A Californian woman has filed a class-action lawsuit against
Microsoft after she was charged $59.25 for downgrading her Windows
Vista PC to XP.
In a
lawsuit
filed in the US District Court for the Western District of
Washington in Seattle, Los Angeles resident Emma Alvarado is asking
that Microsoft return the downgrading fee she paid when buying her
Lenovo PC.
That PC came pre-installed with Windows Vista Business but she
wanted Windows XP Professional, which she saw as a more reliable
system.
Alvarado purchased the PC in June 2008, according to the
lawsuit.
Alvarado is also inviting others who have paid similar fees to
downgrade to XP to join the action, and is requesting refunds for
them as well.
Many customers who purchased PCs with Vista pre-installed opted
to downgrade to XP, because they were unhappy with Vista's
"numerous problems," according to Alvarado's action.
The lawsuit accuses Microsoft of using its market power to "take
advantage of consumer demand for the Windows XP operating system",
by requiring people to buy Vista PCs and then charging them to
downgrade to the XP operating system they would like.
Microsoft has not commented on the action. It says it has not
yet been served with the lawsuit.
When Microsoft released Vista to customers in January 2007, it
gave them downgrade rights if they were not happy with the new
OS.
As the forthcoming Windows 7 OS is said to be similar to Windows
Vista, Microsoft may be worried that there will still be a call
among some consumers for rights to carry on downgrading to XP.
OEMs have already had their rights to carry on selling PCs with
XP pre-installed, and most slimmed-down netbooks come with XP as
the only option. Microsoft says all netbooks will be able to use
Windows 7.