The holiday season is over and we want to know how well Windows 8 did.
The first evidence is in and it shows that Windows 8 wasn't a total bomb with consumers -- some folks out there definitely bought new Windows 8 PCs. But it also shows that Windows 8 isn't setting the world on fire.
A web site that monitors which operating systems are in use by computers on the Internet, Net Marketshare, shows that slightly more new Windows 8 devices were fired up in December than new Windows 7 PCs.
To be specific, in November, Windows 7 had 44.71% market share of all PCs and Windows 8 (including the tablet-only version, Windows RT) had 1.11%. In December, Windows 7 market share grew to 45.11% and Windows 8 (including RT) to 1.77%.
So, Windows 8 was up 0.7%, as compared to Windows 7, which was up 0.4%.
Windows 8's popularity seems to be on track with Microsoft Vista, an unpopular version of Windows released in 2007. Computerworld's Gregg Keizer reports that at the two-month mark, Vista's accounted for 2.2% of all Windows systems.
In the past, Microsoft has cautioned that it's still early for Windows 8, and therefore any snap judgments after two months are premature. When asked for comment, it again said that early sales of Windows 8 outpaced early sales of Windows 7, so there is reason for optimism.
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