Migrating to Windows 7 will ultimately be worth the cost

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Microsoft intends to stop support for Windows Vista a few months ahead of its XP SP2 and Windows 2000. Vista service pack-free OS will no longer get Microsoft support after April 13 this year, leaving the flaky platform entirely at the mercy of hackers who might wish to exploit that code.

Opportunity

At the same time, he said that migration also presents an opportunity to take full advantage of new OS's productivity, security, control enhancements, connectivity improvements and to become a more efficient business — but at this scale, how can you keep your migration efficient, cost-effective, and sustainable, while protecting end-user productivity? Not only that, it gives a chance to look at where you are spending money and where you can save money.

Why migrate? He said, according to industry analyst IDC estimates 19 per cent of the global IT workforce will be running on Windows 7 by the end of 2010 and it will be the preferred business platform in a very short period. Globally, more than one billion computers run on Microsoft's operating system.

He said according to Gartner's report, 66 per cent of users are expected to migrate to Windows 7 in the next 12 months while two per cent are considering migrating to alternative operating systems — Mac OS X or Linux.

He said Microsoft will have sold 177 million units of Windows 7 by the end of 2010, from 40 million last year.

"Many organisations have software which they don't use and at the same time pay license costs. So it is a good time to take stock of your company's applications and hardware so that you can get rid off a large amount of applications and save money. Organisations need to prioritise migrations according to which applications in their environment are Windows 7 certified and which are not," Mol said.

Sound plan

He said in the past, migration meant collecting inventory and configuration data by hand, pasting together solutions from individual parts, writing and testing scripts to handle endless contingencies and dependencies, plus a thousand other dull routines that drain time, energy, money, motivation, and executive patience.

"It's a way to get started on the right foot when Windows 7 is deployed and make sure data is secure and systems are protected. There is an inherent risk of losing data when migrating. A smooth migration requires a sound plan as much as an integrated, automated solution and preparing your team is an essential part of that plan," he said.

That is why he said Symantec takes a different approach, combining world-class technologies into solutions that handle the busy work so that you can concentrate on issues, not details.

As businesses plan to migrate to Windows 7, they can also assess whether they have the protection mechanism in place to back up data and make sure it's available if something goes wrong. The migration can be a challenge as well as an opportunity.

Mol said organisations can create a risk-free backup as they migrate and apply it to their long-term backup and disaster recovery strategy when Windows 7 is fully deployed.

He said you can start migration from wherever you are — Vista, XP, or even Windows 2000 machines — based on business needs, not software limitations so that you can take full advantage of your hardware investments and perform migrations during evenings or off-hours.

"Migrating is an ideal time to upgrade to new levels of efficiency, manageability, and cost-effectiveness that can sustain your IT environment in the years ahead and providing that you can do it without compromising the migration," he said.

Mol said the global virus threat environment has changed dramatically — focus is now on targeted and surprise attacks, threats to data and applications, and risks from insider errors and malfeasance.

Your migration is an ideal time to replace patchwork legacy security measures with powerful, integrated solutions, featuring centralised management according to clear, enforceable policies.

"Symantec can help organisations meet the challenge and capture the opportunity as Windows 7 is the best chance to wipe the slate clean," Mol said.

By Naushad K. Cherrayil

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