Josh's Windows Weblog » Windows 7 SKU’s Announced

Windows 7 SKU’s Announced

Yesterday Microsoft announced their SKU lineup for Windows 7 and it looks like this..

    1. Windows 7 Enterprise (for VL customers)
    2. Windows 7 Professional (Businesses)
    3. Windows 7 Ultimate (Enthusiast)
    4. Windows 7 Home Premium (Most home users)
    5. Windows 7 Home Basic (emerging markets only)
    6. Windows 7 Starter ( OEM only for certain hardware – netbooks?)

What else is new.  Well, Business editions will have Windows Media Center. Starter will allow only three concurrently running apps. It is unclear what the value add around Ultimate will be as most of the current customer probably still feel jaded on this version.  My guess is it won’t sell that well.

There is one part of this that disappoints me just a little and that is they didn't’ make Bitlocker available on more SKU’s this time around.  I think security should have been a top priority and should have transcended SKU’s and not been used as a price point differentiator.  As such I would have like to seen them make Bitlocker in all SKU’s except maybe starter and home basic.

The SKU count also doesn’t take into account any N versions I guess, I assume they still have to make one of those for each?

What are your thoughts on the new lineup?

Posted Feb 04 2009, 02:45 AM by Josh Phillips

Follow Me on Twitter

Did you enjoy this article? If yes, then subscribe to our RSS 2.0 feed or

Comments

Stuartm wrote re: Windows 7 SKU’s Announced
on 02-04-2009 2:38 AM

Not including BitLocker in the Professional version is my biggest gripe about these SKUs. Microsoft are saying that yes, security is important, but only for businesses that can afford it. Most small and medium sized businesses still buy computers with OEM Windows installed, and most of these will be Windows 7 Professional OEM. So they miss out on BitLocker unless they want to upgrade to the ridiculously expensive Ultimate edition, or ditch all their cheap OEM licenses and subscribe to an expensive volume license agreement. BitLocker should be available for all business versions of Windows 7, or perhaps there should be just 1 version of business software.

Amal Roy wrote re: Windows 7 SKU’s Announced
on 02-04-2009 3:05 AM

Yes i agree with you. Microsoft should have made Bit locker available in Professional Version.

Jaxim wrote re: Windows 7 SKU’s Announced
on 02-04-2009 6:00 AM

I still they think that they should only have 1 consumer SKU.

Provide Ultimate to the consumers and Enterprise (multi-licensed version of Ultimate) to big companies. Basically eliminate Professional and Home Premium.

They can keep Home Basic and Starter but they shouldn't be available at retailer stores and should only be for emerging markets.

CJ wrote re: Windows 7 SKU’s Announced
on 02-04-2009 6:52 AM

One thing that astounds me is the fact that Starter edition only runs 3 concurrent applications. Seeing as this will be the version that ships with netbooks, I take it that Microsoft doesn't think that anyone with a netbook will want to run more than three apps!! How stupid is this?!?

Bink wrote re: Windows 7 SKU’s Announced
on 02-04-2009 7:48 AM

It appears MS has learned its lesson from the clusterf*ck of versions with Vista, but, perhaps, this is really not the case.  For example, is the Client for NFS built into all versions this time around?  Or is it a mystery like it was with Vista?  Perhaps we should all move to OS X—where licensing is simple and you don’t need to consult matrices to understand what you actually bought…

Josh Phillips wrote re: Windows 7 SKU’s Announced
on 02-04-2009 8:10 AM

dude, Harsh!

Sam Gentile's Blog (if (DeveloperTask == Communication && OS == Windows) wrote New and Notable 287
on 02-04-2009 8:16 AM

Finally got enough snow to delay school for a couple of hours. Oslo/CSD/Queing/Azure/WCF Charles Young takes a closer look at the new CTP of Oslo that I reported the other day He also references this post for what's new and changed in the Oslo CTP Brian

punkcoder wrote re: Windows 7 SKU’s Announced
on 02-04-2009 11:03 AM

Since you pretty much have to have a virus scanner and spyware scanner running all the time on a Windows box, does that take up 2 of the 3 concurrent applications that can be running on the Starter Edition?

» How would you tweak Microsoft’s Windows 7 line-up? | All about Microsoft | ZDNet.com wrote » How would you tweak Microsoft’s Windows 7 line-up? | All about Microsoft | ZDNet.com
on 02-05-2009 11:38 AM

Pingback from  » How would you tweak Microsoft’s Windows 7 line-up? | All about Microsoft | ZDNet.com

Windows is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation.
Powered by Community Server (Non-Commercial Edition), by Telligent Systems Themed By nb development