Of course, in many ways the bar wasn't set too high. Still, Microsoft must be feeling relieved at the good sales clip for what is still, after all, its core business.
Unfortunately, thanks to pre-sales discounts and general lack of promotional effort behind the Ultimate version, revenue growth wasn't quite as impressive. Looking strictly at dollar sales, Windows 7 is up 82% over than the equivalent time period for Vista.
The NPD reported the top-selling versions of the software and their average prices for the week ending October 24 as follows:
1. Windows 7 Home Premium Upgrade / $76
2. Windows 7 Pro Upgrade / $147
3. Windows 7 Home Premium Family Pack 3 User Upgrade / $149
In a tough economic time for packaged software, Windows 7 appears to be faring fairly well. The PC hardware sales picture wasn't nearly as rosy, however. Although total PC sales were up 49 percent in year-over-year sales and a full 95 percent over the previous week, the overall growth rate was not as high as during the Vista launch window, which saw a 68% jump in year-over-year and 170% gain over the week prior to Vista's launch. Vista had a slight advantage with its January release however, which typically shows a larger PC sales footprint than the month of October.