Laptop Buyers versus Microsoft Windows

On March 14th, 2008 Preston Gralla on his blog on Computerworld argues a point about Microsoft loosing the battle for laptop operating system. His conclusions are based on observations on top best selling laptops on Amazon.com and the price comparison PriceGrabber. I have to mention that he accounts only retail consumers sales, not the direct sales (like Dell) or corporate sales. His point is that Microsoft is loosing the battle to get the buyers on entry level and premium level, because those kind of laptops are in pole positions in best selling lists on online sales stores. Considering the facts that he used in his blog his conclusion is correct, and the main fault of Windows developer is that Vista is a hardware hog. I am not a Microsoft or Windows fan, because I also think that the Richmond giant needs to reinvent himself in order to survive the future, but I can’t stop myself from considering other fact that I think it completes the big picture. It is not the first time when Microsoft Windows is accused of being bloated and running slow on pc. Almost every single operating system that Microsoft has ever sold had been criticised as 'bloated' when they first came out; even those now regarded as the exact opposite, such as MS-DOS. He always was ahead of it’s time when he launched the new operating systems making hardware in our homes obsolete. It was always a race between Microsoft and hardware manufacturers, a race for end users money. And Microsoft is not the only software manufacturer the uses the consumers to improve the not mature enough on launch operating system. Below is a table taken from Wikipedia about Windows recommended system requirements.

Comparison of Microsoft Windows Recommended System requirements
Windows version
Processor Memory Hard disk
Windows 95[7]
25 MHz 8 MB ~50 MB
Windows 98[8]
66 MHz 24 MB 140–255 MB
Windows Me[9]
150 MHz 32 MB 320 MB
Windows 2000 Server[10]
133 MHz 64 MB 1 GB
Windows XP[11]
300 MHz 128 MB 1.5 GB
Windows Vista[12]
1 GHz 1 GB 15 GB