Microsoft has announced, at the Computex trade show in Taiwan, that it will extend the life of Windows XP until June 2010 but only on low powered desktops and laptops. According to this BBC report, low powered lap top "machines that have no more than 1GB of RAM; a hard drive up to 80GB in size; a processor running no faster than 1GHz; a screen no larger than 10.2in (25cm) and no touch screen" qualify, but no specifications have been given for the desktops. This comes as little surprise as Microsoft has been extending the life of the OS at each of the previous deadlines and because PC makers have found loop holes in their licensing terms with Microsoft. Many in the industry "believe the decision is also motivated by the fact that low cost machines cannot run Windows Vista" and because the popular low cost laptops, such as the Asus Eee PC, mostly run on Linux.
