According to Gartner Win 2000 a potentially rocky road
GartnerGroup, an information technology research and consulting group, saysthat its clients are playing it cautious when considering upgrading toMicrosoft Windows 2000. While Windows 2000 Professional may "prove stableprior to the release of Service Pack 1 (the first release of fixes to knownbugs), compatibility testing, problem resolution and training will take atleast several months for most enterprises," said Michael Gartenberg,Gartner's VP for distributed desktop technologies.
The keys to success, according to the Gartner report are to be found in"fully analyzing ROI, building an overall rollout plan and following bestpractices in the migration area. In most cases, the most cost-effectivestrategy for deploying Windows 2000 will be a phased migration that deploysnew or replacement systems with Windows 2000, as opposed to upgradinginstalled systems."
A typical migration following best practices, says research director MichaelSilver, "can achieve payback in under two years. Furthermore, enterprisesthat combine Windows 2000 migrations with a conversion to a well-manageddesktop environment using Windows 2000 server capabilities have thepotential to achieve full investment payback in less than a year."
GartnerGroup predicts that over the course of the next two years, as much as45 percent of the base of 32-bit Windows business desktops and laptops willbe upgraded with Windows 2000 Professional.
They also predict that over the same time period, fully half of all midsizeto large enterprises will encounter new compatibility problems withline-of-business applications, non-Windows interoperability or networkinfrastructure when testing Windows 2000.
Gartner predicts that, through 2002, 80 percent ofall Windows 2000 Professional migrations by enterprises with more than 500desktops will exceed their budgets for time or money by at least 25 percent,primarily due to lack of proper planning.