How about a comparison on merit, not marketing 1508

We are talking of different things, obviously. IBM and Novell and others (Red Hat, Dell, HP, for example) serve a server market with characteristics quite different from the home PC market. If you think that Windows Server 2003 is being sold the same way as XP Home, you are not paying attention.

You say that the free software "won't go away" but you typically point to the commercial success of linux from IBM, et al, as proof. Get a clue, the commercial linux is not a free environment.

Well Microsoft is certainly not recommending that server users buy XP Home or even XP Pro to satisfy their needs. Why bring it up at all?

You know very little apparently about Win2K3 or even XP Pro.

You have to define some real world situation that illustrates your point, Bob. You are talking in self-defined abstracts that are just circular arguments. If you have a need for a function that is not in some Windows version that you use, you would have to obtain the extended function somehow. That may, in some cases, mean obtaining a different Windows version. More often it is just an opportunity for someone to market an add-on.

So what is your point? Windows, as sold by Microsoft, satisfies the current needs of a good many consumers who never have any need to go beyond these functions. If and when they do, they seek other solutions, either from Microsoft or elsewhere. That is just an obvious fact. If I buy a car and want to cross the ocean, I have to look for an additional solution. That is my problem and not the problem of the millions who do not want to cross it. Why should we care?