A Microsoft spokesperson said the company “will have more to come in the future about other great offers for different audiences.”

“This is a replay of what Microsoft did with Vista in that they tried to make enterprises buy SA to get upgrades even on the PCs they bought during the upgrade option timeframe,” says Silver. “Corporate users need to push OEMs and Microsoft to give them Windows upgrades on any new PCs they buy, if they don’t get them to do that they have two choices, either buy SA or delay PC purchases.”

The bottom line is that Thursday’s pricing announcement is targeted at consumers and has little bearing on companies looking to upgrade their desktops.

“These prices are data points for corporate users,” says Al Gillen, an analyst with IDC. “Most business uses will not go out and buy Windows 7 Pro at retail. The behavior corporate customers tend to have is to buy a new system with the new OS and they deploy based on getting the new OS with the new PC.”

Silver says the trick for corporate buyers is to figure out how they plan to get to Windows 7 before they buy a new PC. “There is a cost difference depending on how you get there and planning now could save some big money in the future. You need to figure out how many PCs and how they get upgrades.”