Customers wary of Windows 2000

The majority of Windows NT users are delaying migration to Windows 2000 by up to 18 months because they fear the platform will be too unreliable or have no immediate effect on their business.

According to a survey of 1128 US NT specialists by researcher Giga Information Group, only 20 per cent said they plan to move to Windows 2000 within six to nine months, while 30 per cent said they would delay migration by 12 to 18 months.

Only 10 per cent were willing to migrate immediately or within the first three months of shipment. However, they failed to cite a particular reason for the costly and time-consuming move, said Giga analyst Laura DiDio at GigaWorld IT Forum 2000.

Of the early adopters, only 12 per cent said Microsoft's Active Directory server is a major attraction. But concerns over the operating system's complexity and lack of trained staff were among the hurdles for those that would rather wait.

Although migration will not be easy, DiDio said the benefits will be vast improvements to Windows 9.x and NT's scalability, reliability and performance.

"Windows 2000 Professional Edition is 10 times more reliable than NT 4.0, and Windows 2000 Server Edition is between 20 and 50 times more reliable than NT 4.0, but you are going to have to spend money to upgrade," she said.

Companies will have to pay an extra $7000 for each server when they migrate because of the additional third-party system management and directory management packages required, said Giga. This does not include training, which can cost up to $1500 for each person with Microsoft skills and $6000 for those without.

However, payback will be between six to 12 months once customers get over the initial learning curve, said Giga.

The researcher advises those companies taking the plunge to set a minimum configuration of a Pentium II 266 with 32Mb of memory. They should also have at least 3Gb drive with 1Gb free disk memory.