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June 4, 2008 10:28 AM PDT

Microsoft to businesses: Now is the time to switch to Vista

by Mike Ricciuti

Microsoft has already made its case for consumer adoption of Vista. Now, it's aiming its PR offensive at business customers.

The company on Wednesday released a white paper paper targeted at the many businesses that have chosen to stick with Windows XP instead of moving to Vista. Microsoft argues that Vista is more secure, reliable, and can save companies money when it comes to management and deployment.

"We have tried to close gaps for consumers, and we're doing the same for enterprises," Mike Nash, vice president of Windows Client Product Management at Microsoft, told CNET News.com.

Why should businesses deploy now? Nash says the release of Vista Service Pack 1 has improved Windows security, improved driver support, and minimized application compatibility issues, for starters.

Compared with Windows XP, Vista has had fewer vulnerabilities (45 for Vista versus 56 for XP); fewer critical vulnerabilities (17 as opposed to 35); and 60 percent fewer malicious software infections than XP SP2, Nash said.

Microsoft's Mike Nash

(Credit: Microsoft)

The big bonus for companies may come in cost savings versus XP when it comes to deployment and management of Vista across multiple machines, Nash said.

Tom Norton, the worldwide Microsoft services practice lead for Hewlett-Packard, said that a majority of HP's top 500 customers globally "are looking at this (Vista) as a way to save money on support of client environments."

As for application compatibility, the move from Internet Explorer 6 to Internet Explorer 7 was more traumatic than the Windows upgrade, said Norton.

Still, despite the statistics and reassurances, initial impressions tend to last. And the initial Vista experience for many people was less than stellar, a point which Microsoft concedes. Nash says that, yes, the company made a lot of changes with Vista that have taken time for customers to get used to, and initial driver and application support was lacking. But, "there is a huge gap between what is possible with Vista and the perception that is out there," he said.

Nash, who will soon celebrate his 17th anniversary with Microsoft, said that he has seen similar customer trepidation in the past when it comes to new Windows releases. "There has always been a version of Windows that is new that people don't know what to do with; there has always been the incumbent version; and there is always a new version on the horizon. It's not a new phenomenon," Nash said.

This time around, the X factor is Windows 7. Microsoft has said precious little about the planned Windows release, except that it will come in 2009 and will include a touch interface. Still, with companies just getting around to Vista deployment, does it make sense to wait for 7?

"I have heard that with every release (of Windows)," Nash said. "What I will say: back when I worked on security at Microsoft, a lot of customers said they would never deploy XP. Initially they were waiting for better security, then they were waiting for XP SP2. Then they were waiting for Longhorn (the code name used during Vista's development)."

Microsoft's message to customers is that Vista introduced a fair amount of new code in the operating system kernel and in device-level software. Sure, it's been a rough transition from XP to Vista. But Vista and Windows 7 will be largely compatible in those areas, according to the white paper release on Wednesday, meaning that customers will eventually need to bite the bullet and make the switch.

"There is always some level of evaluation that customers will want to go through. Five minutes for some; 12 to 18 months for others. The question is: what is the right time for you as a customer?" Nash said.

Mike Ricciuti joined CNET in 1996. He is now CNET News' Boston-based executive editor and east coast bureau chief, serving as department editor for business technology and software covered by CNET News, Reviews, and Download.com. E-mail Mike.

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Add a Comment (Log in or register) Showing 1 of 2 pages (56 Comments)
by MyRightEye June 4, 2008 10:48 AM PDT
And the reply for a growing number will be, "No, now is the time to switch to OS X"
Reply to this comment
by Lerianis June 4, 2008 11:50 AM PDT
Yeah, right.... with the numerous problems that they have been having lately with Leopard..... I don't think so.
by thelemurking June 4, 2008 1:43 PM PDT
Hardly anything my company runs has a Mac version of the software... so that option is rather pointless. We are sticking with XP. We have 4 Vista desktops and the only problem we have had with them was going through an old Linksys switch. Once I tracked that down and swapped it with a new switch, the networking problems cleared right up. Other than that, the Vista boxes work great for what they do, (Video production with Adobe CS3 Production Premium) Our video guys have all but quit using their iMacs in favor of Vista with CS3. Other than that, accounting for billing and traffic, plus the backend stuff such as playlists and schedules is all Windows.
by Penguinisto June 4, 2008 4:52 PM PDT
Actually, my own corp (nearly 100k employees, firmly in the Fortune 100) answered MSFT already with a big, fat nicely-worded version of "bugger off - we'll wait to see if Windows 7 is any good first". IMHO, corps would more likely switch to Linux long before OSX, if only for the fact that Linux already has all of the corp-friendly tools in place, and integrates nicely with the servers which (mostly) already run Linux.
by Dalkorian June 4, 2008 5:10 PM PDT
Lerianis replied on June 4, 2008 11:50 AM PDT
"Yeah, right.... with the numerous problems that they have been having lately with Leopard..... I don't think so."

Like what? (Careful Lerianis, I'm using Leopard right now and have been for months!) No, the reason they'll pick Linux over OSX is simple - Linux will run (very well mind you) on the equipment they currently have.
by UN4GIVEN-3 June 4, 2008 10:55 AM PDT
With everything going on in os market. I think I'll keep my xp until the end. At which time I'll convert everything over to mac.
Reply to this comment
by Lerianis June 4, 2008 11:51 AM PDT
Yeah right.... convert over to a Mac that cannot play any games, cannot run most programs, etc. etc. etc...... I don't think so.
If you do that, you are stupid, to be quite blunt. Even if my PARENTS were saying that, I would call them that.
by Penguinisto June 4, 2008 4:54 PM PDT
Leria, kindly keep your astroturfing arse quiet and let the adults speak... thank you. UN4GIVEN-3... you're certainly not alone; if Apple's growth curve is any indication, OSX will very likely become the dominant home machine by 2010, 1012 at the latest.
by catch23 June 4, 2008 6:00 PM PDT
Penguinisto, kindly keep your astroturfing arse quiet and let the adults speak... back to the basement with you!
Vista has 2x the USERS in a year and an half then Apple has been able to do in 20+ years.
By 2010 ( or I'll assume you meant 2012) you'll still be sitting there telling me Apple will be more then a bit player 'any time now'.
Just like last year, or the years preceding that.
by HomerSmi June 4, 2008 10:58 AM PDT
As far as I can tell businesses didn't switch to Vista because of lack of application compatibility. I'm not sure that a switch to OS X is going to address that.
Reply to this comment
by Penguinisto June 4, 2008 4:55 PM PDT
Agreed. OTOH, not much is stopping the corps form converting their in-house apps to run on something else entirely (e.g. Linux), or simply convert them for use in OSX (maybe, but not likely IMHO).
by epr_epr June 4, 2008 11:14 AM PDT
HomerSmi,

remember you are talking to Jobs fanboys.....
Reply to this comment
by wjcunning June 4, 2008 11:17 AM PDT
My business simply can't run on Vista. We telecommute a lot, and our Vista clients have serious problems handling routine VPN duties, not to mention problems interfacing Microsoft's own Outlook Web Access services. Vista is so bad that our vendor flatly refuses to do Vista installs for fear of liability.....they fear guys like me that will eye poke them if Vista breaks my business processes. Hey sports fans, with gas prices soaring, telecommuting looms LARGE in my company's future, we're squandering tons of money on commuting fuel costs, and it has to stop......until Vista lears to telecommute, we're solidly in the XP camp.
Reply to this comment
by Lerianis June 4, 2008 11:52 AM PDT
Vista telecommutes just fine. And it's VPN services are basically the same as the one in XP.
If there are problems, it is because your vendor is causing the problems somehow. I was recently setting up a VPN network for a school system.... took me 10 minutes for 30 computers, all running Vista.
by Vegaman_Dan June 4, 2008 12:36 PM PDT
Comments such as yours indicate that your IT department is woefully undereducated and/or incompetent if they are unable to provide these services. OWA is a browser based application and has *zero* to do with Vista. You might as well blame Firefox, Opera, and Safari for exactly the same reasons by that logic. Seriously, your IT department needs some basic computers 101 courses if this is the case.
by MMC Racing June 4, 2008 6:58 PM PDT
Is your Vendor "Geek Squad".. I mean really, OWA works perfect in Vista and so do VPN options... Operator Error at its best.
by NWLB June 4, 2008 11:18 AM PDT
Microsoft to business: It still sucks, by it anyway, we want to get our money before we replace it with Windows 7 two years hence.

Morons.

I play LOTRO, which supports DirectX, and I am not going to upgrade my perfectly good 5 year old system until early 2009, so I can get a decent Nehalem CPU that can run XP and Vista in a dual boot setup. If I have to buy Vista to run my game, so be it, but I'll be darned if I use it for anything else.

The day they start porting native versions of games to Mac, I'm taking my aged copies of XP, and leaving Microsoft forever, and I know I won't be alone.
Reply to this comment
by Lerianis June 4, 2008 11:54 AM PDT
Yeah, you will pretty much be alone, because a LOT of people who I know don't want to be locked into the Macintosh "Buy a whole new computer every year!" cycle.

I also don't understand why people bash on Vista. Frankly, on my PC's, it runs FASTER than XP does, not slower, but F A S T E R!

Same thing for most people who have tested their systems with Vista and XP both... it actually runs faster with Vista because of some memory management improvements.
by Kev Orng June 4, 2008 12:41 PM PDT
@Lerianis
"Buy a whole new computer every year!" cycle?

Huh?
I use two Macs at work, one is 6 years old, one is seven. My home Mac is 6 as well, and I have a ten year old Powerbook that needs a wallop every now and then, but it works. I've never heard of anybody ever talk about needing a new computer every year, even among the mac-haters. If anything, I usually hear reasonable people saying the Mac is better value because it has a longer life-span on average, barring the occasional bad bit of hardware, but any manufacturer can turn out a few of those every now and then.
To be fair, alongside our 2-year-old WinXP compositing workstation, we have a Windows2000 Pentium4 that hums away without a hiccup, and one of our edit suites is a rock-solid nine year old Windows NT workstation. Which we will hopefully be replacing soon, but only because the available hardware and the video codecs are getting ahead of us. It works fine otherwise.
But the older Macs need the least maintenance, and from my conversations, that's consistent with other people's experience. So I don't know where you got the "buy a new computer every year" theory from
by sniperdoc June 4, 2008 12:09 PM PDT
The problem is that Microsoft is trying to buy the corporate IT world's approval of Vista. I myself was approached by Dell and CDW about "incentives" to get all of our desktops switched to Vista. Here's why I can't and won't:

1. Our accounting software does not work with IE7 under Vista. There's a patch for IE7 under XP though.
2. We still have some Dell Optiplex L150r's and Inspiron 2500's if that rings a bell for people. (Sub-128MB of RAM and 800MHz CPU's, no dedicated GPU)
3. Poor business practice on Microsoft's part by "buying" the corporate world to inflate their figures for who in the corporate world uses Vista.

The ONLY reason they show a large use of Vista is because their numbers being terribly inflated due to OEM's pushing Vista out, but not having figures on how many users replace the OS with XP.

They say there's a lower cost? How so? Training of staff on a entirely new confusing interface? Training of support staff in troubleshooting new Vista "issues"? Productivity lost during the "adjustment phase" to the new operating system?

What a farce. Problem is nothing old supports Vista. I would have to buy entirely new hardware AND software just to keep the shop going beyond that... and with a staff of TWO I.T. guys supporting 14 offices in remote locations in FL and MI... no way.

Pardon my french but Fu@# Vista AND Microsoft.
Reply to this comment
by Vegaman_Dan June 4, 2008 12:38 PM PDT
Your reasons for not swtiching to Vista are valid. You are running on obsolete equipment many many years past its product life cycle. You're set up to work with an older OS just fine. This is not the norm for most business that replace their systems on the industry standard three year lifecycle though.
by Penguinisto June 4, 2008 4:59 PM PDT
@sniperdoc: Understandable, IMHO. I know of quite a few companies who faithfully run DOS-based apps to perform certain functions which do not require a huge new machine to perform them. @Dan: It takes nothing to install XP on a brand-new machine, and conceivably won't for at least the next five years or so, barring any massive new paradigm shifts in hardware tech.
by Mergatroid Mania June 4, 2008 6:47 PM PDT
You're 100% right. We operate some older machines at our business as well. To say "most businesses" replace their machines every two or three years is just BS. Show the stats to prove that please.

Obsolescence means a machine that can no longer do the job. Since your computers do the job just fine, they are not obsolete for the task they are performing.
There's no use AT ALL in buying a sports car to make a run to the grocery store.
by Timmy_J June 4, 2008 11:39 PM PDT
You couldn't be more correct. I am the ONLY IT person for a laptop based school that has students in every part of the US, Canada, Europe, as well as the middle east, and I simply can't see imaging all of those laptops with Vista instead of XP. Most of our students haven't even used a PC with Vista on it, let alone WORKED on one. I would have to work 24/7 just to answer all of the questions that the students would have about the op, and that doesn't even factor actual problems that the computers would have. Also, we would have to upgrade all of those laptops with better hardware just to run Vista.
I'm not even going to get started with the Vista problems. I will however say that, I took two years at a technical institute working with XP half that time, then with Vista, and I still have problems using Vista. It's just VERY difficult to find essential tools that were labeled under other names in XP as they are in Vista.
My advice to Microsoft for Windows 7, make it navigate more like XP than Vista, and MUCH system demanding. (My PC is dual booted with XP and Vista, and Vista uses an entire GB of ram just idling. Whereas, in Xp I can be surfing the web, checking my mail, and have an OCing program running an not even using 500 MB.)
Vista is not for businesses that are doing just fine with XP!!!
by fokkwp June 4, 2008 12:12 PM PDT
Maybe these Microsoft VP types would be more believable if they didn't so closely resemble CIA operatives - big, bulky, seeming to frown even when they are "smiling" as if it is an alien experience for them . . .
Reply to this comment
by fokkwp June 4, 2008 12:15 PM PDT
So, the message seems to be: when XP came out you guys thought you'd just wait for Longhorn, but look what a basket case *it* is, so don't even think about waiting around for 7.
Reply to this comment
by Maccess June 4, 2008 7:43 PM PDT
Yes, that's because the job of an operatin system is to WORK, and WORK efficiently with reasonable hardware requirements. 98SE was found in many businesses until 2005, Windows 2000 is still in widespread use, and XP saw widespread adoption only since around 2004, sometime after service pack 1.

Having a business OS isn't about bells and whistles, it's about being able to run company apps efficiently. Many admins spend so much time trimming down the OS, removing things that either use precious resources, or are security risks.

Companies don't adopt the latest and greatest fresh out the door, or even up to two years out the door because their main criteria is reliability and stability (and ability to run their applications--not the OS makers unwanted bundled applications).
by Michichael June 4, 2008 12:34 PM PDT
The problem is that deploying a new OS with this high of hardware requirements would BANKRUPT many businesses. Vista won't be phased in until every last machine has at least 2 GB of RAM, and justifiably, what the hell does a desktop user need that much RAM for? The OS?!

I'm a systems administrator for a fairly large company. Microsoft stopped selling XP licenses. We have over 800 Vista licenses and 0 Vista installs - we purchased down-grade rights and reimaged the machines. How much time and money could you save over my 20 minute reimage of an OS everyone of our employees knows how to use?

You couldn't PAY me to push Vista out on our users, and I love it at home. It just would not work in a business environment. The hardware reqs are far too high.
Reply to this comment
by hetzbh June 4, 2008 12:40 PM PDT
'We have tried to close gaps for consumers, and we're doing the same for enterprises,"
Translation: We made it absolutely DAMN hard to buy a PC/Notebook with XP for consumers. You want XP on your PC? buy a business class machine!
Now they try doing the same on enterprise, only this time it's gonna be harder.. way harder! saving? whats wrong with Pentium 4/onboard graphics/80GB disk with XP + apps that works perfectly well? where's the saving if I need to buy a WHOLE new machine to do the EXACT same job for the same person with the same work at my company? none, no savings!
Reply to this comment
by sanjayb June 4, 2008 12:53 PM PDT
I work @ a major Canadian bank. Vista probably won't be in our world for at least another 2 years. Most of our machines would need to be upgrade and we have alot of software that are not compatible with Vista.
Reply to this comment
by fgsdfgdsfgdsfg June 4, 2008 1:40 PM PDT
as a systems admin for a medimum sized business i can say i agree with Michichael. we purchase vista licenses with software assurance and employ downgrade rights and deploy XP on the machines. (i know microsoft is counting this as a vista license sold even though we aren;t running vista)
vista just doesn't work w/ many of the apps we run. IE7 in vista doesn't display many web pages correctly for our web based apps. (IE7 in XP works fine)
i have to run XP in a virtual machine so i can log into my sonicwall appliances because IE7 in vista doesn't display the pages.

vista is also much slower. i run a machine w/ a 10,000 RPM raptor hard disk and 4 gigs of ram running vista 64 bit. my co-worker running half the ram on a 7,200 RPM hard drive runs circles around me. when i type a unc path such as \\server\share it takes vista almost a full half minute to bring it up. XP is less then 1 second.

and why is IPv6 enabled by default. no one will ever use IPv6 for an internal private network. IPv4 will always be sufficent. IPv6 will only be used for public addresses on the internet (IE the public ip of your firewall or router). businesses will always still use IPv4 for their private LANs. The only time IPv6 would be used by vista is when someone plugs directly into the internet. even your average home user is behind a router most times?
Still microsoft insists on flooding your network with un-needed IPv6 broadcast traffic.
i don't get it.
Reply to this comment
by tekwiz4u June 4, 2008 2:08 PM PDT
Question is WHY UPGRADE?!!! Don't feed us "Its better because its more secure", or "it will save you money" crap. Nash will probably be saying the same thing when Windows 7 comes out, and the next version after that. The primary focus for the company is revenue turnover, but its at the expense of aggravating everyone else.
Reply to this comment
by bugm3n0t June 4, 2008 2:14 PM PDT
Earth to Redmond, Earth to Redmond....
Whoever is running the show over there, business doesn't want Vista. Repeat, business doesn't want Vista. Should we send someone to hit you on the head with a hammer or did you hear us the first time? With Windows 7 (great name, i know it's just code but did we fire the vice president in charge of code names?) around the corner (I'll believe that when I see it), business has every incentive to wait. Move on, light speed to Windows 7.
Reply to this comment
by craigbuyer June 4, 2008 3:21 PM PDT
I used windows 98 till the year 2006. Then I switched to Windows XP since windows 98 does not support large disk beyond 127GB. As a home user I just need internet explorer and MS office, Acrobat reader, VLC player. For running these applications, I dont need windows Vista. I am hoping Windows XP takes my for another 10 years before I will think another version of Windows.
Reply to this comment
by The_happy_switcher June 4, 2008 4:33 PM PDT
Microsoft to its consumers: "eat our crap, it's all we've got to offer."
Reply to this comment
by ppgreat June 4, 2008 5:03 PM PDT
Any IT department worth its salt should be investigating alternatives to MS right now. Not waiting for Windows 7 vapor or whatever. The time has never been better.
Reply to this comment
by mhatter13 June 4, 2008 5:19 PM PDT
Oh please, MS. No one believe this stuff anymore. I asked my pal at the Gates Foundation, in downtown Seattle no less, what OS they are using there. The answer? Windows XP. If Gates' own foundation doesn't need / want to 'upgrade,' why should the rest of us...
Reply to this comment
by Mergatroid Mania June 4, 2008 6:39 PM PDT
For me the issue is the DRM that has been built in. I've heard horror stories of people almost losing operability of all their movies and music because of a problem with Vista.

I honestly don't believe my computers operating system should be policing me, nor keeping track of what I have purchased.

Obviously MS cares more about the movie studios and record companies than they do about their customers or they wouldn't build crap like this into the os.

And, considering the cost, no I don't think I'll be buying it. I think the most expensive piece of my computer should be hardware, not the os.

Oh ya, will Mike Nash come to my home or business and pay to resolve any issues we have if we did switch? Pay to replace any software that doesn't work? I doubt it...
Reply to this comment
by TheSmellyMoa June 4, 2008 7:20 PM PDT
On the contrary, MSFT is as contemptuous of the recorded music and film industries as it is consumers. It wants to tax the RIAA, MPAA and the consumers through it's DRM. It'll never work. The entertainment industry lawyers are much nastier than MSFT's.
Showing 1 of 2 pages (56 Comments)
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