You remember Vista don’t you? Microsoft’s much maligned operating system that followed Windows XP? I’m sure many of you are trying to forget it, so apologies for the reminder. The reason I bring it up is that there are many parallels between Vista and Android Honeycomb. Google could have another Vista on its hands, and it would do well to learn from Microsoft’s ordeal.
By many measures Vista was a vast improvement over its predecessor. 5 years in the making, it introduced the visually stunning Aero interface, integrated search, better security, ReadyBoost, SuperFetch, IPv6, Direct3D 10, and more. By mid-2008, over 180 million copies had been sold.
This pales in comparison to Windows XP, however. The industry breathed a sigh of relief when Vista was replaced in 2009 with Windows 7. By early 2011, Win7 sales passed 300 million. Many enterprise customers skipped Vista altogether and went from XP to Win7.
What was wrong with Vista (and Honeycomb)?
So what was wrong with Vista? There were a number of individual problems such as incompatibility with older devices, and a penchant for asking for security permission on many common operations. But I think the biggest one was perception.
Consider that in its first year of availability, PC World named it as the biggest tech disappointment of 2007, and InfoWorld rated it #2 on a list of Tech’s all-time flops. Just the mention of the name “Vista” was enough to scare off potential users. In one marketing campaign users rated Vista 4.4 out of 10 but gave a new operating system named “Mojave” 8.5 out of 10. Mojave was just Vista with a different name.
Now compare that with how Windows 7 was received. PC World named it one of the best products of 2009. CNET described Win7 as “what Vista should have been”, giving it 4.5 out of 5 stars. Techradar called it “the best Windows OS ever”.
Win7 must have been a major rewrite of Vista for this kind of turnaround, right? Nope. Windows 7 is basically Vista with a few focused, incremental enhancements such as a new Taskbar, transparent window borders, and some performance tweaks. The system requirements are the same as Vista, and the drivers are the same.
If some hardware didn’t work with Vista it wouldn’t work with Win7 either. But everybody loved it. Vista had a bad reputation, but Windows 7 got a good reputation.
Lately, I see Honeycomb being maligned in the press. Jason Perlow called it “half-baked” and “a piece of junk”. John Paczkowki says the Motorola Xoom (the first tablet to run Honeycomb) is “at best a dud, at worst a bomb”. Is that perception or reality?
Continue reading: Perception vs. reality >
