News in brief for Thursday, Feb. 12, 2009
Microsoft pushes Windows XP customers to Vista, not Windows 7
In a blog posted Wednesday, Gavriella Schuster of Microsoft's Windows
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product management team told corporate customers they should get off Windows XP and onto Vista and not to wait for Windows 7.
"We want these customers to understand the following considerations, so they are not surprised later on:
- You may find your company in situations where applications are no longer supported on Windows XP and not yet supported on Windows 7.
- You will want to take time to evaluate Windows 7 just as you evaluate any new operating system for your environment prior to deployment. As Windows 7 is planned to be released in about 3 years after Windows Vista, the total period that many customers will likely be waiting prior to deploying Windows 7 in their environment will likely be in the range of 5 years after Windows Vista release."
She also recommended that all customers weighing a migration to either Vista or Windows 7 deploy the Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack (MDOP), which is part of the Windows Optimized Desktop, to help them establish best practices.
Many Microsoft partners have said that forcing two migrations -- to Vista and then to Windows XP -- is beyond the pale for many customers, especially those that are not in a hardware-refresh cycle. Many Microsoft partners agree that a heavy-handed push is a bad scenario for customers. Vista has been broadly available since early 2007, but was plagued by quality problems. Windows 7 could be out as soon as late 2009.
Dell announces stimulus package of its own
Dell Inc., taking a cue from the success of its zero-percent-down financing offer on EqualLogic storage, on Wednesday added aggressive financing on select Latitude laptops and PowerEdge Energy Smart servers. A new zero-percent $1 buy-out lease promotion targets small and medium-sized businesses. At the end of the term, as the name implies, customers can buy the gear for $1.
Check out yesterday's IT channel news briefs.