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Mid-market Still Mostly Cool to Windows Vista

Vista still poses challenges for mid-market companies, where IT budget and staffs are stretched tight. Many mid-market IT pros say application incompatibility fears and hardware requirements have stopped them from upgrading, though some are now giving Vista a second look.

 

November 06, 2008CIO

The system requirements involved in upgrading to Microsoft's Windows Vista operating system remain a problem for many IT departments. But they can be magnified at mid-market companies, because of smaller budgets and smaller staffs, with tech vets who may be resistant to change.

Unlike small businesses, mid-market companies don't solely use store-bought mainstream applications that integrate smoothly with Vista. They tend to use mainstream apps along with older and internally-customized applications that are more likely to butt heads with Vista.

And then there are the hardware requirements. When Vista was released, Microsoft advised that businesses run Vista on computers with at least 40GB of storage, 1GB of memory and a 1GHz 32- or 64-bit processor. IT managers in the mid-market continue to grumble that Vista requires more modern hardware than they want, need or can afford.

"Our decision [to stay with Windows XP] was initially based on our installed hardware base," says Mark Horste, IT Director at Centers for Dialysis Care, a midsize health care facility in Cleveland.

"Our purchasing cycle for PC and thin client platforms favor consistency and cost effectiveness," Horste says. "Early tests of Windows Vista indicated it simply would not run fast enough on the majority of systems on our network. Windows XP has proven to be a stable and adequately secure operating system for our needs."

Smaller companies have been quicker to upgrade to Vista than the mid-market, to date. Still, Al Gillen, a research vice president at IDC, says that signs show that the mid-market is coming around on Vista.

"Our research shows that the mid-market is warming up to Vista and will continue to do so in 2009."

A Gradual Warm-Up to Vista Ahead?

Bolstering IDC's predictions, there have been some incremental victories for Vista over the past few months. In August, Forrester research data showed that Vista deployments were finally ramping up at enterprises, and that Vista migrations were coming from Windows XP machines, whereas previously, most were coming from Windows 2000.

On Monday, Microsoft reported that Windows gained market share for the second time in three months, with Vista increasing its market share 0.96 percent last month.

The release of Vista Service Pack 1 in March and a slow—albeit very slow—shift in the public's negative views of Vista are two factors that may be giving mid-market IT managers some comfort.

But the Vista adoption story is a complicated one. And for every positive report about Vista adoption, there's one brimming with bad news right around the corner.

 
 
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WHITE PAPERS

VMware vSphere (TM) and Intel (R) Xeon (R) Processor 5500 Series

The VMware vSphere (TM) and Intel Xeon processor 5500 series provides the ROI needed to succeed in an on-demand business environment.
 

Faster, Easier, more Effective IT Infrastructure

Business continuity with low administration and maintenance costs. Can you make it happen? This Oracle business brief explains how mid-sized can improve performance by creating an IT infrastructure that makes working faster, easier and more effective.
 

ERP at the Speed of Light

Without the right strategy and tools, implementation acceleration carries the risk of abbreviated end user training and change management, over-engineering of business processes, and other problems that can lead to higher over-all cost of ownership and the erosion of business benefit.
 

a Reliable and Powerful, and Affordable IT Infrastructure

This whitepaper provides an overview of the challenges midsize organizations face, and how Oracle products can help them overcome those hurdles.
 

Maximum Efficiency Gains with Virtualization

Learn best practices to optimize your infrastructure and operations department and gain the most from virtualization.
 

Manage Virtualization Initiatives

Learn how you can better manage virtualization initiatives to recognize this technologys maximum value.
 

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Webcast with Dan Vesset: Investing in Business Analytics Technology

What exactly is business analytics and why should you care? Dan Vesset of IDC and Gaurav Verma of SAS answer this a...
 

Capitalize on Your SAP Content

After 18 years of partnership and over 3,000 successful customer deployments, Open Text has become SAP's premier pa...
 

Enterprise Cloud Computing: Ready for Primetime?

The progression toward enterprise cloud computing is happening today, as industry leaders deploy technologies that ...
 

Preparing Your Business Services for the Future

Would you trust your network monitoring tools enough to know when something is truly halting a business service? Wh...
 

Enterprise System Management Challenges in Big Organizations with Eli Almog

In this Podcast with Eli Almog, Corporate Architect in BMC's CTO Office, discusses how IT managers can know when it...
 

BSM in the Field, Practical Insights from Peter Armaly

Have you thought about BSM, but haven't quite gotten the buy-in you need? Get down and dirty with BSM installations...
 

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