14 DAY TRIAL // Windows 10 is alive and kicking and PCs running the new operating system are already up for grabs, but HP, which is one of Microsoft's partners and a company that hopes to see increased PC sales because of the new software, says that the free upgrade offer doesn't help much.
At least not now.
HP's PC chief, Dion Weisler, who will become the CEO of HP Inc., told BI that offering Windows 10 as a free upgrade doesn't help too much when it comes to new PC sales because most customers prefer to get the operating system free of charge on their existing hardware rather than buying a new computer.
Windows 8 needs to go
Weisler also explained that early signs prove that Windows 10 adoption is going well, but he believes that Windows 8 needs to go dark before the new operating system becomes a hit.
“We do anticipate a challenging operating system transition to Windows 10 on two dimensions — one was a free upgrade and the the very short transition time, which is normally like three months, which was compressed to under one month,” the HP official said.
“What that drove was fairly high Windows 8 channel inventory levels. That will take a little time to flush. The good news is that the Windows 10 feedback is pretty good and a great operating system is important for the ecosystem and in the industry. So once Windows 8 flushes, which may take a little time in the industry. We should see some simulation from Windows 10.”
Windows 8 is often referred to as the new Vista and Microsoft itself wants to make this operating system go away as fast as possible, especially because it wants all computers to be upgraded to Windows 10 and support its goal of bringing the new software on 1 billion devices by 2017.
Right now, Windows 8.1 has a market share of around 15 percent worldwide, but this could vary by country, so it shouldn't be too hard to move all users to Windows 10 on the long term, especially thanks to the free upgrade offer.