Win 2000 Or Lose 2000?

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Who needs Windows NT, excuse me, Windows 2000 anyway? With Sun, IBM, HP, Silicon Graphics moving their Unix OSs to the Intel Merced and Xeon platforms, Microsoft may be facing a W2K problem in addition to Y2K issues.

Microsoft is apparently so concerned about the DOA (dead-on-arrival) potential for NT 5, it changed the program's name to Windows 2000 in an effort to squeeze the maximum leverage out of its Windows brand name recognition. And the company will need all the help it can get.

Personally, I think Microsoft miscalculated on this one. NT has become a household brand name in the corporate market. Windows 2000 sounds gimmicky and too much like a consumer product. That won't sit well with serious corporate network administrators.

There has never been much doubt that Unix, any Unix, is far superior to buggy and down-time prone Windows NT. Unix systems tend to stay up and humming along for months on end. And they consume a fraction of the systems and network resources compared to NT.

The early success of NT has been built, to a large degree, on the proprietary nature of Unix hardware and the high premium companies must pay for such equipment. Just ask any Mac user used to shelling out two or three times as much for Mac peripherals than what PC users pay for identical PC versions.

NT's rapid growth in the small and medium size of the Unix market, is one of the four major reasons the major Unix houses are caving in and rushing to port their software over to the Intel platform. The other three are:




PERFORMANCE:
Intel's Xeon and future Merced processors are approaching or eclipsing the performance of Sparc, MIPS and other Unix chips. And because Intel can make them economically in huge volume, why waste huge corporate resources fighting a losing battle against Intel, AMD and other Intel-based processors.





LINUX: Linux is the Unix OS designed to run on Intel chips and it has become a runaway success. Already some 10 million computers worldwide run Linux on Intel-based servers, including on new Xeon chips. Linux has simply forced the hand of other Unix vendors facing a loss of business to Linux-based workstations and servers.





A WINDOW OF OPPORTUNITY:
Windows NT is late, very late. Already Windows NT 5.0, sorry, Windows 2000 is not due until mid-to-late 1999. Even then, it will be early 2000 before it is widely available. By jumping on the Intel processor platform bandwagon now, all Unix houses will be selling an Intel alternative by the time Windows 2000 arrives. As such, it may be a DOA. By the time the data is in on NT reliability, many network administrators will have made long-term Intel-based Unix commitments.

No doubt, Intel will emerge as the best thing that could have happened to the Unix community and may spark a major reinvigoration in the Unix market and software development community. Network administrators will be able to build vast and highly complex networks with an Intel/Unix backbone serving hundreds, if not thousands of Windows workstations. The trend towards Intel-based Unix platforms is also expected to blow new life into such markets as PC X server software that lets PCs run Unix applications sitting on Unix network servers.

A Unix revival won't bring Microsoft to its knees, maybe back to Earth if we're lucky. And yes, it would be nice to see at least one better-than-Windows OS fend off the Microsoft juggernaut for a change.

PAUL SWART,





Silicon Valley News Service.

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