New Hard Drives Could Spell Trouble for XP Users

Usually by tracking web activity. Your computer informs every web site you visit what type of operating system you are using, which web browser, etc. Of course, you have to statistically adjust for how likely someone is to defeat that; Fewer than 1% of Windows users do, but upwards of 30% of Linux users do. Are those numbers solid? No. But if Linux numbers should be adjusted up to 1.2%, instead of 0.9%, does that change the truthfulness of what I wrote?

Otherwise, you could compare a Linux download to a Windows sale. My guess is that greatly overestimates the portion of users using Linux, since a lot of people use it for limited purposes. (I’ve downloaded various Linux flavors a good dozen times, but bought a Windows-loaded computer only about four times.) But that’s still a whopping 2%.

I manage several web sites, mostly tech sites but some general interest sites as well. What I'm seeing over the past year in operating systems is about 78-82% Windows of all flavors, 10-13% of Mac, 9-10% Linux and the rest are insignificant, including the no-reports. That's on the non-tech sites.
On the tech sites, Windows is about the same, Mac drops to about 9%, Linux goes up to about 11% and the number of VCIW systems goes up to add to a few percent (FreeBSD, BeOS, Blackberry, iPhone, etc.)

I have not seen Linux at only 1% or anywhere near in the last ten years, even on Windows-centric sites it runs at least 3-4%.

You may be seeing something else, but I'm not seeing Linux as insignificant, and I'm seeing Mac as much higher than you claim as well. Likewise, the trend I'm seeing over the past year is Linux is growing at the expense of Mac, mostly, but Windows is declining a bit as well (about 3% over the past year, about 4% over the past 2.)

XP is still the most popular version, at 63%, of all Windows hits over the past year. Vista is number 2, at 25%, and 7 is just getting started at 3.5%. I see as many hits from NT over the past year as 7. But the trend is that Vista and XP hits are declining in favor of 7, with XP dropping to about 59% and Vista to 18% with 7 picking up the difference.

Anyway, that's what I'm seeing these days. I don't see Linux at all as marginal as you're seeing it. *shrug*

Just roamed the web trying to see if I could find any data to support your claims. I Absolutely cannot find anything near what you’re reporting.

Look at this link:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_desktop_operating_systems

It shows that estimates range from 0.37% to 1.55%, with an average of 1.03, or 1.12 including Droid.

I double checked my past posts, seeing if I wrote anything that you could interpret as a guess as to Mac’s share. Nope. Never did.

*shrug*
I’m not Wikipedia, and I don’t know enough about their numbers to say how they count things. I’m just saying what I see coming in the front door. I’ve run websites since 1994, everything from small personal sites to doing server environment builds & support for top Fortune 500 co’s (Fortune 10 would be more accurate ;). Since 1998 I’ve seen more and more Linux, and in the last three years a significant increase among the non-technical sites. At first I thought it was a spike from the Eee 701, but it’s stuck around and it’s not just Xandros I’m seeing. Anyway...

As to Mac, apologies, must’ve conflated others’ comments.

No argument that Win is the 400 lb. gorilla, but the other desktop OSes are about 10-20% of the traffic I see across various sites. Mobiles (Android, iPhone, WinMo, WinCE, etc.) are about another 1-5% of traffic.

Would I buy that 95-98% of users have a Win box they use regularly? Oh, yeah. But so far as I can tell they spread their browsing around between OSes, at least.

Thanks. Most of my time is going into "real" work at present, but I've started preparing some new material that I'm hoping to post in the next few days--new images, software, etc.

I like the 8085. I think it's as far back on the Intel line as I'd be willing to go with a new system. The 8080A takes more ICs and voltages, the 8008 and 4004 are too demanding for me any more as well, I'm afraid.

However, I've got this nifty Signetics 3000-series board that emulates the 8080A at something like 5-8 times the original's speed. Its single supply at +5V and it breaks out all the signals that are muxed on the 8080A. That I could build a system around...

..once I finish the other two I already have in train.

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