Despite protests, petitions and lobbying to keep Windows XP as an alternative to Vista, Microsoft has announced today they are still planning on phasing out Windows XP on June 30th (which had been extended from January 31st). After this date Windows XP will no longer come pre-installed on most new PC’s. There is however an exception, “ultra-low cost” machines. These include Asus Eee PC, Intel Classmate PC and those PCs generally lack the hardware needed to run Windows Vista. In this case Windows XP will still be available for these machines until June 30, 2010 or one-year after the release of the next OS version (code named Windows 7), which ever is later.
It is also important to understand that the June 30th cut-off does not mean you will not be able to purchase a mainstream PC with Windows XP. Simply put this is the last day Microsoft will provide Windows XP to PC manufacturers and retailers. Retailers and manufacturers may continue to install and re-sell any copies of XP they have purchased prior to this June 30th cut-off. So it may be a while before we see ‘Vista Only’ on the mainstream machines. Further, system builders (people or companies) that build individual PC’s from scratch can still obtain Windows XP until January 31st, 2009.
News Source: Todd Bishop’s Microsoft Blog
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