Windows is dead, long live Windows!

So Microsoft has finally killed off Windows 98. Despite some protests when it tried to put the old girl to sleep back in January 2004, this time most everybody regards it as a mercy killing.

Not that any Windows 98 boxes are going to self-destruct on the anointed date, but after that time you won’t be able to ask Microsoft for help if you can’t figure out what went wrong.

Rabid suggests that if you’re still using Win98 you shouldn’t be allowed out on your own. You could get hurt.

Windows Vista is just around the corner, well, OK, there’s a huge chunk of long straight road before we reach the corner, but when it arrives it will be the fifth Windows incarnation since Windows 98 supplanted Win95.

Despite the promise of a brand new version real soon now, the biggest noise surrounding Windows is that you can also run it on your new Macintosh.

The jury is still out on whether this will see increased market share for Apple, but one thing is certain. Microsoft will sell a few more copies of Windows Vista than it had predicted.

When enough users have loaded Windows onto their Macs, will Microsoft finally realise that the problem hasn’t been Windows after all, but dodgy hardware?

Apple has long championed the reduced crashability of its PCs over the offerings from the Wintel camp, but what if it turns out to be nothing to do with the OS but better built hardware?

Once again, the real winner will be Microsoft while the losers will be all the me-too beige-box PC makers. Rabid can hardly wait for a clone war if Apple’s kit proves to be an irresistible platform for Vista.
And Apple has never been afraid to sue anybody.