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Windows 7 Pricing Released, The Final Question is Answered  

Hardware Canucks > News > Operating Systems News > Windows 7 Pricing Released, The Final Question is Answered
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Posted by admin — June 25th, 2009, 10:16 AM


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With the release client already on thousands of potential customers computers, the official release date set and the box art revealed, the only secret left for Windows 7 was going to be the pricing. Well, this morning, Microsoft is taken off the veil.

To top it all off, Microsoft has announced some pretty spiffy pre order pricing, available for the next 2-3 weeks. The pricing is shown as both “Upgrade” for users upgrading from accepted prior versions of Windows, and the “Retail” price for those purchasing for a new installation straight off the shelf




Windows 7 Version

Upgrade

Retail

Vista Retail Price

Home Premium

$119

$199

$225

BusinessProfessional

$199

$299

$280

Ultimate

$299

$319

$249

*prices is USD. Vista Retail Pricing taken from www.newegg.com


From June 26th – July 11th, Microsoft will be running promotions on the upgrade version of Windows 7 through their store, available to residents of Canada and the USA. It will feature Home Premium at $49 or Professional at $99. Visit the Microsoft Store for more details


Windows 7 Home Premium should offer the necessary tools for a majority of consumers, with Pro/Bus featuring a few extra tidbits for Networking and Backup, and Ultimate boating unique features such as the BitLocker security software and Multi language support. Microsoft has listed a handy and simple comparison tool on their website, found here


Microsoft also announced, that due to their recent decision to only offer retail, fresh installation editions of their branded “E” versions in Europe, (due to the European Commision’s medling) that pricing for retail “E” copies in affected EU countries would be the same as the unavailable upgrade versions.


The last remaining mystery, is the question of cost for OEM copies of the operating system. Microsoft has traditionally released cheaper versions of the OS, that mimick the retail versions without the fancy packaging and official Microsoft technical support. They generally can only be purchased by users buying computers from authorized retailers, but consumers often find a way to toss the software in with computer hardware purchases.


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  • Spaceman-Spiff

    Wonder what the OEM prices will be…

  • FiXT

    Well, seeing as how OEM Home Premium is under $100CAD, it sure better match up with that, because $199 is crazzzzyyyy talk.

  • Andy

    :( I wanted the ultimate retail version and if I convert that to Canadians dollars, add the standard taxes in then I am looking at $418.38.

  • Eagle Eye

    Futureshop just posted their pre-order pricing for Windows7

    http://www.futureshop.ca/popup/windows7_lightbox01.asp

    EE

  • Sprengkopf

    Anyway could someone tell me: Can we upgrade OEM Vista to Windows 7???

  • Wurmer

    Honestly, this doesn’t strike me as good pricing if their gold is to make me switch from Vista to 7. When I first bought my Ultimate version it cost me almost as much as what their asking for the upgrade. I am not even sure that they will be able to lure the hard core XP user who passed on Vista……. I don’t for sure what I’ll do but I might wait and see if 7 goes down in price later on……

  • FiXT

    The upgrade is a great deal right now… Come October I don’t see it being so hot. Microsoft has eluded to a “back to school” promo pricing – But I don’t think we will see much of an improvement.

    From what I understand, Microsoft is also offering Windows 7 upgrades on new purchase of Windows Vista. Almost smarter to buy Vista, and get the free upgrade :P

    @Sprengkopf
    Unfortunately I am not sure if the upgrade counts for OEM licenses. I would suspect that it would, as new OEM sales are capable of getting the Upgrade for free, so logically old OEM licenses should be able to upgrade no problem if they pay.

  • r0bc

    I have Vista 64 Ultimate right now and if I want Windows 7 Ultimate its $300 US. It don’t seem like much of a deal at all really.

  • daveloft

    For people complaining that its too expensive to switch for Vista to 7, I don’t think Microsoft cares. For people who have no issue with Vista, there will be no rush to update. Since 7 is really just Vista SE, software and hardware should work just fine for the foreseeable future. For those who hate Vista they probably wont care how much it is just as long as they never have to see Vista again. The goal of the new OS is to convince the naysayers the XP hold outs to make the switch to Microsoft’s newer OS and to keep people from switching to Mac. I’m ok with Vista for now and will wait till I upgrade and just pickup an OEM 64bit Windows 7 Home Premium. The other versions just seem unnecessary for the majority of the people.