Windows 7 buzz may stall Vista
The positive buzz for Windows 7 is creating an interesting challenge for Microsoft: It appears to be making it tougher to get businesses to move to Windows Vista.
And it's not like there has been a mad rush on that front to begin with.
Gartner did a survey in October that found about 30 percent of large businesses were likely to skip Vista and a significant number of other companies still hadn't decided what to do.
Plaudits for Windows 7, combined with a weakening economy, could mean that as many as half of businesses decide to skip Vista entirely, according to Gartner analyst Michael Silver.
"Anyone who was on the fence... is now pretty much likely to skip," Silver said Wednesday.
That's made things rough for those inside Microsoft whose job it is to advise businesses on their Windows upgrades. Microsoft isn't necessarily trying to discourage businesses from going from XP to 7 (an upgrade is an upgrade after all). But, the company is offering a couple of warnings.
"They are incredibly excited (about Windows 7)," says Gavriella Schuster, a senior director in the Windows unit. "We're just trying to temper that...so they are very realistic."
Although Windows 7 is getting strong early marks, it isn't a panacea for all of Vista's pain, Schuster said. Businesses have to work through the same application compatibility issues to go from XP to Windows 7 as they would to move from XP to Vista. Although Windows 7 is designed to be highly compatible with Windows Vista, all of the things that have made going from XP to Vista a challenge for businesses are also present when going from XP to Windows 7.
(Credit:
Microsoft )
Schuster also notes that some of the business-oriented features of Windows 7 only really light up when a business also moves to Windows Server 2008 R2 and starts using IPV6 networking.
Furthermore, Schuster says, businesses that are going to wait for Windows 7need to pay close attention to their schedule for moving off of Windows XP.
Customers should just think things through, Schuster said. "What are risks of skipping and are you comfortable with how quickly you may have to move to (Windows) 7?"
Silver notes that companies find that the end of life for the older operating system "kind of sneaks up on them." In part, that's because Microsoft offers support for so long for its software. Typically Windows releases are supported, at least in some form, for a decade or more. Third-party software makers, however, are keen to support as few operating systems as they need to.
By 2012, he says, many software makers are going to be aiming to drop support for XP, particularly for the latest versions of their products.
In general, Microsoft says those that are close to deploying Vista should move ahead.
"Keep going," Schuster said, adding that businesses that move to Vista will find that they will be in good shape to move those same machines to Windows 7.
In addition to the fact that many of the early compatibility and other challenges have been worked out, Schuster notes that many businesses now find themselves with a large number of Vista capable machines--something that wasn't the case when the software was initially released.
Schuster said many IT departments have been looking to Microsoft for some support that it still makes sense to move to Vista.
"They just want to make sure (they can) stand up and defend this," Schuster said. "Help me make sure this is the right thing," she said the companies are telling Microsoft.
During her years at CNET News, Ina Fried has changed beats several times, changed genders once, and covered both of the Pirates of Silicon Valley. These days, most of her attention is focused on Microsoft. E-mail Ina. 
I don't see how this will hurt sales though on the bottom line. Doesn't matter if the money is spent on Vista or Win7- it all goes to the same company in the end.
Compared to Vista, I actually somewhat agree (though until Windows 7 goes RTM, all bets are still off... the Vista beta ran far better than the RTM product, after all).
@AppleRocks:
In all fairness, if a biz is paying for MS Software Assurance, they're already paying for the licenses, no matter which version they stay with or move to (and buddy, it ain't cheap!)
--
The funny part is, there's no contingency for folks who had completed a Vista deployment... heh, wonder why that is? (I can name that tune in one note, but it'll still be good for a laugh to see how it gets spun).
You will upgrade an OS simply because you have a defined lifecycle from Microsoft? Where can I get clients like you. Our clients demand legitimate reasons for making huge investments in hardware and training required to make such moves.
Right?
If you're buying a new PC, get Vista.
If you have a PC already with XP on it, leave it alone.
I'm all about upgrading to the latest and greatest but putting Vista onto a machine that already has XP (so was likely made in the "XP days" is a terrible idea. Likewise, a business holding off getting Vista put onto CURRENT machines they're buying is a bad idea. Might as well get them with Vista so that when machines are shipping with Windows 7 you've worked out your kinks.
Cody
Needless to say, I do see a lot of similar complaints about Vista that I did when XP hit the streets, even after SP1 was released. But do I see that some of the criticism is valid, but not all of it can be or should be placed on Microsoft's shoulders. Even I made a few harsh comments about Vista when I first used it, but then I realized that it was mostly me having to deal with a new environment and getting used to a system that has more hatches battened down than ever before. As I got used to the new OS, I learned to love it and never looked back at XP!
I totally agree with your assessment, cody. If people have a computer with XP on it already, simply do the world a favor and leave it alone. I never would have put Vista on my older PC, as I was unsure if it would run that well. When I built a new computer back in March 2008, I made the swift move to the new OS, even doing it in 64-bit. :)
My current desktop was bought in the last month XP was available and I
demanded XP. It could easily run Vista, but I don't want the performance hit
or the headaches.
I am recommending that businesses stick with XP right now. If they are
currently upgrading their hardware, they should 'downgrade' to XP and
avoid Vista like the plague. a competitive website had an article about 80 MILLION
vista business licenses sold that were not activated, they installed XP instead.
The market has spoken.
For home users I am doing something I have never done before, I am recommending
they switch to Macs. Techies, I recommend Linux, but for the Vast majority of people
I have been recommending Macs.
Too many questions left unresolved about XP users 32 bit and 64 bit alike.
I will be sticking with XP and so is the place where I work at least through the end of the year
Microsoft needs to dummy down to 2 version at best, one version would be better.
Let people pick the add ons later. If anybody does buy either, I could only recommend the ultimate
version due to the likely problem of picking anything less will leave in the hole and not able to do everything at home you can do at work and vice versa.
If you remember this happened with XP when it only had 2 versions. Many basic features you needed for work were modified or left out and suddenly the user need to do something at home for work and nothing setup the same way.
Vista and it's UAC design caused multiple problems at the user level, administrative level, and the develpment side of things. IT should be turned off by default and only implemented at locations that REALLY have a need for it. Looks like Windows 7 will continue the stupidity.
Guess What, the same driver problems that Vista had.. are NOT THERE anymore, and the reason that Windows 7 seems to good, is that its based on drivers mostly for Vista. DUH
Enough of this crap, if a company gets vista , they can can a cheap upgrade to Windows 7 as can anyone else.
The issue will simply be that companies have to invest money in doing a system wide rollout .. its time and money and they dont want to do it twice. That is the reason for the stall, and has almost F$#@ all to do with W7 buzz.
This is more a comment to the commentators and not the editor who kinda mentions these things in the article.
I installed the Windows 7 Beta and it is like having a new machine. Much faster and more stable. Vista is a terrible operating system. MS had to know it was crap when they released it. Before SP 1 it could not even copy files from one machine to another in a reasonable time or unzip compressed files properly. They should give every Vista user a free upgrade to Windows 7 since it is really nothing but Vista SP3.
That's not exactly sounding like a failure to me.
Ultimately, MS will only have maybe 15% of business running Vista. I submit most of those were forced licenses that upgraded back to XP. Were it not for MS strong arming PC makers, they wouldn't have 2% Vista users. There is always a group of idiots that will buy anything.
Because that's not what the businesses are saying.
And, as for where I get my information. I have been a software engineer / developer of mission critical applications for government applications for 25 years. They are not budging off XP. Anyone tells you different & they're on drugs.
Then the problem would be solved.
Then why do it twice over? If they've lasted this long on XP, and some are still on 98 and 2000. If you migrate to Vista now, when Windows 7 is released, Steve Ballmer will be ridiculing you for using a 4-5 year old operating system. Fuggetaboutit.
It has been confusing, frustrating, almost impossible to implement, and so user unfriendly that migrating to it for business purposes just never made sense.
Now before the Microsoft shills go spouting off about the.(urp), safety of Vista, It required to much expenditure in both hardware and software to be cost effective for any company with more than 5 machines and one server, whereas the larger concerns would get a less costly proposal by waiting for Windows 7 machines to go on sale and buy them in bulk, or just buy the os and do a backup of all data and do a fresh install as it will run on somewhat older hardware very well, even an 8 year old laptop.
Linux is still a better option for small to medium businesses, as freeware, and it will run exceptionally on real old hardware.
But, Microsoft wanting businesses to buy and install Vista before Windows 7 makes less sense than passing out Meth at an office function, this is just greedy and foolish. No one could afford to install Vista because better than half their printers and other equipment would not work with it and would have to be replaced, And everything else would have to be upgraded at the same time. One of my customers would have had to spend in excess of 100 thousand dollars just to run all his current equipment , he is a doctor in a busy office.
You have to look at the economics of the situation.....
Give me a break... Your hardware and software issues are NOT Microsoft's problem. Do not blame them because your hardware and software vendors are unable to support Vista. But then again, lazy people prefer to take the simple route of placing all the blame on Microsoft because they're completely inept and can't check if their hardware and software are compatible BEFORE upgrading. You spent a lot of "green" simply because YOU couldn't or didn't want to take the time to check if your hardware and software were compatible with Vista. Your problem, not Microsoft's!
Hehe, my comment was directed at OFC_Rocco, not you. :)
But I do understand the complaints people have, but I do tend to see a lot of misdirected complaints at times. Not all of the woes over Vista are Microsoft's fault or problem. In some cases, yes, Microsoft does have to share the blame.
As I said, I had these problems out of the box with this os. Web cam cannot be fixed to work under vista, but will work under 7, same with scanner, cannot tell with the forms printer as have replaced it. As for the programs that stopped responding when installed in a vista environment how is hacking to get some of them to work lazy? I paid good money for them and should not have to buy a different version of the same thing to run it on a different os.
Bulls**t. Try harder next time.
I'm just planning on buying new boxes with 7 and there's a couple reasons why. I think we're doing the same at work. For one, they're getting old, but will make great home servers or perhaps something else. You could compare them to old XP machines even though they're not actually. A couple of advantages here. A computer that comes with 7 will more likely be fully compatible instead of hopefully compatible. Also, the hardware that'll be available when 7 is released will probably be more powerful than the hardware we have now and prices should actually be cheaper. With the economic crisis looming I can't be sure of that though, but if the whole system breaks down you won't need 7 at work anyway right?
If you wish to run 7 you could end up running it on a much more powerful machine for the same price if you wait. If you don't need more power until 7 comes out and it's not out yet then what's the freaking hurry? Wait until your $ buys you a lot more.
Another issue is my current POWER system only goes up to 4 gigs of ram and maxes out. Guess I should have bought a better board, but the point is I can run 64 bit Vista on it, but it doesn't really help get over the 4 gig limit. By the time 7 ships computers should theoretically be cheap enough that it's a piece of cake to get 6 to 8 gigs of ram in them or more. A computer with more than 4 gigs of ram basically has to ship with the 64-bit version of 7. Buying a computer this way you can't get screwed into buying a 64 bit computer with a 32-bit OS and having to put the 64-bit version on yourself. Unless somebody really tries to screw you and sells you a computer that can only use half its ram, but that's whole different Vista capable lawsuit waiting to happen.
Waiting until 7 is released means I can have a brand new box that's fully compatible with loads of ram and the 32-bit world is definitely, finally 100 percent behind me and it can die in a fire where it truly belongs. So, everyone should just forget Vista and go right to 7. That's what I say.
And I'm sorry, but I remember when I bought my first Dell with the 6 month old XP install and not having any issues whatsoever, except maybe trying to keep some archaic palm device connected.
It's an odd thing that the defense of Vista includes making up horror stories about XP. There was almost NO hardware it would not run on and it was the most stable consumer OS I've ever owned, right from day one.
The only thing more stable than XP was my PowerMac running OS 9 That thing would stay on for months. VooDoo video, firewire/USB card, TV tuner, MS Office, capturing video, editing audio... Now I have to get me a new PowerMac! And a Mac laptop. Yes.
What was I talking about? Oh yeah. Two years after the release of Vista the hardware is faster and the manufacturers got off their collective ***** and wrote drivers. That really is the only reason "Windows 7" is getting such rave reviews: it's been fixed! Nothing new or extraordinary about it. Windows 7 sure as hell isn't a new OS.
- by ferretboy88 February 14, 2009 1:51 PM PST
- I love the Apple fans who say vista sucks. They don't even use it but they judge it. I use Vista everyday. In fact I run the 64 bit version and love it. Xp was and is crash happy but Vista doesn't get all those error messages(this program had to quit and blah). When I was running a macbook I was getting the spinning beachball all the time. It would just spin and spin and I had many problems trying to get the disk out of the slot. It would always fail and crash the computer. I just uploaded the brand new drivers(64 bit) for my brand new GTX 285. If it wasn't supported then why I am getting all the drivers I need. In my opinion I really like Vista and in fact just bought another copy($99 newegg) for my new build. Do Macs have the new I7 yet? I'm running 12 GB of ram, in a Mac that ram would have cost me $1200 for Korean junk ram.
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