Vista: Not Cutting Edge, But Bleeding
What harm can there possibly be in selling the latest and greatest in PC technology to your customers? Plenty.
It has been my experience that no Windows OS is ready for prime time until the official release of at least Service Pack 1. Vista is a case in point: Straight out of the box, and not long after the day of release, Vista required no fewer than 10 updates from Microsoft's Web site.
Today, if a system builder updates clients' systems with Vista, they will need to check every application and hardware device installed in the customer's machine for compatibility. The system builder will then need to update these apps and devices as necessary. Device drivers will have to be found, downloaded and installed manually.
As a result, a large-scale roll-out of Vista systems by a small system builder—especially if attempted without adequate planning—could be a profit-eating monster. Not just once, but repeatedly over time as new issues are potentially uncovered by customers' usage habits.
Today, I am recommending that my customers stay with Windows XP Professional, using the recently released Service Pack 2b. For those who do, I offer a free upgrade coupon to Windows Vista that they can use later. These coupons, by the way, are available through authorized distribution channels.
This wait-and-see approach offers the customer peace of mind: Their current XP system is reliable and compatible with all of the latest hardware and software offerings, and they can upgrade to Vista when both they and Microsoft are ready. This approach also buys critical time for the system builder. He can wait until Microsoft prepares the necessary Vista updates, and until other hardware and software manufacturers release verified, Vista-compatible updates of their products.
HOW DID WE GET HERE?
Ever since Windows and Windows NT co-existed in the market back in the early 1990s, Microsoft foreshadowed its great move to integrate the code base and create a unified version of Windows. Like Rome, this could not be built in a day. Rather, it evolved over years. Slowly, the differences between the "home" and "business" editions diminished--under the hood, anyway. It began with Windows 2000 Professional and was fine-tuned with Windows XP. Now, with Vista, we have the ideal vision of the Windows OS according to Microsoft.
There are two big disadvantages to this approach, however. One, the cost of the OS is much higher than before. Two, the new OS requires much higher-caliber hardware to run it smoothly.
This phenomenon is further complicated because it is taking place during the industry's transition from a 32-bit computing architecture to a 64-bit computing architecture. As a result of this transition, both CPU hardware and application software are currently in a state of change. The introduction of a totally new OS in the midst of all this has forced both system builders and users to contend with a veritable minefield of hardware and software incompatibilities.
The net effect of all this is much more than a mere annoyance. Rather, it is having a profound impact on both the system-builder business and the satisfaction of system builders' customers.
Now that I've made my case, let's examine the evidence. I believe the facts are compelling.
THE TRUE COSTS OF VISTA
To Microsoft's credit, the company has tried to hold down the cost of Vista. Unfortunately, the way Microsoft has done this has created confusion.
Microsoft set out to let customers purchase only the Vista features they need, and to avoid paying for features they don't need or want. To this end, Microsoft created four different versions of the OS, each with its own 64-bit variant.
While that plan may look good on paper, it has some shortcomings. First, the entry-level product, Vista Home Basic Edition, has had so many features stripped from it to keep the price down, that it is (in my opinion) not worth buying.
The next level up in the hierarchy, Vista Home Premium Edition, has an suggested retail price that is 20% higher than the price of Windows XP Home Edition.
At the high end of the scale, Vista Ultimate Edition creates the ultimate sticker shock. Its price is 30% to 40% higher than Windows XP Professional.
To be fair, Microsoft did hold the price line on Vista Business. It has a suggested retail price of $299, which is the same as the suggested price for XP Professional.
In the following table, I compare the suggested retail prices for Windows Vista, XP, Millennium, and 98 versions:
WINDOWS PRICES
THE TRUE COSTS OF VISTA-READY HARDWARE
On Vista, the magnitude of the revisions to Windows' Graphical User Interface (GUI) has ramped up the requirements for the PC's video hardware appreciably. I am reminded of the days when we switched from the DOS text-based command line interface (CLI) to the new Windows GUI. This is when a high-performance video card first became necessary; it was called the Windows Accelerator because at the time, that was (for the most part) its only real purpose.
The more things change, the more they stay the same. With Vista, even PCs intended only for business use will need a fast 3D video card with at least 128 MB of video memory. These are hardware specs that until very recently were seen only in high-performance rigs used by video-game enthusiasts.
In fact, if you intend to rely on a video chipset that is integrated into your chosen motherboard, be sure to verify that the drivers are Vista compatible. Also, verify that you've got enough memory to handle the Vista GUI. And finally, verify that you also have enough graphics processing power. Vista needs a lot of hardware power.
Also, since integrated video often shares the main system memory, you should go ahead and build your systems with 2 GB of total system RAM. My recommendation: Do not fool around with anything less.
As far as a motherboard goes, I recommend Intel parts. To save you some time in the planning stages, here is a link to the list of Vista-compatible Intel motherboards.
The following tables illustrate my point about the substantial increase in hardware resources required to run Vista. They compare the system requirements for different versions of Windows, using information taken from Microsoft's Web site:
MINIMUM PROCESSOR REQUIREMENTS
MINIMUM RAM REQUIREMENTS
MINIMUM HARD-DRIVE SPACE
MINIMUM GRAPHICS REQUIREMENTS
As you can see, the hardware requirements and recommendations jump dramatically from Windows XP to Windows Vista. The jump is much more dramatic than the one required for, say, Windows Millennium to Windows XP.
Experienced system builders also know that real systems will need much more RAM than these tables indicate. These RAM specs are minimums; for truly smooth performance and effective multitasking, you'll need much more.
The end result: Business users will likely spend much more on their Vista PC hardware than they did for prior Windows releases. In fact--and much to the chagrin of IT managers at large organizations--upgrading the hardware of pre-Vista computers is often either cost-prohibitive or not operationally feasible. Most users will instead purchase new systems if they want to use Windows Vista. VISTA TECHNICAL DIFFICULTIES: HARDWARE DRIVERS
Windows Vista is fundamentally different from other versions of Windows, even XP. Therefore, Vista requires updated device drivers for most hardware. At the time of Vista's release in January, almost no on-disk drivers were included with the off-the-shelf hardware. Some hardware already in the field became immediately obsolete when no future Vista support was planned by the manufacturer.
One example: Creative Labs' Soundblaster Live! series sound cards and earlier PCI- and ISA-bus sound cards. Basically, any hardware that's been in the market for more than three years is likely to have no Vista drivers available.
The earlier release of Windows XP did not cause this type of disruption to users and system builders. That's because Windows XP was built on the same code base as Windows 2000 and Windows NT. As a result, many older device drivers were already XP-compatible. These drivers could be pressed into service until new revisions were released. The same principle applied to Windows Millennium Edition; it was able to use device drivers originally programmed for Windows 95 and 98.
While many Vista drivers can be downloaded from manufacturers' Web sites, this process is tedious. And it's more tedious than allowing Windows to either install a built-in driver or install from a disk included with the hardware. What's more, when it comes to compatible hardware drivers, there seems to be much less support for the 64-bit versions of Vista out of the box.
Until these issues are resolved by hardware manufacturers, system builders will be forced to alter their systems' Bill of Materials to account for the lack of available Vista-compatible drivers. System builders must be sure that future Vista support will be forthcoming for the hardware they specify for their systems. I believe more time is also required to configure a Vista system, due to the need for finding and downloading device drivers and Windows Updates.
VISTA TECHNICAL DIFFICULTIES: SOFTWARE APPS
If the problems of Vista incompatibility stopped with the device drivers, it might somehow be bearable. But they don't, and it's not.
Perhaps the worst nightmare of switching to Windows Vista is combating the various software application incompatibilities that plague this new OS. If you see one of those warning screens from Vista telling you that an application is not compatible, heed its advice and stop there.
The problem may be relatively mild, such as the need to download and install an update from the manufacturer (and not a small download, usually). Or it may be quite serious, such as finding that the system has locked up, won't respond, or has crashed entirely. In other cases, a system may behave oddly when trying to install or run applications that have not been reprogrammed for Vista.
System builders are essentially at the mercy of software manufacturers to release new versions of their programs that are Vista-compatible. Not every software maker will make Vista updates available right away for their current products. For example, Adobe recently announced that it will actually withhold Vista support for several of its products until the next version of Vista is released (see this news story for more details).
My final recommendation: If you have business customers who depend on certain core applications for their productivity, then be very careful before advising an upgrade to Vista.
Also, assume you will need to do a lot of research when planning for application migration and data transfer to Vista. If you do not plan for every possible outcome, you could end up with some seriously dissatisfied customers.
Waiting is another option. By the time Vista Service Pack 1 is available, I will likely change my mind and begin to eagerly advise my customers to switch to the new OS.
DAVID GILBERT is the owner of Appalachian Computer Systems, a West Virginia system builder that specializes in multiprocessor SCSI RAID servers.