According to The Register, Intel plans to deploy Windows 7 on its employee's computers. When asked at a Technology Summit with reporters and analysts in San Francisco whether the company would wait until service pack 1 to deploy Windows 7, Intel's EVP and chief sales and marketing officer Sean Maloney said, "This time I think we'll go faster."This is good news for Microsoft since Intel and many other companies skipped Vista. The company's top salesman also sympathized with those who passed on Vista. "There was an excuse not to deploy Vista, because - rightly or wrongly - people said 'wait for service pack X' or 'we don't like the compatibility issues."
But this time, things may be different. Maloney said, "There are really good reasons for the business client in terms of security, power management - lots of good reasons why you'd go for it."
Maloney also referred to Windows XP Mode saying, "It looks really robust. You've got compatibility mode, which takes away a bunch of those arguments, so I think it's all positive." However, in order to run Windows 7's XP Mode, its CPU must support Hardware Virtualization, and unfortunately, many Intel multicore chips don't support this.
Regardless, Maloney wants companies to upgrade their PCs to run Windows 7. "Now the question is," he said, "can we get the argument to the CFOs and the CEOs that it makes more sense to spend a little bit on capital to reduce your operating costs?" He seems quite clear on the answer to that question, "We think it makes overwhelming sense if you have a three-year-old PC to replace the thing, for security violations, virus, power consumption, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera - and Windows 7 is just one big positive."
LMAO I thought that was interesting too...
It is more to do with accounting. They amortize the cost of the PC over 3 years, and they have to get rid of it according to some financial rules. I imagine a lot of people at intel would need very fast machines.
i'm not talking about Intel particularly. his comment is directed at all companies and that's just insane to actually tell a company to replace a pc that's only 3yo.
If you just wanna run win7 itself then 3 or 4yo hardware is just fine. I ran it ok on a 6+yo POS for the hell of it.
The company I work for also has a 3 year replacement policy. The old PCs/laptops end up getting decomissioned and thrown away. Like what cakesy said, it's more of an accounting/inventory policy that we follow based on Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) compliance (Enron's to blame for this).
Our company is actually moving to a new building in spring 2010 and our CTO wants to have Windows 7 deployed when we move. But we probably won't do it until Office 2010 is released. I'm just going to hate the support calls I have to deal with from our ignorant user base (1500 or so
Last edited by Rail Grinder on 31 Jul 2009 - 05:57
The reason that is has to do with cost-amortization rules (in short, tax laws) for desktop computers. For servers, the rule is five years, for HPCs, the rule is seven years; for mainframes, the rule is ten years (and used to be fifteen years). It has nothing to do with what the desires of Intel and Microsoft (or even IBM) and a lot to do with cost-recovery for businesses.
If each system isn't replaced every 3 years and the deadline is missed then that machine stays in service for 6 years.
3 years is a long time for a full time used machine.
It's actually pretty standard business practice, my last employer hold the UK MOD, DWP and many other major size projects. The situation is standard across all estates with systems normally leased on a 3yr period and then refreshed.
Not that older PC's cant' cope with 7 I ran it on a laptop that struggled with XP without probs. Naturally Intel as a MS agility partner, will help to push the sales and it makes sense for Intel to use the next thing in OS's internally as Vista was a flop 7 clearly isn't going to be.
It depends on the PC. We have 3 year old dell optiplex gx 620's with only p4 processors with failing power supplies. So yes a 3 year old pc can be junked.
The quote is attributed to Intel's "EVP and chief sales and marketing officer". Gee, I wonder why somebody in such a position would recommend companies replace their PCs every 3 years?
Hopefully it wont and people will start to think for themselves. Maybe they will figure out that being stuck to one company has its issues, even one as big as MS. Maybe people will start to try other OS that are just as good, and in some ways better.
But probably not, and everyone will move to 7 because they don't think.
But probably not, and everyone will move to 7 because they don't think.
Yeah, same thing at my company. The braindead IT people force the super expensive Microsoft OS and Office suites down our throughts. I would kill to get a Mac here. And the crap RIM devices we have to use are just horrid. I have started using my iPhone for everything at work as it is so much better than anything RIM has.
It's true that not all Core 2 Duo/Quad chips support VT-x, however I wouldn't say "many." A quick look through http://ark.intel.com/VTList.aspx shows that 83 out of the 106 different models/revisions support VT-x.
Saying that however, there are only a couple of Pentium Dual-Cores that support VT-x...
(Or maybe they're actually only installing it on one employee's PC
More than likely as it is the same backend with tweaks and improvements... but they did include XP mode for a reason
Commenting has either been disabled on this article or you are not logged in. Click here to login or register, its free!
Note: Anonymous commenting is disabled in order to keep the quality of responses to a high standard.