Yes, great assessment Ben. -----Original Message----- From: Linda C Jones [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Friday, January 09, 2009 11:45 AM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: Re: Gone way OT: Windows 7 On TechNet Now
Very well said. My sentiments exactly! Linda Ben Scott wrote: > On Fri, Jan 9, 2009 at 8:24 AM, John Hornbuckle > <[email protected]> wrote: > >> And as you say, Vista isn't nearly as bad as the FUD-spreaders would have people believe. >> > > Of course, neither is Linux. I must admit, the Linux fan in me is > somewhat amused to see Microsoft falling victim to one of their own > favorite tricks. I have a hard time dredging up any sympathy for > Ballmer and company. Especially when they're obviously trying real > hard to get people to move off XP to Vista/7, when many of their > paying customers are apparently are saying we'd rather not. > > >> ... just plain unwilling to learn something new. >> > > A big part of my objection to Vista (as an IT management weenie) is > that the apparent improvements don't warrant the apparent costs of the > changes. The ROI just isn't there. Aside from the learning curve, > there's lots of incompatibilities. Drivers. MSIE 7. Roaming > profiles. UI. Sure, those incompatibilies only affect existing stuff > -- guess what, we've got existing stuff we have to worry about. So > does 99% of the rest of the world. > > If there were some radical improvements -- like there were with the > 95/98/NT4 -> 2000/XP switch -- it would be one thing. But I frankly > just don't see it with XP -> Vista. > > Image-based deployment? We've already invested time/effort/money in > RIS here, and now we're supposed to invest in something different that > does the same thing. BitLocker? Licensing issues make it non-viable > for all but very large companies. Better GPOs? Don't help our 100 or > so existing XP stations. > > It seems like the major added capabilities in Vista are Aero, > DirectX 10, and home multimedia stuff. Fine for home users, I guess. > But none are something I want in a business environment. Indeed, in > business, *we want a consistent UI*. Otherwise support, training, and > documentation all become more expensive. > > Likewise, a big part of the reason we haven't deployed Office 2007 > anywhere is the radical UI change. Sure, people can get used to it. > Sure, it's arguably an improvement in some ways. But guess what? > Throwing out 25 years of working UI conventions for a very marginal > improvement in usability is just plain not worth it. > > It's like the auto industry engineers who keep trying to replace the > steering-wheel/pedals/shifter arrangement. Sure, it might be possible > to do things a little better, but it's simply not worth the effort of > teaching hundreds of millions of people how to drive all over again. > > Heck, the very thing that keeps many people on the Microsoft > platform is that it isn't worth the pain and drawbacks of switching to > something Linux or Mac. When it comes right down to it, a computer's > pretty much a computer, regardless of the software you're using. All > the various offerings have their strengths and weaknesses. But > throwing out something that mostly-works just to replace it with > something else that will mostly-work is a bad value proposition. > > So Vista isn't the train wreck some say it is, but it also didn't > provide Microsoft a good ROI for the huge amount of time and money > they spent making it. Maybe it will pay off eventually by making it > easier to introduce improvements in future versions of Windows, but I > kinda doubt it. In 50+ years of the IT industry history, such > scenarios have rarely paid off. > > -- Ben > > ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ > ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ > > ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~
