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IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

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Gartner argues that significant cost increases from changes in licensing for Win2K will drive companies to less restrictive server operating systems such as Solaris and Linux. Do you think the cost of Windows 2000 licensing supports the idea that Microsoft uses monopolistic practices? Have Win2K licensing costs made you consider alternative operating systems? You can read the related Gartner article, which will be posted on 3:00 A.M. Wednesday, at http://www.techrepublic.com/article.jhtml?id=r00620000614ggp01.htm

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IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

In reply to IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

Licensing costs are a huge dis-incentive to continue to use Microsoft products but I don’t know to what degree I would tie that to monopolistic practices. Oracle licensing costs are also high and there has, so far, been no accusations of monopoly with regards to them.

I continue to consider and deploy non-Microsoft products whenever it makes sense on a total cost of ownership basis. Thus, I use Apache on Linux or FreeBSD for Web serving, Samba on Linux or FreeBSD for file and print sharing, but Windows2000 for Terminal Services and on the desktop (for now).

paul

Paul M. Wright, Jr. MCSE, CNE
McKay Technologies

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

In reply to IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

In reply to IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

I work for a medium-sized company which, for the moment, is an MS shop. The current platform for clients and servers is NT 4.0. We are currently conducting a “next-generation” study where the original viewpoint was a migration to Win2K.
But as of this moment we no longer hold this view. Win2K is simply too expensive.
While it is unlikely that we can switch the client-side(we have, ofcourse MS Office), it is a safe bet to say that the back-end will switch completely. File and print services,mail and fax services, web services, databases will be hosted on unix. At this point we’re not sure what vendor we will choose for directory services. Novell is a strong candidate.
We are aware of the conversion and migration costs for switching platforms but, and this is the keypoint, we are now *willing* to make them as we believe them to be justified on a long term base.

So, is MS monopolistic? No, because I believe that there are alternatives wich more compelling each day.
Are they bullish and arrogant?

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

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IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

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If it looks like a duck, Quacks like a duck, it is probably a duck

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

In reply to IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

In reply to IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

Changing operating systems Is a lot of work. Bill Gates realizes this, and bets that increase in prices won’t make us change systems . And will continue to find ways to charge for services just as creativly as the The Telephone companies do! Take a good look at your phone bill! You wil see all kinds of charges just to have a dial tone, 10.95, Charges for in home wire repair , called wire pro, $3.20, and wire pro plus , $1.20, Savor 60, for so called savings on calls made $3.60 whether you make one call or 100 so think you save anything making a few calls at 10 cents a min. which would add up to maby 2.00 dollars you don’t save anything but it cost you more. and for directory assitance charges .95 cents, having your phone # listed .14cents unlisted .28cents, etc, ect, so are the phone companies monopolistic?? We are stuck with greedy corpaorate America and all its charges, monopolistic or not. all operating systems are going to charge and if you save maby a few dollars is it worth changing services ? He

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

In reply to IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

In reply to IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

I don’t quite understand your point. In our case the competition for Windows 2000 and SQL server for our website would be Sun Workstations, Solaris and Oracle to get something near the same level of performance. Win 2000, SQL server, CALs and Intelhardware are nearly an order of magnitude less expensive than our alternative. If Win 2000 is in trouble from Linux then what about Sun and Oracle?

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

In reply to IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

In reply to IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

While Gartner makes some good points, one has to wonder if this isn’t a short term situation (and short term thinking on Microsoft’s part). *** IF *** (and this is a BIG IF) the company is split up per the recent court decision, one has to wonder about the viability of a company whose only products are operating systems. If MS-1 produces Windows-X and MS-2 produces Exchange, there’s no incentive for MS-2 to require their customers to pay extra for the privilege of running on a Windows based platform.

Would Apple see this as an opportunity to come out with a Mac-like OS for the x86 processors? Didn’t Apple go down this road with the original Mac – making the system very proprietary and trying to lock in users and limit choices? (And look what that got Apple…) Either way, market forces may very well force this to change, and if so, Microsoft’s right to change terms at will could mean a DEcrease in costs… In the mean time, this is one more dis-incentive to m

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

In reply to IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

In reply to IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

Microsoft once had me believing that they wanted to sell their products. You look at the costs for a Win2k setup and then you have to wonder what good ol’ Bill is thinking. I must admit, I have Win2k on my laptop and it runs great, but would I be willing to recommend a site-wide installation of Win2k? Not in the slightest. Linux servers for mail, news, database and file sharing is the way to go. I’d stay away from Solaris just because of equiptment costs. There are two great SQL servers for Linux that are freeware and you can get Oracle and Informix if you feel so inclined. Samba may not perform as well as Win2k, but free is free. And I never did like exchange.

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

In reply to IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

In reply to IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

As I read the article, the only thing that came to my realization was monopoly. Until this article was released I was so sure that Microsoft was being corporately ambushed. But, in light of what I’ve just read I can see and understand why it came tocourt. Now, if I’m understanding this correctly, Microsoft is charging Win2K CAL fees even when an enterprise uses another vendor’s NOS with Exchange; and this is being done because Exchange needs NT authentication. Yet, needing the same authentication, as long as an enterprise uses NT 4, there’s no charge. Granted there’s more in Win2K, but to have the audacity to charge fees even when its system isn’t used is monopolistic from what I understand of the term.

What’s even more intriguing isthe fact that if an enterprise uses a Microsoft function here or there, while continuing to use another vendor’s system, those functions force the use of other functions that require additional charges, as I understand the article(anyone feel free to correct me if I mis

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

In reply to IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

In reply to IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

Since we, the IS and IT industry in this continent has sold our soul to MS and willy enslave ourselves to the MaSter, we shouldn’t complain about cost at all. We should all be thankful that we are even given the good fortune of sending our master our hard earn cash so that we can continue to enjoy MS products. There should not be any complain about cost, or bugs, or lack of function, or any other unauthorized opinion. Just remember, having one single company in a industry is a good thing.

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

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IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

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I think bigboss’s answer is right on (sarcastically so).

I once felt I could rely on the “Loyal Opposition” in this country (USA) to avoid this kind of situation. But it seems Corporate America is not very democratic or freedom loving. They’re willing to buy into a bully’s system as long as everyone else is doing it. As usual American business is short sighted.

Of course Microsoft is doing this! It’s what they planned all along.

I’m not going to yell monopoly, I’m going to yellviable alternatives!!! Let’s use our freedom and consumer strength and make some good choices!!!

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

In reply to IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

In reply to IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

This kind of reminds me of what finally made me strike out on my own and start my own business. Too many hoops, hurdles, etc from my old boss tends to force me to quit and create my own better solutions.

The quickest one, IMHO, is to get every business registered as an educational facility. Have you seen their discounts! $10,000+ reduced to $1,600 of Level B MOLP.
Anyone needing training???

Maybe some “good” hacker can create a patch to replace MS authentication code with their own. Oops, would that lead to another court case?

Maybe its time to throw more support behind open code OSs and let MS know about it. After all, the diffence between a consultant and a salesman is whether or not you do what is best for the CUSTOMER. And I know which one I am.

Travis B. Creighton
CompuTron

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

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IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

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This situation also points out how convoluted software licensing really is. It is very difficult as an IS manager to ensure that you have licensed 30 different applications correctly (30 apps may be too many, but it may not be enough either for a data processing environment).

It is also difficult to ensure that the vendor selling you the product is telling the full story on licensing requirements. The industry needs to have some kind of software licensing manager certification or standard license language for applications. The certification or education program is very attractive, but how often would it have to be upgraded? How many vendor’s programs would you have to know? This is not much different than a certification for inventory management or project management. License management can be a full time position if there is a lot of turnover on applications and systems.

IT Debate: Buyer beware: Windows 2000 li

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