Speaking at a news conference in Belgium, where he was to announce the establishment of an "innovation center" in the Belgian city of Mons, Ballmer gave XP fans a little hope. Ballmer said:
"XP will hit an end-of-life. We have announced one. If customer feedback varies we can always wake up smarter but right now we have a plan for end-of-life for new XP shipments."
The end-of-life plan for Windows XP states that - with the exception of ULCPCs - Microsoft will stop licensing Windows XP to computer makers and end retail sales by June 30.
Microsoft has been quite adamant about the end of XP. It's strange that he made his "if customer feedback varies" statement, because if Microsoft bothered to listen, they'd know both analysts and users want XP to continue until the next version of Windows releases (targeted for 2010). In fact, there's a petition to save XP here with over 164K signatures.
Source: Tech Ex
