Home One of the areas Microsoft had a lot of feedback with Windows Vista was about the SKU line up. The team has heard a lot of feedback from customers and partners that helped shape the current Windows 7 SKU strategy.
Rationale
We have created a SKU line-up where each SKU is a superset of the previous SKU. This means that each higher edition SKU will have every feature lower edition SKUs have. We will be focusing on two primary editions of Windows 7: Windows 7 Home Premium and Windows 7 Professional.
We will continue to offer a few targeted SKUs for customers with specialized needs: for price-sensitive customers with small notebook PCs, some OEMs will offer Windows 7 Starter. For customers in emerging markets, we will make Windows 7 Home Basic available. Businesses have two recommended choices: Windows 7 Professional and Windows 7 Enterprise. Windows 7 Professional is recommended for small businesses and Windows 7 Enterprise is recommended for mid- and large-sized businesses that have a Software Assurance Agreement with Microsoft.
SKUs for Windows 7:
• The SKU lineup for Windows 7 is: Windows® 7 Starter, Windows® 7 Home Basic (in Emerging Markets only), Windows® 7 Home Premium, Windows® 7 Professional, Windows® 7 Enterprise and Windows® 7 Ultimate.
o For Consumers, we recommend Windows 7 Home Premium for most customers and Windows 7 Professional for customers who want additional features and functionality useful for small business activities. o For Businesses, we recommend Windows 7 Professional for most customers and Windows 7 Enterprise for medium-to-large business and enterprise customers that choose to license Windows through Software Assurance. o The features in each version of Windows 7 build upon the one before it. As customers move up from one SKU to the next, from Windows 7 Starter through Windows 7 Ultimate, they gain additional features and lose none.