraded to 7 as soon as it was released on msdn, they're good like that. They even modified the logon screen with the school logo, not hard I know but they were generally incompetant so I was impressed :P

My uni still uses XP though, I suppose a couple of thousand computers is a ***** to upgrade when they've got XP working!

[GommeInc]

That would be equal to the same amount of *****.

Pirating an OS always seems quite bizarre. Not sure why
Especially when W7 wasn't exactly expensive and well worth the money :P

[HotelUser]

Especially when W7 wasn't exactly expensive and well worth the money :P

Vista being the worst thing next to IE the company has even done couldn't of hurt, either.

[Recursion]

Vista being the worst thing next to IE the company has even done couldn't of hurt, either.

Vista was a fantastic OS and paved the way for Windows 7, stop whining.

[Jack!]

Vista was a fantastic OS and paved the way for Windows 7, stop whining.

The advance's it made, Yes. But it just wasnt as refined as it could of been, And it was a bit of a resource hog

[Recursion]

The advance's it made, Yes. But it just wasnt as refined as it could of been, And it was a bit of a resource hog

In the same way Windows 7 is, yes. It wasn't a resource hog at all, people weren't used to their Windows OS caching applications in memory (the same way W7 does right now...) so they load faster. It's memory management was very good.

[GommeInc]

Vista being the worst thing next to IE the company has even done couldn't of hurt, either.
I found Vista pretty decent, a good advance from XP at least. It had so many problems at the start of its life, but the competition weren't any better. Vista didn't wake up from sleep mode and Snow Leopard (Leopard Service Pack 1) deleted personal data if logged in on a Guest Account. Both as hopeless as each other :P I updated a Vista machine which had never touched the internet in its life time. Each update improved it by quite a large margin, particularly the SP updates.

[Jordy]

It's certainly my view each Windows OS is better than the previous one (As it should be). Windows Vista was undoubtedly better than Windows XP. It wasn't the perfect OS, I had a few issues with it, all of which were resolved on Windows 7 but it was by no means unusable. The vast majority of complaints about Windows Vista were baseless and from hear-say/the media. I've no time for anyone who's installed Windows XP over Windows Vista.

[Markeh]

XP was damn good... Vista was OK. I never used to hate it, it was a good OS. Then I used 7. WOW.

[Recursion]

The issue with Vista was the hardware vendors not conforming to Microsoft's guidelines for writing drivers for the new OS. Many of them simply ported the XP drivers only, then it made Vista and MS look bad when things didn't work.

[The Professor]

I have no idea where the Vista love has come from and tbh it's the first I've seen on the internet. Windows Vista is like Windows 7 beta, its largely the same just more broken and doesn't work as well. I wasn't willing to stick with it for years while they made it usable and stuck with XP until 7 came out.

[GommeInc]

I have no idea where the Vista love has come from and tbh it's the first I've seen on the internet. Windows Vista is like Windows 7 beta, its largely the same just more broken and doesn't work as well. I wasn't willing to stick with it for years while they made it usable and stuck with XP until 7 came out.
After playing with a Vista machine not so long ago, there were loads of differences :P Vista was pretty decent - not perfect like 7 - but it worked well for all the programs I used. The only problem was with hardware, and that was more to do with the company behind the hardware than the OS :/

[peteyt]

After playing with a Vista machine not so long ago, there were loads of differences :P Vista was pretty decent - not perfect like 7 - but it worked well for all the programs I used. The only problem was with hardware, and that was more to do with the company behind the hardware than the OS :/

I disagree. From what I heard Vista changed too much and didn't really give hardware vendors the chance to be able to work on something.

[Recursion]

I disagree. From what I heard Vista changed too much and didn't really give hardware vendors the chance to be able to work on something.

No, it gave them a chance with the release candidates and RTM time before it was released to retail channels, hardware vendors simply refused to rewrite their drivers and instead ported them badly from XP, which is why it was so unstable.

[The Professor]

After playing with a Vista machine not so long ago, there were loads of differences :P Vista was pretty decent - not perfect like 7 - but it worked well for all the programs I used. The only problem was with hardware, and that was more to do with the company behind the hardware than the OS :/

My Dell laptop has been pretty bulletproof... after I took vista off and put XP on. Then I put 7 on it and lo and behold, it worked just as well. Even if they have made vista usable now, it's been obsolete for 2 years or so and waiting until it is obsolete to improve it is kinda pointless.

[Firehorse]

My Dell laptop has been pretty bulletproof... after I took vista off and put XP on. Then I put 7 on it and lo and behold, it worked just as well. Even if they have made vista usable now, it's been obsolete for 2 years or so and waiting until it is obsolete to improve it is kinda pointless.

It has always been useable for me, because I bought a computer that could actually handle it.

[nat965]

Impressive, Microsoft :) My school computers and teachers laptops are all Windows 7.

[peteyt]

No, it gave them a chance with the release candidates and RTM time before it was released to retail channels, hardware vendors simply refused to rewrite their drivers and instead ported them badly from XP, which is why it was so unstable.

From what I've heard Vista was rushed. It took so long that apparently instead of making people wait it was rushed out. I've even heard Microsoft apologise for this, so I believe it was more Microsoft's fault than the hardware vendors

[GommeInc]

From what I've heard Vista was rushed. It took so long that apparently instead of making people wait it was rushed out. I've even heard Microsoft apologise for this, so I believe it was more Microsoft's fault than the hardware vendors
Could easily be both though. The hardware companies should adapt to fit what their products run on. If Vista was rushed, the hardware companies would still be expected to follow the change and adapt - it's unwise for an organisation to sit back and complain about an organisation which puts your products to use :P

[peteyt]

Could easily be both though. The hardware companies should adapt to fit what their products run on. If Vista was rushed, the hardware companies would still be expected to follow the change and adapt - it's unwise for an organisation to sit back and complain about an organisation which puts your products to use :P

And they did slowly change. But I think from what I heard they weren't given enough time. If so much was changed xp to vista and they where given little time to update it, then no wonder there where issues.

[GommeInc]

And they did slowly change. But I think from what I heard they weren't given enough time. If so much was changed xp to vista and they where given little time to update it, then no wonder there where issues.
Depends what you mean by little time. I remember hearing of "Windows Longhorn" for years before Vista came out. At least, it may have been Longhorn :P

[peteyt]

Depends what you mean by little time. I remember hearing of "Windows Longhorn" for years before Vista came out. At least, it may have been Longhorn :P

Yeah I remember that to. But there's a massive difference between Longhorn and Vista. It seems a lot was cut out, a few stuff cut to get it out faster. I think by the time anything stable enough for hardware manufactures was released, with a lot of stuff added and a lot of stuff removed, they where given hardly any time to change what was needed.

I could be wrong but I did hear of professionals complaining about this, saying that so much was changed, like the whole code was re-written and everyone else had to try and quickly adapt to it.

[HotelUser]

Vista was a fantastic OS and paved the way for Windows 7, stop whining.

It was crap.

[xxMATTGxx]

It was crap.

You would say that about any Windows OS though. ;)

[Recursion]

It was crap.

You're a Mac user, your opinion doesn't count.

Snow Leopard was crap.

[Jahova]

Well done MS. By the way, Mac OS is crap, our bugless Windows 7 alongside the .NET framework is far superior!

*scoffs*

[sarcasm]

[Recursion]

Well done MS. By the way, Mac OS is crap, our bugless Windows 7 alongside the .NET framework is far superior!

*scoffs*

[sarcasm]

Soooooooo... how does Windows have so many more applications? How is it's graphics performance in Direct3D, OpenGL and DirectX far superior to that of MacOS'? How is it leading the market in OS share? eh? eh?

http://marketshare.hitslink.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=10

http://skitch.*****.co.uk/osmarch11.png

[xxMATTGxx]

Tom this graph is more pretty:

http://mattgarner.net/upload/images/1304208902.jpg

[Recursion]

http://paradoxdgn.com/junk/avatars/trollface.jpg

inb4 warning

[Jahova]

'twas a joke guys. I don't even have a Mac and I love Windows 7 to bits, although I do feel that it's still got some evil bugs hidden away.

[peteyt]

You're a Mac user, your opinion doesn't count.

Snow Leopard was crap.

Surely it does. I don't have a mac but both windows and mac has advantages and disadvantages and both users have the right to criticise the other. However at the same time it annoys me when people say its crap, its rubbish. If your going to do that then at least back up your reasons or you just seem like a fan boy of the other

[JerseySafety]

7 is the best so can see why it has sold so many.

Vista was crap tbh.