Windows 2000 Update

A Windows 2000 Update announced that Mainstream Support by Microsoft ended as of June 30, 2005. What is the impact to your company? Not as much as feared, but it will cost you if you’re a smaller company lacking an IT department that can maintain your PCs using the Windows 2000 Operating System (OS).

While Mainstream Support was free, including tech support and automatic downloads of security patches, the Windows 2000 update now means, as of July 1, 2005, an Extended Support plan with tech support now costing $35 per incident. Security patches will continue to be free and will automatically downloadable, but a support contract will be required to get updates that aren’t security related. According to Microsoft, the Windows 2000 Extended Support phase will lasts for five years after the end of Mainstream Support.

Part of the reason for the Windows 2000 update has to be the push for transitions to XP and the new operating system scheduled to be released next year, called Longhorn. Windows 2000 is still the most popular OS, according to AssetMetix Research Labs in an industry report (Analysis of Windows 2000 Popularity in 2005) released in Early June, 2005, with 48 percent of businesses using the OS. XP currently commands 37%. While this represents only 4% decrease in total system users from 2003, XP gained users from 6% to 38% in the same period and remains the most popular OS for companies with 20-250 PCs. Windows 95 and Windows 98 users dropped from 28% to less than 5%.

Larger companies generally are holding on to Windows 2000 because many have custom applications developed to work specifically with it, but may not work with XP. For small business owners, the impact may be particularly hard felt with companies pushing up timetables for the conversion to XP. Along with this transition is the added costs of reinvesting in software upgrades or purchasing new software outright. But while larger companies can absorb the cost of continued use because of in-house IT departments, smaller companies without in-house IT assets will be forced to make the transition.

While somewhat costly, there are some benefits to the Windows 2000 change. Security issues, mainly spyware and virus attacks, are better handled with newer machines, as long as anti spyware and anti virus tools are installed on a “clean” machine--one that is brand new out of the box. Many of the newer PCs come with trial versions of Norton or McAfee security software already installed, which will allow owners to download additional tools to help safeguard their systems. (For information on free anti-spyware or antivirus tools, see Best Free Anti-Spyware And Anti-Virus Tools).

The other benefit is that newer PCs are generally more powerful, giving small business owners an edge with software selections growing as software developers scramble to make upgraded or new products available for the market.

Is this the final transition? Hardly. Once Vista is introduced, the process will begin all over again, with early adopters running for the new while the more cautious small business owners wait and see. As with any transition in OS, there will be problems that will take a while to work out. That may mean that XP may be around for a 5-year run. But one never knows. Eventually all support will end for Windows 2000 and eventually XP will fall into the same unsupported pit that all previous OS have. But that day remains, hopefully, still far enough off not to be too concerned about it.

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