Microsoft touts sales of greater than 200 million Win 8 licenses. Listed here are 5 reasons to not be impressed.

Microsoft sold greater than 200 million Windows 8 and eight.1 licenses throughout the controversial OS’s first 15 months, Tami Reller, the company’s executive VP of selling, revealed Thursday at a Goldman Sachs technology conference.

Sounds impressive, right? Not exactly.

Sure, 200 million is a huge number — that’s about one license for each 35 people on this planet, a degree of ubiquity most companies would kill for. But Microsoft isn’t most companies. Put into historical or aspirational context, Windows 8 and eight.1 have underwhelmed.

Not convinced? Listed here are five reasons to not be impressed.

1. Windows 8 sales can’t keep pace with Windows 7’s precedent.
In January 2013, Reller, then CFO of the Windows division, said Windows 8 had sold greater than 60 million licenses since launching the former October. She said the pace roughly matched Windows 7’s progress in the course of the same period. In May, when Windows 8’s license sales passed 100 million, Microsoft again said its new OS was performing comparably to Windows 7.

Microsoft’s Windows 8 boasts have always been a section suspect, however the company can not argue that Win 8 is selling in addition to the former version. Windows 7 license sales topped 240 million within the OS’s first year of availability. In three more months, Windows 8 had moved just a little greater than 80% as many licenses.

[Are Android apps coming to Windows? Read Microsoft’s Windows Strategy Gets Muddy.]

2. Microsoft defines “sell” differently than most people.
Microsoft’s Windows figures consult with “sell-in” numbers, not “sell-through” numbers. Those 200 million Windows 8 and eight.1 licenses, in other words, derive from the amount sold to OEMs and retailers, not the number sold to actual end-users. The variety of Windows 8 machines actually active within the wild is lower.

Microsoft’s tally doesn’t include volume licenses, consisting of those sold to enterprises. But analysts say volume deals had been sluggish, too.

Corporate Windows 8.1 uptake hasn’t increased outside of isolated tablet projects, or even within mobility deployments, Windows 8 slates are activated less often than iPads, Forrester analyst David Johnson told InformationWeek last month. “Windows 8 and the enterprise aren’t belongings you usually hear within the same sentence,” said IDC analyst Al Gillen in a separate interview.

3. Some Windows 8 licenses are more valuable than others.
Windows 8 Pro launched at a promotional price of $39.99, but some Windows 7 users could purchase it for as low as $14.99. In February 2013, though, the professional version jumped to $199.99, with the everyday version coming in at only $80 less. Though Windows 8.1 was released last fall as a free upgrade to existing Windows 8 users, the $199.99 and $119.99 prices still stand for everybody else.

What’s the takeaway? loads of Windows 8 licenses were sold at a reduction. In theory, this tactic don’t have hurt Microsoft’s final analysis — by sacrificing licensing revenue, the corporate hoped to encourage Windows 8 adoption and thus revenue for its new Modern UI app ecosystem. In practice, however, this hasn’t worked out.

Here’s a part of the matter: Many early Windows 8 adopters installed the OS on older PCs that did not have touchscreens and were ill-equipped for Win 8’s touch-oriented Live Tiles. Win 8 also shackled the desktop with knuckleheaded UI changes consisting of the missing Start menu, which only exacerbated the difficulty.

Windows 8.1 was an try to assuage the user discontent that resulted from these problems, however the OS has mostly continued to flounder. Evidently aware that 8.1 wasn’t enough, Microsoft is reportedly planning another Windows update to make its new UI friendlier to mouse-and-keyboard users.

4. Windows licenses don’t drive device sales as they used to.
Reports last year claimed Microsoft offered OEMs cheaper Windows and Office licenses in exchange for ramped-up production of smaller Windows tablets. While such reports have never been verified, manufacturers have released a rash of Win 8.1 mini-slates in recent months, most of which come pre-loaded with Office. This means that just as Microsoft took an early hit with discounted Windows 8 licenses, the corporate may also have sacrificed upfront revenue to realize a number of its more moderen sales.

Regardless of behind-the-scenes negotiations between Microsoft and OEMs, many Windows 8 and eight.1 devices have sold well only following hefty price cuts. Microsoft presumably hopes these low-margin devices will eventually stimulate growth in additional lucrative areas akin to the Windows Store or Office 365 and other of the company’s cloud-based services. But thus far, much of Windows 8’s modest momentum appears to have come on the cost of profit margins.

5. Windows 8 isn’t popular on any form factor.
Microsoft apologists sometimes indicate that Windows 8 was predestined to post lower sales numbers than Windows 7 since the latter had the good thing about following Windows Vista, whose infamous flop drove demand for a latest desktop OS. Some have also suggested Windows 8 adoption was stunted by the slumping PC market. With more people using tablets, some older PCs aren’t being replaced, and others are being pushed into longer lifecycles. Both trends, or so the arguments go, decrease demand for a brand new version of Windows.

While these arguments aren’t completely invalid, they ignore a massive point: Windows 8 was designed as both a tablet and desktop platform. If the OS have been more appealing, that needs to have insulated it from fluctuations within the traditional PC market.

Unfortunately for Microsoft, Windows 8.1 tablets are still living off Apple and Google’s table scraps. A barrage of holiday sales may have helped Windows tablet makers move several more units — but they couldn’t stop record iPad sales or the ongoing proliferation of low-cost Android slates.

Even if the computer slump isn’t Windows 8’s fault, the OS clearly hasn’t helped. In January, Windows 8 and eight.1 accounted for a measly 11.7% of all desktop users, in line with Net Applications. Windows 7 runs on almost half all desktops, or even Windows XP, in order to lose support in lower than 60 days, greater than doubles Win 8/8.1’s market share. Greater than 60% of Win 8/8.1 users are still running the sooner version, indicating that 8.1 hasn’t done enough to motivate the market. To feature insult to injury, HP has started selling Windows 7 PCs in a “back by popular demand” promo.

Put simply, Windows 8’s failure is twofold: It is not popular among Microsoft’s legacy customers, and it’s not popular one of many mobile-minded new generation of users.

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Michael Endler joined InformationWeek as an associate editor in 2012. He previously worked in talent representation within the entertainment industry, as a contract copywriter and photojournalist, and as a teacher. Michael earned a BA in English from Stanford University in 2005 … View Full Bio

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