News - Microsoft has sold 200 million Windows 8 licences in 15 months

[HEXUS]

The troubled OS thus undershoots Windows 7's 12 month tally by 40 million.

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[Guy]

Actual number of licences in use or 'sold' to OEM's and retailers...

[aidanjt]

Actual number of licences in use or 'sold' to OEM's and retailers...

The latter, no doubt.

[shaithis]

Regardless of the hows and whys, they have to be quite happy with selling that many after the reception it had and the decline in PC sales.

[Corky34]

The lower uptake when compared to 7 is even worse when you take into account that 8 has been optimised to run on more device than 7, particularly the very same tablets and smart phones that are oft-cited as the reason for the decline in PC sales.

[whitetop]

90% sold to oem makers 10% pirated

[kompukare]

90% sold to oem makers 10% pirated

Who in their right mind would pirate Windows 8?

What was the old unofficial Microsoft saying? If you aren't going to buy our software, we'd rather you pirated our software than use somebody else's...

[semo]

I just bought a value range Lenovo with Win8 on it and was planning to install an SSD on it. Normally, I would use the machine to create a recovery media and then use it to restore the machine to the factory image after the SSD upgrade. Failing that, I could always download the latest .iso from digital river and then install the OS using the OA sticker on the computer.

Well, you can't make recovery media with Lenovo's one key software anymore. I tried Windows' own recovery app but then the restore didn't work on the SSD. I tried using the OEM license key that is burned into the BIOS/SLIC table and download Windows 8.1 but the application that MS provide only works with upgrade and retail keys, not OEM. I don't mind giving 8 to friends and family (I know I'll get more calls asking for help) but it seems I can't do it the legit way. I'm now having to use old W7 licenses which I no longer need to perform the SSD upgrade.

The problem with Windows (and most products these days) is that there is too much regression and it seems that Microsoft are spending more resources on fluffy UI gimmicks than on improving features. I can't believe they dropped WinFS and that in this day and age, I still can't give file tags/categories and the only way to organise my files is by use of file names and directory structure.

[DanceswithUnix]

How many active though?

I bought one of the cheap promo licenses just to give it a try and a year on haven't used it yet!

Other people buy WIn8 pro and use the key to install Win 7.

[Saracen]

How many active though?

I bought one of the cheap promo licenses just to give it a try and a year on haven't used it yet!

Other people buy WIn8 pro and use the key to install Win 7.

Likewise, more or less. The machine I use/used it on currently has a drive in it with Win7 on installed, and the Win8 drive hasn't been installed/booted for months.

If it wasn't for the fact that I need the ability to test on W8, I'd sell the licence/package.

[Montysaurus]

"...Windows is a central part of life for more than 1.5 billion people around the world,..."
So 200 million licences sold to OEM's and retailers out of 1.5 billion potential customers!!!
I count that as a major FAIL!

[OilSheikh]

I just bought a value range Lenovo with Win8 on it and was planning to install an SSD on it. Normally, I would use the machine to create a recovery media and then use it to restore the machine to the factory image after the SSD upgrade. Failing that, I could always download the latest .iso from digital river and then install the OS using the OA sticker on the computer.

Well, you can't make recovery media with Lenovo's one key software anymore. I tried Windows' own recovery app but then the restore didn't work on the SSD. I tried using the OEM license key that is burned into the BIOS/SLIC table and download Windows 8.1 but the application that MS provide only works with upgrade and retail keys, not OEM. I don't mind giving 8 to friends and family (I know I'll get more calls asking for help) but it seems I can't do it the legit way. I'm now having to use old W7 licenses which I no longer need to perform the SSD upgrade.

The problem with Windows (and most products these days) is that there is too much regression and it seems that Microsoft are spending more resources on fluffy UI gimmicks than on improving features. I can't believe they dropped WinFS and that in this day and age, I still can't give file tags/categories and the only way to organise my files is by use of file names and directory structure.

Macrium Reflect Free edition > Create ISO of whole HDD on another physical USB or HDD > Restore ISO to SSD ( Remember to create a Macrium recovery CD first ! )

[devBunny]

"...Windows is a central part of life for more than 1.5 billion people around the world,..."
So 200 million licences sold to OEM's and retailers out of 1.5 billion potential customers!!!
I count that as a major FAIL!

Let's scale down from those huge numbers. 200 million out of 1.5 billion becomes simply 2 out of 15. Now, given that nobody's expecting all 15 to upgrade, ket alone for them all to do it in the first year, or even the first three, I wouldn't say that it's "a major FAIL!".

Small letters without the exclamation mark will suffice. ;o)

[devBunny]

Talking of relative numbers ....

There's an article on BBC News about a serious new science project in the States which is projected to be about 1.5 billion dollars. The article is about - woohoo!! - British involvement and it seems like a big thing. "UK backs huge US neutrino plan", "BBC News has learned that the UK has now agreed to be part of the $1.5bn (£1bn) project".

Yet here's the basic outline.

USA: We're doing some deep research on fundamental particles. It's gonna cost $1500 million.

Britain: Sounds great. Count us in!

USA. We're putting up $1000 million of the budget.

Britain: We're keen too. We'll put in maybe as much as £20 million.

That's £2 out of $150.

[DeAnt28790]

Windows 7 was highly anticipated. It had been a long time since XP had come out and people craving something new that wasn't Vista. Windows 8 on the other hand has come out at a time that most people are very satisfied with 7 and don't want something that isn't too different.

I'm just saying, whether you like windows 8 or not; Windows 7 had a huge demand where 8 just didn't, so of course it hasn't sold as well.

[dfour]

I think they would have sold a lot more (including to me) if they had created 2 versions. 1 for tablets etc and 1 for desktops without the stupid metro interface. I know that they are effectivly doing that now with the boot to desktop option(im sure i read this someware) but why not just have done it in the first place??