According to a report issued by the NPD Group, the launch of Microsoft’s new operating system, Windows 7, has been well received by consumers and has surpassed the initial sales levels of its predecessor.

According to NPD’s weekly tracking service, Windows 7 software unit sales in the US were 234 percent higher than Vista’s first few days of sales. But according to Stephen Baker, vice president of industry analysis at NPD, revenue growth wasn’t as strong due to a combination of early discounting on pre-sales and lack of promotional activity for its top end edition, Ultimate.

“Microsoft’s program of early low-cost pre-sales, high visibility marketing, and aggressive deals helped make the Windows 7 software launch successful,” he said.

“In a slow environment for packaged software Windows 7 brought a large number of customers into the software aisles.”

Another interesting fact to come out of the report was that Windows PC sales were up 49 per cent over this time last year and a staggering 95 per cent compared to the week before launch. But overall PC sales performed much better during the Vista launch which saw a 68 per cent year-on-year growth and 170 per cent increase compared to the week before launch.

“A combination of factors impacted Windows 7 PC sales at the outset, but the trajectory of overall PC sales is very strong leading into the holiday season,” he said.

“Vista had a slight advantage at launch, as January traditionally has a bigger sales footprint than October.  The other hurdle Windows 7 faced was sales of PCs with older operating systems (XP and Vista) were high, making up 20 percent of sales during the Windows 7 launch, compared to just 6 percent of older operating sales during Vista’s launch week.”