Last week PC Advisor hosted a poll to find out what percentage of its readers were going to "Uprgrade to Windows 8?". Interestingly 44 percent of poll participants claimed that they had no plans to upgrade their OS at all, voting for the "No. I'm sticking with that I've got' poll option."
What's worrying for Microsoft is that just 30 percent of voters revealed that they would make the switch to Windows 8. 13 percent of these said they would upgrade to Windows 8 when it launches, while the remaining 17 percent said that they will only upgrade to Windows 8 when they buy a new PC.
While nine percent of participants weren't sure if they were going to upgrade to Window 8 or not, a far from insignificant 18 percent of pollers selected the "No. My next PC operating system won't be Windows" option. Such statistics suggest that the future will see Window's grip on the traditional PC market slip further, with recent figures suggesting Windows hold as high as 92.2 percent of the current PC operating system market.
While the prospect of Microsoft losing its dominant grip on worldwide operating system sales isn't a new story - back in 2010 Apple's Tim Cook claimed 20 percent of all PCs sold in the US were Macs - our poll evidence would suggest that Windows 8 has so far failed to capture the imaginations of technology enthusiasts, as it would have hoped to.
As always, poll participants were encouraged to further express their intentions on our forums. Forum user Estuary's views on Windows 8 summed up the general feeling pretty well. He said: "My answer to this question is probably no . I cannot see any good reason to change from win 7. I am not interested in a touch screen or joining facebook or twitter or sharing anything with anybody! I think that my long burning curiosity about Apple may result in me buying an imac in the future."
This week's poll - How much storage is in use on your primary PC?
Click here to see a full list of PC Advisors's polls.
Comments
Maccyroo said: Service Packs are not just for corporate environments at all A Service Pack minimallycontains all the important bug fixes and security fixes releasedsince the original product launch Or as in the case of SP2 for XP a host of new features and functionality
Ian Cooper said: A number of our clients are beginning to move to our hosted desktop wwwhostedaccountantscouk platform that runs Windows 7 This is mainly due to support for XP expiring this year from many UK software companies Most businesses that I speak to will move to Win7 and then skip Win8 upgrade like many skipped the Vista upgrade But as a consumer solution itdefinitelylooks interesting
Beryl Russell said: I upgraded from XP to Vista Home against my better judgement when I bought a new PC It was a bloated nightmare It took just 3 weeks for me to reformat with XP Home Along came Windows 7 My daughter has Windows 7 on her laptop I tried it No thanks Apart from being too expensive for me to buy I didnt think it was much of an improvement on XP Why were we in the UK being charged the same number of s as those in the USA in s The usual rip offUpgrade to Windows 8 I dont think so I have watched my Doctor fume as his touch screen refuses to co-operate I told him he should go back to XP
Yanta0205 said: The ONLY thing that would entice me to upgrade is the ability to a utterly disable metro b The ability to restore the start menu and c Get rid of the new cartoonish kids version of the task manager
jonathan said: windows 7 did not make us want to use touchscreen so what makes windows 8 any different
Jusskoll said: I said NO and I mean no not no plan As you are referring to forum user Estuarys Im saying same Im not interested in touch screen and all those social toys at all Im happy with Windows 7 and even SP1 Windows 8 wont make me like it I think SP-s arent that important to regular users as they are for corporate environments and in this context I suppose enterprises are moving to Windows 7 now or just start switching
Maccyroo said: These figures are not at all surprising to me based on my own trial of the developer preview and feedback from friends and colleagues I have spoken to Steve Jobs was right in saying that a touch screen was no good for the desktop system Hardly anyone owns a standalone touchscreen capable desktop monitor and so for desktop users there is nothing in Windows 8 to warrant an upgradeFor desktop functionality Windows 8 offers very little over Windows 7 and many laptops are going to be awkward to use with a touchscreen tooPeople are going to end up with all sorts of muscle strains trying to get the screen angled just right for touch control and viewingBusinessesare even less likelyto upgrade in my opinion A huge amount of companies missed out Vista and many have only migrated their corporatenetworksfrom XP to Windows 7 in the last 12-18 monthsWith the state of the economy most companies arent going to have a budget to upgrade to Windows 8 in the near futureeven if they wanted tooIt will be interesting to see how manysystem builders offer Windows 7 as an option on new systems after 8 is releasedBuilders like Chilliblast and Arbico were still offering XP as an alternative to Windows 7 on the their desktops systems only 6 months agoIf given that choice by their chosen brandthat 17of people who said they will upgrade to Windows 8 when they buy a new system may rapidly shrinkAnother interesting thing to note is that as yet Microsoft have not announced any upgrade path with relation to costs for XP die hards or Vista and Windows 7 usersThey may have to resort to heavy discounting for users of these systems to get them to eventhink about upgrading to Windows 8
Matt Egan said: Interesting points all We do the best we can given the limitations of such polls and were not claiming that this is scientific research As to the numbers As I write we have had 2459 votes which is OK in your book On Wed 25 Apr 2012 163034 0000
Gareth Evans said: Wow Another article full of statistics that dont reveal that much How many respondents were there 10000 great 2000 OK 1000 hmm less that 1000 who caresAlso the answer that says 13 will upgrade as soon as 8 launches doesnt cover the vast majority of people that will do so after they know how reliable 8 is or after the first Service Pack I would guess that a LARGE proportion of those saying they have no plans to upgrade mean simply that - no plan Which is not wont upgrade just it isnt planned - yetRight now there are no compelling reasons to upgradeAs the launch gets closer these will start to be pushed and once real life use of 8 is in evidence therell be more info on why it was a good idea for company X to upgrade And when there are W8 tablets out in the wild and the seamless integration between the two world tablets and PC the more compelling the reasons will becomeOh and Im sure Tim Cook will start to modify his numbers now that the hacking community consider a platform worth looking atand Apples false claim to be the most secure platform goes up in smoke