Measuring Windows 7 appeal to businesses
There are a whole bunch of reasons why Windows 7 should appeal to businesses, but one threat--the still-sluggish economy--could overshadow all of those reasons to move to the new operating system.
"I think they have a really good product at a really bad time," Directions on Microsoft analyst Michael Cherry said in a telephone interview this week.
Among Windows 7's business-oriented features is "XP Mode"--a downloadable add-on that lets applications that won't work natively in Vista or Windows 7 run in a free, virtualized copy of Windows XP.
(Credit: Microsoft)While Cherry says that there is definitely a lot to like about Windows 7, the release comes at a time when IT budgets are shrinking and companies are trying to limit new technology projects, even ones as badly needed as updating aging stables of desktop and notebook PCs.
"Even if they like it, I don't know how fast it is going to go when it is ranked against all the things IT has to do against a shrinking budget," Cherry said.
Among the things that should appeal to businesses about Windows 7, Cherry said, are its improved compatibility and performance, Windows XP Mode and a DirectAccess feature that allows for automatic virtual private network-like connections to a corporate network anytime a PC is connected to the Internet. (See chart below.)
Windows 7 goes on sale to consumers and small businesses on October 22. However, large businesses with volume licensing deals can get access even earlier, although most will wait before putting it on anything other than test machines. Gartner analyst Michael Silver said that, as with other releases, most businesses will take a year or 18 months before starting to deploy Windows 7. However, he added that "we've had a surprising number of calls with organizations, some very large, planning to move fairly early."
With little appetite for widespread spending to beef up old machines, Cherry said that many businesses may just upgrade to Windows 7 as they buy new machines. "I'm not sure that isn't going to be the majority way that this is handled," Cherry said, pointing out that would still be an improvement from Vista, where most companies wiped the operating system off of new PCs and instead installed Windows XP.
One quibble that Cherry has is with the way that Microsoft bills Windows 7 as a major upgrade even though so little has changed under the hood.
"I think they confuse major with important," Cherry said. "It's an important update. It's one you want to take advantage of."
Windows 7, Cherry said, is noteworthy simply because it addresses many of Vista's shortcomings and makes the key improvements that Vista brought now accessible and attractive to businesses.
In many ways, he considers Windows 7 to be the "R2" release of Vista, borrowing the nomenclature Microsoft uses to describe updates to its server products. That's not a bad thing, he said, noting that server customers have rather liked the way Microsoft alternates between minor and major releases.
"R2 has been a very solid approach for (Windows Server)," Cherry said, "and people know what they are getting."
As an indication of just how close Windows 7 is to the border between minor and major, the server version that was developed simultaneously is being designated as Windows Server 2008 R2--a minor upgrade.
Cherry said that perhaps Microsoft should just embrace Windows 7's "minorness."
"You really don't want two major releases in a row," he said, arguing that the major architectural changes made with Vista are akin to pouring new concrete. "It needs time to cure. It needs time to settle in," he said. "It doesn't mean that, as an interim release, Windows 7 isn't important."
(Credit:
Directions on 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. 
OTOH, you have to get an XP compat package (not the internal ones) or an XP VM if you want to run a few apps.
One example that sticks out for me: VMWare's vSphere client doesn't work at all in Windows 7, even though the VI3 client runs fine (ironically, this is probably because the vSphere client requires the J# runtime). Also, you're likely going to have to update your Java runtime as well - I've found many apps which worked fine in XP or Vista with Java 6u5 and 6u7 suddenly don't work anymore until you bump up to Java 6u14 or higher.
I suspect there's going to be a bit of a delay in rollouts as folks start having to see what works, what doesn't, and what's going to require some patches or re-coding. Microsoft has made a little VM-like package (similar to Parallels) for things that simply will not run in Windows 7 or in any of its built-in compatibility modes - but performance will suffer a little. If you have an SA/EA agreement you can get it free - not sure if it'll cost you otherwise (haven't looked).
Overall - one would do well to test against numerous OSes (e.g. Snow Leopard can apparently talk natively to Exchange now, Linux just works anyway, etc), since Windows 7 is likely going to require more than just a little work to implement, XP compatibility tools be damned.
@mjconver means REAL smoothless interaction with Active Directory, that is:
1) no UAC prompts (that would confuse endusers) when adding shares
2) no hidden Win 7 PC or with confused properties.
3) no shared printer driver problem or confused driver due to machine having 7 instead of Vista (interesting problem... agreed?)
4) no integrated security problems (SSO or something else) using IE8 or VB6 programs using COM+ AD objects.
As you can see, it's not as easy as testing that your machine logs into the network. There's lots of other tests which--by the way--have no REAL company requirement to charge them to.
I mean that's huge and bigger than anything before.
As for the major/minor thing - kind of agree. It's a small but important improvement and worth paying for.
It was a bit of a strange dynamic, but the plans to upgrade were likely budgeted and allocated for before the economy went splat, but hadn't been carried out yet. I wouldn't rely on them to predict some sort of explosive growth for Windows 7 just yet.
So it really is a Vista bug fix for $400? And no upgrade path from XP? What a ripoff!
Now we just need a better price, Microsoft you want to cut down the number or pirated copied of Windows cut the price by 60% and watch sales ramp up, yes there will always be the pirates but learn from Apple cheap upgrade equals fast sales.
Microsoft gives bug fices in the form of Service Packs for free (they usually add some new functionality in Service Packs as well, but nothing major).
So you have:
- Individual fixes (free).
- Service Packs (free).
- Minor upgrades (paid, include lots of new functionality and improvements).
- Major upgrades (paid, include new functionality as well as architecture changes).
By the way, why do you talk about $400? You pay $400 if you don't own any previous version, so it wouldn't be a bug fix even under your twisted view. That smells like a troll to me. Most users will pay between $50 and $150.
And $400? Say what?
Obvious troll is obvious.
...that's because we don't have the luxury of just not running an app that refuses to work.
"That's why they tend to subscribe to volume license programs..."
No, we do it because it's cheaper in bulk, and because it is less painful to endure a 'true-up' than it is to endure a BSA audit.
"As consumers adopt the OS and start asking for it at work, you will see IT Pros embrace it quicker."
That's not how it works for the majority of users. Unless that user is a CxO or VP, or the request is for a specific technical reason (e.g. to run certain apps and such), it simply doesn't happen that way.
2) better, more responsive UI.
3) more functionality out of the box. Things like desktop search just work, whereas in XP you have to install separate software which just doesn't work as well.
4) Better included tools.
5) Much, much faster resume (in a laptop, resuming on XP takes twenty seconds, whereas on 7 it takes two).
6) Better power management and better battery life.
7) Much better management of wireless networks.
8) Better navigation between documents, with great previews and jump lists.
9) Better device management.
10) Ability to run as non admin in practice.
11) Parental controls.
And that's off the top of my head, there's much more in there.
Of course it is not a must, as least for as long as XP is supported. But do you only do what you MUST do or somethimes do just things because they are better for you?
New interface.
It just something new to play.
better security, through it still probably got as many undiscovered holes as previous versions.
If you're a business, you buy new PC's and they'll run Windows 7
If you have machines already, then there likely isn't a need to UPGRADE their OS to Windows 7.
I love Windows 7 but if I were running a biz I wouldn't go and upgrade existing machines. I'd just upgrade through attrition as they get replaced.
Windows 7 is also costly (deployment, user training, hardware upgrades and, of course, licenses), but in general it's nothing compared to the costs of operation.
The hardware requirements are on the steep side, but it still installed on a Pentium III with 384 MB of RAM and an 8 MB cheapo ATi video card with a SoundBlaster 16 for sound.
The other flaw involved programs that nobody is going to use: Adobe Photoshop 4 and Adobe Illustrator 8. The patches for those two programs wouldn't load at all, and just hangs.
Other than that, I think the other glitches, inidicating no network connection when there is, and no hard disk when there is, is specific to the RC I'm using for the testing. I have installed all of my business programs from the Windows 2/3.x days and up. Other than the Adobe flaws, everything else works great, including the MovieCD player (strangely), EO Video, and TweakAll 3. For gaming, I haven't ran into anything specific, but I also haven't bought a new computer game for Windows since 2006, when I purchased a PSP, Wii, iPod 5G, and Xbox 360, and still use my old PS2 and original Xbox. Still, not one single game for me has failed, considering I've had game failures frequently on old Windows 95 games constantly in XP.
I hoping to purchase a 32-bit version of Windows 7 for my in-laws to fix their computer with just a minor upgrade. Windows 7, to me, anyways, is as much of an improvement as Windows 95 was to Windows 3.1. For the record, I'm a Mac user, but I totally like Windows 7.
See above - you can add VMWare vSphere management client to the list of apps that don't work so hot in Windows 7 (as in, not at all in the RTM stock release).
MS better get 7 right or it is their end.
"R2 has been a very solid approach for (Windows Server)," Cherry said, "and people know what they are getting."
Since Code-Base OS/2 (Windows) will always be Code-Base OS/2 (Windows) it would be most interesting to know which Version of OS/2 this new release of Code-Base OS/2 (Windows 7) should be???
Cool!
This is a minor upgrade to Windows. The entire OS space needs a major upgrade, Apple included. We seem to be in the "decadent rococo" phase of OS development, with barely anything worth mentioning being added.
or get Windows 7, get bloated, viruses, DRM enforced, etc, waist money on software you can get for free (OS) , update hardware to get some decent speed, etc.
best move i see for microsoft to get now some self esteem back is to drop DRM enforcing, make an user friendly OS and give-it away for free, plenty of money to make from all other things that come from using the OS ... or at least make a decent free platform and extra payed options for it (to use as server/mail server/ domain controller , etc)
in a time we have an option to use a free OS, there is no need to pay for one just to get "more" that is not there
Nah! The very best move that IBM, Microsoft, Intel et al (that have intellectual property rights to the OS/2 Source Codes) would be to have these "Shared" or even "Open-Sourced"; and, Windows, Linux.... will be toast. Wanna bet the farm on the latter not happening any time soon.
But, then - there will be eComStation soon anyway; so, let's wait just a little bit longer and see what punch this OS/2's extension packs.
- by ptn107 August 28, 2009 9:46 AM PDT
- I second shymooned.
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- by cloudmatt August 28, 2009 10:17 AM PDT
- lulz. first off no rip on linux its a good os makes for a great novel server base no beef with performance but ptn107 and shymooned the users are soft and week. they want windows, their nice warm fluffy blanket of familiarity. those who work with their company want documents from office not open office. even if the server is a linux/unix based novel monster of awesome, the client will most likely need to be windows for the over whelming majority.
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- by sunishkumar August 28, 2009 10:34 AM PDT
- Ubuntu is great!!!
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Showing 1 of 2 pages (72 Comments)Since the release of Vista we've moved all our servers to Ubuntu LTS or Debian and workstations to Ubuntu LTS. Both work perfectly fine with active directory (openLDAP), postfix (email server) and play nice with each other in our network. Why pay [again] for a Microsoft OS when you can get the same functions and features for free?!
All hail NetWare Admin and kneel before the all mighty penguin, you will still have to get reamed by that geek in Seattle when it comes time to remember the users.
It has proved Linux can be great desktop OS too.
My colleague who uses Win XP used to open his .docx (Microsoft Docs) files in my Openoffice bundled with Ubuntu.
That is the reality..