5 hot smartphones under Rs 20,000

5 hot smartphones under Rs 20,000.

Microsoft offers Windows 8 for Rs 1,999 to cajole users of pirated OS

NEW DELHI: Offer a sophisticated operating system for the price of a pair of branded jeans. This seems to be Microsoft’s strategy to cajole millions of users running pirated copies of its flagship Windows operating system (OS) to turn a leaf and become legitimate, paying customers.

The Redmond, Washington-based software giant is offering a deep discount on Windows 8 for a few months, selling a copy priced at Rs 11,999 for Rs 1,999. From a computer that runs Windows XP, Vista or Windows 7 – pirated or otherwise – users can download a licensed copy of Windows 8 Pro, the version with all the bells and whistles, for an 83% discount. No questions asked.

The offer is valid till January 31, 2013. An upgrade DVD costs Rs 3,499 and if you bought a Windows 7 computer after June 2012, an upgrade is yours for Rs 699.

Microsoft is silent on whether this is a security loophole or a deliberate strategy. Company officials declined comment. Raju PP, editor of tech blog Techpp.com, who installed Windows 8 on a non-activated Windows 7 installation by paying Rs 1,999, said: “I have strong reasons to believe that this was a deliberate move to push up initial sales. Microsoft is big and wise enough to do a basic check for legitimacy of Windows 7 installation. They could have done a background check of the installation or could have asked for the Windows 7 licence key. But they didn’t”.

For years, the hordes of users who used pirated copies of the flagship Windows OS represented a tricky knot for software giant Microsoft. They were potentially robbing the company of billions of dollars in revenue. And yet, cracking down would have made them turn to free, open-source platforms.

This would have diluted the immense network effect that benefits Microsoft and helps preserve its market dominance. So, Microsoft mostly cracked down on piracy among companies and enterprise users and left personal users alone.

That seems to be changing as the company unveiled Windows 8, a touchscreen-optimised OS that marks a radical departure in its user interface to usher in a tile-based system common to personal computers, tablets and mobile devices. With these upgrade offers, within four days of its launch, 4 million licences of Windows 8 have been bought and downloaded globally.

The deep discount is likely to find many takers among users in emerging economies who run pirated versions of the OS. “They are obviously trying to lure pirated users, which is a big market. Not many enterprises plan to move to Windows 8 as they are still in the process of moving from Windows XP to Windows 7. Microsoft is trying to tap into the big market of pirated Windows, which is much bigger than their enterprise market,” said Vishal Tripathi, principal research analyst, Gartner.

As per Netmarkershare.com, Windows currently has over 80% market share worldwide in desktop OS. The main reason for piracy is the high price of a legitimate Windows copy. A genuine Windows 7 OS costs at least 5,000 (Home Basic) even today, while a pirated copy of Windows 7 Ultimate, legally priced at 11,488, can be bought for a few hundred rupees in the grey market. There has been great consumer interest in Windows 8, which clocked 16 million downloads for preview.

Google’s Android software in 3 out of 4 smartphones

AN FRANCISCO: Three out of every four smartphones sold in the third quarter featured Google Inc’s Android mobile operating system, as the gap between Google and Apple Inc-based phones widened further, according to a new research report.

Shipments of Android-based smartphones made by Samsung, HTC and other vendors nearly doubled in the third quarter, reaching 136 million units, according to industry research firm IDC. The strong sales boosted Android’s share of the worldwide smartphone market to 75 percent, from 57.5 percent in the year-ago period.

Apple’s share of the market increased to 14.9 percent during the third quarter, from 13.8 percent a year earlier. Apple’s iPhone uses the company’s iOS mobile software.

While Android pulled further ahead of Apple’s iOS, its gains have come mainly at the expense of rival operating systems Blackberry and Symbian, with shipments of phones running those systems declining significantly.

IDC analyst Kevin Restivo cited Android’s close “tie-ins” to Google’s broad array of online services, which include online search and maps, as an important asset that has helped Android grow.

“Google has a thriving, multi-faceted product portfolio. Many of its competitors, with weaker tie-ins to the mobile OS, do not,” Restivo said in the IDC report, which was released on Thursday.

Google offers its Android operating system free to phone manufacturers, and primarily makes money from online advertising when consumers access its services on the devices.

Research in Motion’s Blackberry operating system had 7.7 percent share in the third quarter, compared with 9.5 percent a year earlier.

Symbian, which had 14.6 percent share a year ago, had a 4.1 percent share in the third quarter. Smartphone maker Nokia still offers the Symbian software in some of its phones, but the company has largely shifted to Microsoft Corp’s software.

Mobile versions of Microsoft’s software accounted for 3.6 percent of the smartphone market in the third quarter. But IDC said that the recent launch of the new Microsoft Phone 8 operating system could improve its position in the fast-growing market.

Microsoft’s SmartGlass App: A futuristic app that helps devices talk to each other and access content

BANGALORE: Even as Ferraris zipped across the Buddh International Circuit last week for the 2012 Indian Grand Prix Championship, a set of young gamers in India were traversing the similar course on their Xbox machines. The driver/player behind the console’s hot wheel (Forza) can now be assisted by a navigator, informing the driver of key turns, route maps, the position of the car and speed. The only difference is that the navigator accesses vital information on his smartphone which is enabled by an app – the SmartGlass app – launched by Microsoft on Oct 26, along with the Windows 8 launch.

With this SmartGlass app, the navigator can access the screen displayed on the driver’s console box on his smartphone. It ensures interconnectivity between the devices – Xbox screens can be shared on TV screens, PCs or on mobile phones. Simultaneously, the navigator can also do some browsing (with the IE10 browser) and dig out information while the game is on.

This app has enabled different gadgets to connect to each other seamlessly and even access content simultaneously. Users can access emails, check information on the hero of the movie that they are watching or find the latest weather report on one of the gadgets and at the same time not disturb the main screen. This is a new level of device integration and the beginning of a technological trend that is likely to find its way in many futuristic gadgets.

Despite the onslaught by app developers, a tech major like Microsoft is able to maintain an edge by bringing out features and products which are difficult to replicate because of the huge implementation base, scale and costs involved in creating them.

Apps, especially mobile apps, have emerged as a serious threat to tech majors, with worldwide mobile app store downloads surpassing 45.6 billion in 2012 and free downloads accounting for 40.1 billion and paid-for downloads totalling 5 billion as of September 2012, according to a Gartner report.

Microsoft seems to have maintained an edge over rivals by developing more and more futuristic technologies. Interestingly, the SmartGlass app has made a quiet entry onto Windows 8-enabled devices through the XboX platform – the same gateway through which the Kinect technology made an entry a few years ago and opened a vista of people-friendly applications in the motion-sensor space.

“What Kinect did to the motion sensing technology, we expect SmartGlass to do in the device integration space,” says Anshu Mor, business group head, interactive entertainment business, Microsoft India. “The gaming console can double up as your PC enabling games, music, video and smart jobs,” he says.

Intel has been hinting atdeveloping chips to enable this form of interconnectivity between devices. During a meet at San Francisco, the company’s CTO had stated that they were creating wifi-enabled chips where wi-fi functionalities are loaded onto the processors itself. “Everything that computes connects,” Yorgos Palaskas, research leader at Radio Integration Lab, Intel, had told ET when asked to comment on the new wifi chip Intel is working on. Such chips would help devices connect to each other.

The first taste of this interconnectivity feature, which is likely to be seen in future gadgets, has been unveiled through the SmartGlass app. The full potential of this app will be unleashed when Indians get to access services like Xbox Music and Xbox Video. “There are 30 million music apps on Xbox Music. However, these are not available in India. They are only available in 22 markets globally,” says Amrish Goyal, director, Windows Business Group, Microsoft India.

Once this is available in India, the entire playlist of songs of one’s choice can be accessed on the mobile phone. With the smartglass app, users can scroll through the playlist on their smartphones.