Windows 8 Pricing Update

I think OEMs will be happier that people will be buying new PCs for Windows 8 rather than giving their old ones new life with an upgrade. It is an incredible leap in price though...

DON'T shoot the messenger, eh? :D. Glad I'm an early adopter

Upgrade Pricing by OS

Android Free
iOS Free
Linux Free
Mountain Lion $19.99
Microsoft $199.99

If so many livelihoods were not at stake here, one would laugh.

I'm wondering how important this really is. I used to build my own PC's but that was only cost effective because I used an unofficial version of Windows. With the cost of PC's now, the move to laptop/touch screen devices and Windows 8 being so integrated with the services it makes much more sense to just buy a PC. Everyone now has had months to upgrade their PC's for a nominal cost so the market for this must be minimal.

I was expecting Windows to be moving forward to more regular lower cost updates, but given this pricing it seems we are back to the big update every 3 years.

Also am I missing something, you cannot buy a full non-upgrade version? What if I have just built my own PC? or want to install it on a mac?

"The $200 price is coming after everyone who really wanted it has already upgraded".

So, now who will buy the $200 upgrade? Does it make sense?

I do not shoot the messenger. :-)

I've seen Windows 8 Pro upgrade discs on Amazon and a few other retailers for just under $70. Is that going to go up as well?

I'm building a PC and plan to install Windows XP and then upgrade to Windows 8 Pro so I can get the upgrade price, but I won't have the funds to build the machine until after Feb 1. Can I pay for the online upgrade now and then not use it until I'm ready for it? Otherwise, I guess I need to buy the upgrade disc while it's still cheap.

Is it possible to install the upgrade version from scratch if you have a valid key, or does it have to be installed on top of an existing XP,vista, or 7 install?

Clearly, this has been probably the best upgrade offer in the history of Windows. Those of us who still close windows by double-clicking their left corners know this.

But I'm wondering if you have any insight as to what the rationale for this promotion might be. Since I think we can all accept that most users get their copies of Windows by purchasing a new PC, what harm is there in leaving the $40 upgrade around? The $150 jump is incongruous with both the previous offer and what (I presume) any chunk from a new PC sale could possibly give Microsoft. The only two reasons that I can come up with are that (1) it encourages people to simply buy new PCs that are perhaps better suited to the Windows 8 experience, incentivizing a hardware revolution or (2) the current promotion was begrudgingly offered after much internal battles and that some parts of Microsoft are worried about "upgrade piracy", if that makes sense.

I feel that the only types of people who encounter these licenses are the enthusiasts, the builders, the people who actually care about PCs. Everyone else is getting their software via OEMs with their new PCs or through their expensive MSDN or volume licensing through work. The market for this particular kind of license doesn't seem that large to me, and I think that's why Apple has priced its latest upgrades so low: it surely garners good will and doesn't really make much of a dent on the bottom line since lots of people feel good about it but few actually take advantage of it.

So what gives? I think there's a story here somewhere.

I'm thinking that there is no possible way that Microsoft will be offering a yearly paid (but low-cost) update cycle for Windows if they're increasing the cost to the previous regular price. Otherwise customers will be outraged at paying $200 now, only to pay $40-some dollars every year for updates, starting this year.

....or else Microsoft is planning a carriage fee for service ala Xbox LIVE Gold (a service fee on top of a purchase price, just for basic functionality). They need to do one OR the other. Doing both would spell their demise.

This article served as a good reminder. It reminded me to purchase two copies of Win 7 64 bit home premium for less than the copy of one non-discounted Win8 upgrade. Our office has no plans to support Win8 for the VPN, and I'd like to have a couple Win7 licenses available if I need/want them.

Win8 is fine on my laptop, but I'd rather have Win7 than have to install Classic Shell and ignore the hotcorner stuff that pops up when I mouse into them. Win7 + new process manager and file-copy dialogue from Win8 would have been an easy upgrade choice for me.

But instead I'm now making sure I have Win7 licenses so I stay legit. I feel like the crazies storing incandescent lightbulbs when there was the fervor about possibly outlawing them in favor of LEDs/Compact-Flourescents :-(

In this case though, I think Microsoft is the crazy one.

You have to wonder about a company that thinks the answer to a lacklustre respornse to its new OS from the market and an army of bloggers across the internet, looking for any reason to give Microsoft a bad news day, is to increase its core products price by several hundred percent

I'm remind of Steve Balmers proud proclamation at the WIndows 8 launch "We're all in". As a Windows developer I can tell you Steve, no, no you most certainly are not. You haven't even started to be competitive and I'm sure II'm not the only developer getting increasingly fed up that you're not..

Windows upgrades in the consumer market has been a negligible business for 25 years so I've been curious what Microsoft would do with Windows 8.

Pricing for us early adoptors has been a good way of kick starting the new release but 99% of consumers will not have considering the upgrade yet, largely because its not something they have done before.

The significance will only start to become visible to consumers when they consider buying a new device such as a tablet or change their setup to switch to office subscription etc. A typical new scenario would be an existing Windows 7 laptop user who buys a Windows tablet. They can then run a Windows store app on tablet and old laptop only if the laptop is upgraded to Windows 8. A valuable and new upgrade incentive that was never there for earlier versions of Windows. However at $199, this is a non-starter for most people who can see this as a strong incentive to make a move from Windows to the Android or iOS space.

A missed opportunity by Microsoft and its hard to see any rationale in trying to maintain the status quo on upgrade pricing. Its going against the whole point of Windows 8 being to try and build more relevance in the modern consumer market.

Is it OK to buy an upgrade (actually, a key) now, but run the actual upgrade after 31 January? Do activation keys time constrained? I still need time to resolve some compatibility issues on my PC...