Please stop your whining, it is getting quite annoying. We do realise you have an OS called MeII (aka Vista) and it isn't selling. Please accept my sympathies but not my dollars, you lost me and all my clients as a customer. I am going Linux now wherever possible, and from the sound of things, that is in many more places than you find comfortable.
Why? There are a bunch of reasons, some of which I will outline here. First, MeII brings me as a consumer nothing but a pretty shell. There may be a bunch of nuance things that are better, but under the skin there is really nothing to write home about.
You then raised the price quite a bit while hurting consumers with activation. I have yet to meet anyone who has a positive view of this technology, but most aren't informed enough to realize how badly they are being hurt. You don't feel this way because it fattens your already 80+% margins.
Security is a valid scare tactic, but I found the UAC so annoying in the beta inflicted on me that I stopped using the OS. It has been thoroughly defeated and your ultra-secure OS has had enough security related patches already to burst that particular balloon. Still you bang the drum, and just look silly doing it.
When it comes to security, people with access to the full MeII source tree, many with code in XP and MeII itself, tell me the security tacked on is just that, tacked on. They tell me there are no fundamental changes to the security model, just in their words, "Windows(TM) dressing". Throw white papers at me until you get bored, but I will take their word for it any day, I actually trust them.
Then comes compatibility or lack thereof. I installed MeII on about 10 client machines, and so many things broke that most were removed within a week. Two remain, the rest are drawing up plans for Linux migrations, the first server goes in the week after next replacing an old Windows 2000 Server box.
The whole point of backwards compatibility is to run the legacy software that people use and have enough invested in to override the massive markup and attendant costs that come with MeII. If you are going to have a case to sell the new OS, you need seamless backwards compatibility.
If you don't have the backwards compatibility, you need to demonstrate a damn good reason not to have it. Security is more than a good enough reason, and I should be congratulating you on your choices, but you cheaped out on the security while breaking compatibility. This is a complete worst of both worlds situation.
If thing are not compatible, and they are not, then you have the choice to go with a new OS and new software or stick with the old. Most of my clients are sticking with the old, but when an upgrade is necessary, MeII will be the last option. Creative types are looking at Macs, servers are all going Linux, and quite possibly there will be a few MeIIs put in, but I will not be maintaining them. My clients have a long memory, and so do I.
Then comes the DRM infection, baked in to the very DNA of MeII. Why you did this is beyond me, software like AnyDVD and countless others has comprehensively trounced any DRM you have on the OS. You are left with a user antagonistic forced upgrade cycle where you are in a release war with the anti-DRM crowd. You have lost this kind of fight every time, you will lose this one, and all the end users get is pain. Why should I like this again? Where is the benefit to me?
Then there is the speed, or lack of it. If you put MeII head to head on anything but the latest high end hardware, it is notably slower than XP. If you wonder why people are not rushing out to shell out the dough for this, that is an easy one to show potential customers.
The list goes on and on. In the end, what it comes down to is that people don't trust you as a company any more, and you are not demonstrating that MeII gives them anything that is a clear benefit. For their money, there are lots of easy ways to show how it is demonstrably inferior to its predecessor though.
From the increasingly desperate screed emanating from your spinners, it sounds like you are getting the message where it counts, in your wallets. Good, maybe this will catch your attention more than trifling lawsuits that you can buy your way out of with campaign contributions. For me I am gone, Ubuntu is quite nice, and with ATI opening up their Linux drivers, well, I don't need anything more.
The arm twisting sales days are over, there are several credible alternatives now. When you try and force upgrades like you are doing with DX10 and games, you will lose more than you gain. I want to play Shadowrun and others, but instead I bought a Wii. Windows is no longer considered a gaming platform for me.
So, you can't force things, there is no benefit, and there are lots of negatives. Microsoft faces an uphill battle to convince IT managers like me that they are relevant in the face of Google and Linux. If MeII is your best response, well, it hasn't been all that nice knowing you.