Windows 7 To Have Six Versions?

I had mentioned this in the PCMech Weekly Newsletter but it definitely deserves an article of its own. If you hadn’t heard, Windows 7 is planned to have six different versions when released late this year or early 2010.

Many people did a facepalm when they heard this.

To note, this is not a repeat of the way Windows Vista was done. Most of the versions do have a legitimate purpose.

The six versions at present will be as follows:

Starter Edition
Basic
Home Premium
Professional
Ultimate
Enterprise

Here’s how each of these breaks down.

Starter Edition is supposed to be specifically tailored towards computers that don’t have a lot of horsepower under the hood (read: netbooks).

Basic is a version you will most likely never see on the shelves. It’s meant for "emerging markets".

Home Premium and Ultimate are the two versions you will see on the shelves and bundled with just about all OEM boxes.

Professional is supposed to be for small businesses.

Enterprise is for corporate environments.

Of these six, three of them could be killed off easily. There is absolutely no reason to have Basic, Home Premium and Ultimate. It should be simply Starter Edition for the low-powered boxes, Professional for the home edition and Enterprise for corporate. That’s it.

Some say there should simply be one version of Windows 7 – but I don’t agree with this. Having a difference between low-powered, home and enterprise is necessary.

Even though at present Microsoft intends to release six versions, a lot of things can happen between now and release time.

Hopefully Microsoft will simplify and cut out the fluff. It’s not necessary. For the home version, give us one. For enterprise, same deal. One. For netbooks and other low-power computer boxes, one. This makes a total of three and would fit the bill nicely (in addition to curing a crapload of confusion as to which to pick).

What do you think? Are six versions too many? Which ones would you kill off, if any? Do you think there should be my suggestion of 3, or just one version for all?

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blaster3
i totally agree with you, there’s no need for multiple releases.
sometimes, if not always, too many choices lead to wrong choices, & inadequate support.
considering so many of us now have either a home based business, or have a home office for there small business, i would like to see the professional version used for most apps, the enterprise version for ‘big business’.
why have ‘low power’ boxes at all. with the abundant supply of cheap ram & multicore processors there’s no reason manufacturers can’t build ‘very cheap’ comps to handle the pro versions.
Sharron Field
Oh you guys wrote an article on this also: It’s interesting to read your perspective.
Personally I think it’s all tailored toward maximising Microsoft’s profits, I have a feeling the Ultimate edition will cost a small fortune, and the only realistically affordable version will be Home Premium.
I forecast on my blog, with some trepidation, that they were going to do this, several months ago.
It’s a stupid idea for them to do so; bearing in mind the catalogue of errors made with Vista. – If a new approach is tried and the product flops it is a logical thing to conclude that if you don’t make any of the same mistakes again: NONE of them, then any future product has less chance of flopping. M$ have a different approach though: rather than doing exactly the same thing in the same way and expecting a different result, they choose to do only some of the things they did before in the same way, expecting a different result. – And that’s what they’ll get: A partial flop rather than a total flop.
I for one will now not be rushing out to buy Windows 7 until someone else has analysed all the versions and let me know what I’ll get for the orice tag they’re asking in each case.
If it had been a choice between Home, Pro, and Business; I’d have gone straight out and bought Pro. – But I know their game and I’m not playing. Someone else can rush in where angels fear to tread. I’ll be watching the results of doing so.
Now if Microsoft would be prepared to give a full online demo of all 6 versions then that would make all the difference…
http://www.darknet-fusion.co.cc Vertimyst™
As I said on twitter, I think there should only be two versions: Home and Pro. No ‘Premium’ at the end of Home either. Home for normal users, Pro for businesses/enterprises. Simple. And there’s no need for low-end versions of either, if your computer/netbook can’t handle it, turn some settings down during install.
If anything, I think they should eliminate Ultimate. It’s the most annoying/confusing of the bunch.
blaster3
why was my comment not used? be honest.

http://www.menga.net Rich Menga
Those who have not commented on this system prior are automatically put into moderation until an author (such as yours truly) approves it. Those who have commented prior get auto-approved once a few comments get approved. It’s a standard WordPress thing. Your comment is there. See above.

http://none David M
So do they have seven versions in 32 bit and seven versions in 64 bit? That would make 14 versions if so.

http://www.menga.net Rich Menga
That will unfortunately most likely be the case.

jdeb
Just another swindle on the public. If it is better, than why not make it a service pack to fix the previous swindle(Vista). I ran the beta and I wasn’t in awe at all. Just appears they fixed some of the things that were annoying in Vista.
TONY
One edition is all that is required with add ons to extend to what ever one wishes ie. Pro features etc.

lespaul20
Think about what you wrote. This is exactly that. It’s Windows 7 with additional features in each version.
I don’t see where is matters that much. I don’t think they will make the same mistake as they did with Vista when they labeled hardware as Vista ready but only could handle Basic unless they are looking for more work for their legal department.
The only people who get up tight about this is people who do more than Internet, email, office work which doesn’t make sense.
I would like to have two version like XP but there are a lot more features/tool that not everybody needs.
We don’t seem to get upset about car manufactures having multiple trim packages.

Vivid
Why not put all versions on one disk like vista, except actually allow people to install any one they want. i mean its not like Home Premium and Ultimate are that much different… are they? neither will come with much software. microsoft is cutting most windows software and making it “Live” so that we can all just download what we want. either way, i cant wait to get vista off my laptop. its killing me with the compatibilty issues! lol I WANT MY M-AUDIO SESSION TO WORK!!! lol