Windows for India, others won't run on faster chips
By Michael Kanellos, CNET News.com
Friday, May 13 2005 10:29 AM
When Microsoft said that Windows XP Starter Edition, the cut-rate
version of Windows for emerging markets, was for beginning computer
users, the company wasn't kidding.
The operating system will not work on computers running Intel's
Pentium 4 processors or the Athlon from Advanced Micro Devices, a
public relations representative said on behalf of Microsoft.
Instead, it will run on computers containing Intel's Celeron chips,
AMD's Duron or Geode chips, or processors from Via
Technologies.
"When you try to load it onto a Pentium 4 machine, it gets to the
processor ID and stops functioning," said P.R. Lakshmanan, senior
vice president of Zenith Computers in Mumbai, India, who tried it
as an experiment. Zenith is one of India's larger local PC makers.
Starter Edition for India won't be released publicly until
June.
Selective incompatibility appears to be geared at preventing
Starter Edition from supplanting standard versions of Windows XP.
Starter Edition doesn't support the same level of functionality as
the standard Windows XP. However, PC makers have to pay only $15 to
$35 for each copy, according to various PC makers in these markets.
Windows XP Home costs $70 to $80 per copy and the Professional
Edition costs even more.
Without the incompatibility, PC makers and dealers could
potentially start bundling the OS onto computers for business
customers. Microsoft does not sell the OS separately. It sells it
only to PC makers, who then load it onto PCs.
"Windows XP Starter Edition is designed for beginner home computer
users who are seeking a more affordable computing solution for
their homes. As such, it is designed for low-cost, entry-level
desktop PCs running value-based processors," a representative for
Microsoft said in an e-mail.
Microsoft has released or will release versions of Starter Edition
for Brazil, Malaysia, Russia, Indonesia, Thailand and India. These
are some of the fastest-growing PC markets in the world, and the
software is designed to make it easier for ordinary people in these
markets to learn about computing.
Linux, though only a blip in the desktop market, is gaining
popularity. In India, for instance, professor Jitendra Shah has
translated a version of Linux and a number of applications into the
regional languages of India to help villagers learn
computing.
Microsoft hopes to use Starter Edition to familiarize these markets
with its products. Plus, because these countries are also havens
for piracy, the Redmond, Wash.-based software maker wants to use
perks such as bug patches and alerts to demonstrate the value of
legal software.
Sales, though, have been somewhat slow to date in the countries
where Starter Edition has been released. Thailand PC makers have
sold it since October, while the OS has been available in Malaysia
and Indonesia since February.