A Microsoft consulting firm tells me it's buying time for customers -- and itself -- by upgrading aging Windows XP machines to Windows 7. Does this strategy really make sense for small and midsize companies?
Conventional wisdom holds that for most small and midsize businesses, the hassles and expense of upgrading aging XP-powered computers to Microsoft's newest operating system outweighs the benefits. After all, with hardware so cheap these days, you'd better off starting fresh with new Windows 7 PCs, right? Maybe so, but according to a Microsoft VP and a Bay Area consultant, some smaller companies don't see it quite that way.
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I recently shared lunch with Bill Laing, Microsoft corporate vice president in the Windows Server and Solutions Division, and Rand Morimoto, president and CEO of consulting firm Convergent Computing. We discussed a hidden trend of smaller companies looking to wring one last bit of useful life out of their fleets of aging Windows XP machines.
Morimoto said many of his firm's SMB customers have XP machines that have been around so long they've become unstable. These organizations realize, Morimoto added, that they're not going to get another two years out of them without doing something.
But even though hardware keeps getting cheaper, times are so tough right now that in many cases "people are just trying to get over this hump" while spending as little as possible, he said.
Upgrading to Windows 7 -- and perhaps installing a new hard drive -- "breathes life into" aging hardware, Morimoto claimed, allowing SMBs to extend life of their existing PCs for 1-2 years, when hopefully conditions will be better to afford new hardware.
In fact, Morimoto said, he's done the same thing at his own company.
Obviously, as a Microsoft Partner making the PR rounds with the company, Convergent Computing is hardly a typical test case, but the company's experience can still be instructive. "Basically, in this economy we didn't want to spend money if we didn't have to," Morimoto said. "However the systems were getting old and slow."
According to Marimoto, Convergent Computing employees have their own laptops, so while some bought new machines as the company transitioned to Windows 7, most were upgrades from previous systems that were configured as XP or as Vista systems. Upgraded models "range from things that are 4-5 years old (old tablets, old laptops) through the latest Netbooks and Sony, Dell, and HP systems."
The company also upgraded its company owned desktops, including Pentium-based XP systems (circa 2004) with 512MB to 1GB of RAM. "We bought new hard drives for the systems (since we could get new drives for $70 that were faster and larger and not 5+ years old) and just installed Windows 7 on the systems," Morimoto said, adding that the refreshed systems now run just as fast as they did on Windows XP. Like his customers, he's hoping to get 12-18 months of additional service out of the systems.
The desktops and laptops were only part of the upgrade process. At the same time, Morimoto said, "we upgraded pretty much all of our servers from Windows Server 2003 and 2008 to Windows Server 2008 Release 2 -- with the exception of a couple of our application servers that would only run Windows Server 2003."
As part of the process, he added, Convergent Computing "upgraded Windows 2008 HyperV virtual servers to Windows 2008 R2 HyperV R2 to take advantage of the new virtualization software, and we retired our final two VMware ESX servers and replaced them with Windows 2008 R2 HyperV R2 so that we are now 100% HyperV R2 across all of our servers."
The company once had 27 physical servers -- which has now been whittled down to 5 physical servers with about 20 virtual guest sessions. About a dozen of those are virtual primary servers, with the remaining servers on the network for failover and redundancy. Morimoto said the result is fewer servers but twice the redundancy.
Part of the reasoning for Convergent Computing's move, Morimoto explained, was to take advantage of the features available only with the combination of Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 Release 2, such as DirectAccess, BranchCache, improved search, power management, and better offline folder access.
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Most importantly, Morimoto's consultants can now remotely -- and securely -- access the consulting firm's servers. Using using DirectAccess and other features, Morimoto claimed, meant that the company did not have to invest tens of thousands of dollars in VPN and security appliances.
Microsoft's Laing generally agreed with Morimoto's assessment that we would see XP upgrades among SMBs, but he added some qualifiers. "If you've got a 5-year-old XP machine," he warned, "you're not going to put in Windows 7 and keep it for 5 more years." Laing added that "the problem with old machines is that they tend to catastrophically fail."
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Despite the conversation, I still believe that for most companies, upgrading XP machines to Windows 7 isn't worth it. (Vista machines are another story, though.) Most small and midsize companies will be more than willing to wait for the "benefits" of Windows 7 until they're ready to upgrade their hardware as well as their operating system. And you can bet the PC vendors are going to fall all over themselves offering new models at big discounts to entice them to make that decision sooner rather than later.
See more columns by Fredric Paul
Follow Fredric Paul on Twitter @ http://twitter.com/TheFreditor
Fredric Paul is publisher/editor-in-chief of bMighty.com and SmallBizResource.com.
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