News
Analysis: Companies Slow to Adopt Windows 2000 for Many Reasons
- By Scott Bekker
- 02/09/2001
Although businesses generally agree that Windows 2000 is far
superior to Windows NT as an enterprise operating system, they have been slow
to adopt the technology, according to a
GartnerGroup
analysis. The question is why.
As reported earlier by ENT, licenses of Microsoft
Windows 2000 Server, Advanced Server, and Datacenter Server will pass the 1
million mark sometime this month. Still, Microsoft
Corp. expected better short-term sales figures for its Windows 2000
offerings, and Gartner’s Thomas Bittman says there are a number of reasons why
they have not materialized. “The larger the server, the longer it
takes for a company to commit to and fully deploy a new technology, so Gartner
doesn't expect to see companies pushing the limits of Windows 2000 Server
scalability until at least the end of the year,” Bittman writes.
The report points out many of Windows 2000’s advantages --
it scales much better than NT; it is much more reliable than NT (about three
times as reliable, according to Gartner’s estimate); far fewer reboots are
necessary, leading to greater uptime; and Active Directory is a much more
enterprise-ready technology than NT’s domain system -- but those positives,
when weighed against the negatives, have led to its slow acceptance in
corporate environments.
“Before a company
can swap out Windows NT and replace it with Windows 2000 Server, they must
thoroughly test all of their applications for compatibility, which can take
time and talent away from other projects,” according to the analysis. “Also,
many companies may have just spent a tremendous amount of time and skills
stabilizing a Windows NT environment, and they aren't willing to throw that
investment away.”
In addition, Active
Directory migration is fraught with numerous potential land mines for
companies, including a lack of properly-trained employees, complex designs
that, once implemented, are hard to undo, and in-house politics.
Even given these difficulties, Gartner sees light at the end of the tunnel
for Redmond’s server products. “Windows 2000 Server (and AD) deployments will
continue at a gradual, pragmatic pace, experienced skills will become easier to
find, and gains will be made at the very high end -- thereby giving this
software more credibility with conservative technology adopters.” – Keith Ward
About the Author
Scott Bekker is editor in chief of Redmond Channel Partner magazine.