Tamero IT Consulting & Services

Windows XP will not be available on new PCs from the end of January 2008.

While many analysts have reported slow demand for Windows Vista, Microsoft claims the OS is selling twice as fast as XP did when it launched in 2001.

The company said more than 20 million licences were sold during the first month on sale. All versions of XP, including those made for media centre or tablet PCs, are affected by this decision.

Microsoft has confirmed that from 31 January 2008 PC makers will no longer be able to buy licences for the software so they can install it on new machines. According to Microsoft, It's standard practice to allow OEMs, retailers and system builders to continue offering the previous version of Windows for a certain period of time after a new version is released, however he pointed out that OEMs have been aware of the pending changes since last year.

Windows Vista, the successor to XP, became broadly available at the end of January2007, and Microsoft has worked hard to promote Vista as a safer, easier to use, better connected and more entertaining version of Windows than any of its predecessors.

However, there's still a lack of Vista-compatible applications and hardware drivers, hurdles for broad adoption.

Despite those words of caution, many PC shoppers already have no choice beyond Vista. PC makers have already moved almost everything they sell to consumers -- and some businesses over to Vista, both in stores and online.