Migration issues slow Vista adoption

Patching, user downtime and productivity issues provide barriers, according to research

The promise of better security is attracting organisations to Microsoft's Windows Vista, but deployment challenges are slowing migration plans, according to recent research.

About half of Vista adopters are specifically interested in its improved firewall and anti-spyware functions, according to the Fourth Annual Enterprise Security Survey conducted in the US and published in May. Meanwhile, a survey of UK IT managers out this week has found that half believe it would take at least a year to migrate all their users to Microsoft's new platform.

The UK research was commissioned by management tool vendor Enteo Software and found that the sheer complexity of rolling out Vista is deterring many IT departments. While 49 percent said such a move would take them twelve months or longer, a further 45 percent said it would take at least six months. Only three percent said they were contemplating an immediate migration.

“Although Vista is a great leap forward for the Windows operating system, it is a shame that more IT managers won’t be adopting it sooner because of their fears about migration,” said Enteo chief technology officer Stephan Glathe.

Post-migration issues such as patching and user downtime are also cited as potential pitfalls of a Vista migration. IT managers are also wary of investing a great deal of effort in deploying software which may not actually enhance productivity, according to the report.

While Vista has already come under fire for some security shortcomings, its User Account Control (UAC) feature is cited as a major reason to upgrade by respondents in the Fourth Annual Enterprise Security Survey. With UAC, users operate at a reduced privilege level to minimise the risk of malware gaining control of the system.

However, despite the benefits that Vista may bring, the Enteo report concludes that many organisations will still delay migration until after the release of the first service pack, expected to ship by the end of 2007.