Vista: Look Before You Leap

The other day I was asked how I "feel" about Windows Vista, not so much from a technical standpoint but about the product in general. I had a tough time verbalizing an answer without resorting to technical facts and figures.

FRANK J. OHLHORST Can be reached at (516) 562-7485 or via e-mail at fohlhorst@cmp.com.

But the more I think about Vista, the more mixed my feelings have become. Now I'm at a point where I'm not so sure that Vista is the way for businesses to go -- at least for now.

I have played with Vista quite a bit over the last few months and have both RTM code and Release Candidate 2 installed on several test systems. As a matter of fact, my primary notebook PC, a Lenovo T60, runs Vista Ultimate Edition (RTM code), so I am no stranger to the operating system.

However, my comfort level with Vista has plummeted, mostly because I'd like to test the product under different scenarios but Microsoft has been slow to release the tools to make that happen. Perhaps that's due to overwhelming demand or just someone dropping the ball on Microsoft's part. Anyway you slice it, Microsoft's less-than-prompt support added another layer of muck to the Vista puzzle for me.

While that situation hinders my ability to do more testing of Vista in an enterprise environment, I have to wonder if Microsoft's piracy fears, its new licensing model, Vista's activation methods and its deployment changes will create fear, uncertainty and doubt for enterprises considering a Vista upgrade path.

Another area that adds to the murkiness is the number of Vista versions. Does the market really need five versions of an OS? Vista should be trimmed to two versions: a business version and a personal-use version. Microsoft could include everything in the business version and let those users choose which features to deploy, and the company could reduce the feature set for the personal version, such as by removing some networking features, tablet functions or customization options.

I, for one, am trying to figure out why someone would need Vista. What is the compelling reason to upgrade?