3 March 2008
According to an email sent last February by Microsoft general manager John Kalkman, the software giant lowered Windows Vista's minimum hardware requirements to minimum levels only because Intel needed to sell more graphics chipsets.
The email was just one of many released in response to a federal class action suit that accuses Microsoft of misleading users with those "Windows Vista Capable" logos, displayed on new PCs in the run-up to the operating system's debut. The logos appeared on systems more than nine months before the OS was unveiled. John Kalkman wrote to Scott Di Valerio, who oversaw Microsoft's dealings with PC partners saying:
In the end, we lowered the requirement to help Intel make their quarterly earnings so they could continue to sell motherboards with the 915 graphics embedded,
Intel told The Wall Street Journal that allegations surrounding its earning were untrue, arguing that Kalkman:
is not qualified in any shape or form to have knowledge about Intel's internal financial forecasts related to chipsets, motherboards or any other product.
Meanwhile, Microsoft informed the paper that it included the Intel 915 chipset in the Windows Vista Capable program based on successful testing of beta versions of Windows Vista on the chip set and the broad availability of the chip set in the market.
In another message, a Microsoft board member tells Steve Ballmer he's decided against "upgrading" one of his machines to Vista:
I cannot understand with a product this long in creation why there is such a shortage of drivers.
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