Surprise: Windows 8's usage share jumped in August 2013
Usage share statistics provide us with information how well a certain product fares after it enters a market. This is true for new web browsers but also operating systems.
Microsoft released the Windows 8 operating system eleven months ago in October 2012. The operating system had a rough start, even with all the promotions the company had going at that time.
Depending on which statistics you look at, you will notice that the initial boost caused by the promotions was slowing down, and that many users did not upgrade their older operating systems to Microsoft's latest.
Netmarketshare for instance saw an increase of only 0.3% between June and July 2013, while Statcounter saw a jump by 0.67%.
The growth this months though is different. Netmarketshare recorded an increase by 2.01% for Windows 8, a jump from 5.40% to 7.41%. Windows XP fell at the same time from 37.19% down to 33.66, while Windows 7 rose to 45.63 from 44.49.
How can this be explained? There are a couple of explanations for this.
The majority of users - likely - came from Windows XP. Microsoft did release information about Windows XP's state of security last month, but that was mid-August, and it is highly unlikely that it had a big impact on that month's usage statistics.
New hardware on the other hand ships with Windows 8 in most cases, and while users have options to downgrade to Windows 7, it is unlikely that many will do so. But new hardware has been available before. While some new products entered the market in August, it is unlikely that they made such a big impact in the statistics.
Back to school programs may have had an impact on this, even though it may have been a bit early too make a big impact depending on the country.
When you open the main Netmarketshare website, you will notice an announcement about an "important methodology change" at the top left corner.
This month we start deducting hidden pages from our usage share statistics. Hidden pages are pages that are rendered but never viewed by the user, therefore, they should not be included in usage share data. An example of a hidden page is a page that loads in a background tab upon the launch of the browser and is never made visible.
What this means basically is that the company has removed all page loads of pages from its statistics that are not viewed by the user. It is not clear why XP took the biggest hit here though
An FAQ entry on the website explains the effect of hidden pages on the usage share statistics. It explains that browser prerendering, which Google Chrome does, creates hidden pages that users may not view at all. These pages should not count as page views in the statistics. In addition, a browser's session restore feature may also load pages that users do not view during a session. It is interesting to note that Chrome took a dive in August, likely because of this.
It will be interesting to see how the release of Windows 8.1 and the availability of new Haswell powered PCs will impact the statistics. What is your take on this?
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What mental age of reader are you targeting with the first sentence? 10?
Why not write an article on how to *avoid* upgrading from W10 to W11. Analogous to those like me who avoided upgrading from 7 to 10 for as long as possible.
If your paymaster Microsoft permits it, of course.
5. Rufus
6. Ventoy
PS. I hate reading these “SEO optimized” articles.
I used Rufus to create an installer for a 6th gen intel i5 that had MBR. It upgraded using Setup. No issues except for Win 11 always prompting me to replace my local account. Still using Win 10 Pro on all my other PCs to avoid the bullying.
bit pointless to upgrade for the sake of upgrading as you never know when you’ll get locked out because ms might suddenly not provide updates to unsupported systems.
ps…. time travelling?
written. Jan 15, 2023
Updated • Jan 13, 2023
This happens when you schedule a post in WordPress and update it before setting the publication date.
Anyone willing to downgrade to this awful OS must like inflicting themselves with harm.
I have become convinced now that anybody who has no qualms with using Windows 11/10 must fit into one of the following brackets:
1) Too young to remember a time before W10 and W11 (doesn’t know better)
2) Wants to play the latest games on their PC above anything else (or deeply needs some software which already dropped W7 support)
3) Doesn’t know too much about how computers work, worried that they’d be absolutely lost and in trouble without the “”latest security””
4) Microsoft apologist that tries to justify that the latest “features” and “changes” are actually a good thing, that improve Windows
5) Uses their computer to do a bare minimum of like 3 different things, browse web, check emails, etc, so really doesn’t fuss
Obviously that doesn’t cover everyone, there’s also the category that:
6) Actually liked W7 more than 10, and held out as long as possible before switching, begrudgingly uses 10 now
Have I missed any group off this list?
You have missed in this group just about any professional user that uses business software like CAD programs or ERP Programs which are 99% of all professional users from this list.
Linux doesn’t help anyone who is not a linux kid and apple is just a fancy facebook machine.
Microsoft has removed KB5029351 update
only from windows update though
KB5029351 is still available from the ms update catalog site
1. This update is labaled as PREVIEW if it causes issues to unintelligent people, then they shouldn’t have allowed Preview updates ot install.
2. I have installed it in a 11 years old computer, and no problems at all.
3. Making a big drama over a bluescreen for an updated labeled as preview is ridiculous.
This is probably another BS internet drama where people ran programs and scripts that modified the registry until they broke Windows, just for removing stuff that they weren’t even using just for the sake of it.
Maybe people should stop playing geeks and actually either use Windows 10 or Windows 11, but don’t try to modify things just for the sake of it.
Sometimes removing or stopping things (like defender is a perfect example) only need intelligence, not scripts or 3rd party programs that might mess with windows.
Windows 11 was a pointless release, it was just created because some of the Windows team wanted to boost sales with some sort of new and improved Windows 10. Instead, Microsoft cannot support one version well let alone two.
Windows 11 is the worst ugly shame by Microsoft ever. They should release with every new W11 version a complete free version of Starallback inside just to make this sh** OS functionally again.
motherboard maker MSI has recently released a statement regarding the “unsupported processor” blue screen error for their boards using Intel 600/700 series chipsets & to avoid the KB5029351 Win11 update:
https://www.msi.com/news/detail/MSI-On–UNSUPPORTED-PROCESSOR–Error-Message-of-Windows-11-Update-KB5029351-Preview-142215
check out the following recent articles:
Neowin – Microsoft puts little blame on its Windows update after UNSUPPORTED PROCESSOR BSOD bug:
https://www.neowin.net/news/microsoft-puts-little-blame-on-its-windows-update-after-unsupported-processor-bsod-bug/
BleepingComputer – Microsoft blames ‘unsupported processor’ blue screens on OEM vendors:
https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/microsoft-blames-unsupported-processor-blue-screens-on-oem-vendors/
While there may be changes or updates to the Windows 10 Store for Business and Education in the future, it is premature to conclude that it will be discontinued based solely on rumors.
My advice, I left win 15 years ago. Now I’m a happy linux user (linuxmint) but there is Centos, Fedora, Ubuntu depending on your needs.
motherboard maker MSI has recently released new BIOS/firmware updates for their Intel 600 & 700 series motherboards to fix the “UNSUPPORTED_PROCESSOR” problem (Sept. 6):
https://www.msi.com/news/detail/Updated-BIOS-fixes-Error-Message–UNSUPPORTED-PROCESSOR–caused-BSOD-on-MSI-s-Intel-700-and-600-Series-Motherboards-142277
I try to disable the Diagnostics Tracking Service (Connected Devices Platform User Services) but it wont let me disable it, any help will be greatly appreciated.
Tank you for your help