Dell has taken the unusual step — for a PC vendor of its size — of toning down its sales pitch for Microsoft's Vista operating system and warning businesses of the migration challenges that lie ahead for them.
The step is particularly unusual because one of the issues the hardware vendor is warning business about is the extra hardware they will need to buy.
"They need to be looking at the number of images they will be installing and the size of these images," said Dell's European client services business manager, Niall O'Callaghan, on Wednesday. "A 2GB image for each user will have a big impact."
In the past, Microsoft had suggested that a 1GB image was fine for Vista, but O'Callaghan said image sizes of 2GB and larger will be likely.
As a result, said O'Callaghan, Dell is "stepping back" from telling people they must upgrade. "We are set up to give people all the guidance and support they need for this," he said. "We are not here to promote Microsoft and tell people they should buy it. We can show them the advantages of Vista and what they need to put in place to begin to move across."
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Application migration is a key area, O'Callaghan said, echoing comments from Gartner on the size of the issue and the need for considerable testing. "You have to allow time for testing," he said. "Vista is big and complex and there is a lot to it. It requires a lot of testing. You can't just shut off XP on Friday and start Vista on Monday morning. There will be training. There are things to learn."
Overall the challenges will be significant and "should not be underestimated", added O'Callaghan. However, he still thinks that business should go ahead with the migration and not wait for Microsoft to release its first service pack.
Last month, Microsoft passed 40 million sales of Vista, but most of those appear to be to consumers rather than businesses, which have been slow to upgrade.
While O'Callaghan accepted that some business are holding back from migrating to Vista, he denied that there is a widespread feeling that it is better to wait for Service Pack 1. "I have heard that, and I don't buy it," O'Callaghan said. "It used to be a thing people did, and it might have been the case with, say, Windows 2000, but not now."
Talkback
It is indeed the right thing to do, wait for SP1, you seem to have things the wrong way round, people should have upgraded to 2000/XP from 98 but not XP/2000 to VISTA.
In todays age your right it shouldn't be, and I would agree if the benefits of upgrading where outwaying the benefits for staying with XP but they don't.
Back when people upgraded from 98 to XP there was a fundamentle reason for it, 98 was far more unstable than XP, plus XP gave so much more it was leaps and bounds ahead of 98 incorperating business os foundations like NTFS over FAT etc. The change from XP to VISTA is simply eye candy and a few apps that you can probably work into XP. Plus there are issues with software that requires admin rights to run, and there is alot of business software out there like that.
They did the right thing changing there outlook on security, but based it still on a single user model, then implemented it without finding away for single user model apps to run in the hacked multi user environment. This is the same issue that admins already have with people using this kind of software and having to give people power user or admin rights so they may run it. This issue was around along time before VISTA through networks at work. Now they have just passed it onto the consumer.
It is about time they ditched there model, and wrote a OS from scratch, instead of releasing OS's with the same bugs as 98 and XP before they where patched. Proof of them using old code in there new hacked OS.
I say wait for SP1 even if it's just to patch the issues they had 5/10 years ago that they forgot to implement yet again through using old code, not to mention the new bugs and issues.
The trouble will start when XP support is pulled, if VISTA is not ready by this time, there will be huge issues for everyone. Viruses and spyware will become more widespread than it is now, as MS will not be plugging any more holes in security, your virus software might save you but will soon get bogged down with permemnant bombardments trough holes. I suggest MS sort out VISTA or prolong support for XP, or there will be issues for all and just take a guess how many MS boxes there aer out there, filling your cars, taking your payments, organising your flights..................
Paul
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Everyone likes something for free - particularly when it's something that you need. At Camwood, we think that Microsoft’s idea of free is not quite as we would all like it to be. As Vista compatibility specialists, we should know.
In its drive to get organisations to move to Vista, Microsoft is offering a whole host of free tools and consultancy; software tools such as the ACT (Application Compatibility Toolkit) which are expensive to buy, so giving them away seems a great idea to get companies to move to the new platform. Yes, Microsoft has a vested interest in offering such tools and yes, in the scheme of things, giving ACT away won’t cost Microsoft much money. Companies wanting to use them, don't have to pay for them - which in anyone's book saves money and cuts the cost of moving to Vista.
But does it? Is this free software really "free". Technically, yes it is - you don't pay for it. But, like many other such offers, free doesn't always mean no cost! Companies who want to take advantage of this free software have to install it and then support it. This certainly is not free - installation takes time and costs money and ACT is costly to support - it needs resources and people to support it - in fact, it's probably the most expensive "free" tool currently available.
So, whilst free might mean you don't actually hand over any money to Microsoft, it certainly isn't the free lunch that you'd been lead to believe.