Here's a zdnet article on win2000 release:
zdnet.com
Promise broken: Windows 2000 delayed
Sources say Microsoft has abandoned its promise of a 1999 launch for the next rev of Windows. Instead, look for arrival in February.
By Scott Berinato and Mary Jo Foley, Sm@rt Reseller, PC Week
October 14, 1999 7:19 AM PT
Microsoft Corp. marketing will take one on the chin and wait until February of next year to launch Windows 2000, the company's flagship product.
The Redmond, Wash., company is telling partners it will take a deliberate approach to launch rather than try to rush the launch into the end of this year just to save face, according to several sources.
(Speaking at the GartnerGroup's Symposium/ITxpo in Orlando, Fla., on Wednesday, Microsoft President Steve Ballmer said the company is in no rush to ship the OS until it's "absolutely, positively right.")
Microsoft (Nasdaq:MSFT) also will conduct a Windows 2000 launch planning event in conjunction with its partners in late October, where the company will map out in detail its delivery and launch plans for the product, according to partners.
Microsoft officials, who have repeatedly promised shipment by the end of this year, would not confirm or deny any timing issues regarding the shipment of Windows 2000. However, a Windows 2000 trade show in San Francisco has been slated for February and is likely to provide the venue for the OS's launch, sources said.
RTM in December?
Microsoft officials maintain the product will release to manufacture, or RTM, this year -- sources say Dec. 5 is the latest target -- and therefore Windows 2000 would technically ship this year, even though users won't have the software in hand for six to eight weeks after RTM.
But even Microsoft seems resigned to the idea that, given Year 2000 issues, shipping a product at the end of this year is not an ideal strategy.
"I joke and tell [CEO] Bill [Gates] that this is the worst time in the last couple hundred years to ship a new software product," said Brian Valentine, vice president of Microsoft's Business and Enterprise Division and head of Windows 2000 development under Senior Vice President Jim Allchin.
But quality issues and development delays also seem to be playing a part in putting off the launch to February. Sources say a third release candidate, originally slated for October, has slipped to November. And application compatibility, an issue that has dogged the product all year, is still about 15 percent shy of where Microsoft wants it, according to Valentine.
Daunting challenges for users
Users, for the most part, aren't fazed by the timing. Most have no plans for serious deployments until at least the end of next year -- regardless of whether they purchase the product early in the year.
Even Rapid Deployment Partners with deployment success stories are taking careful steps with portions of what many observers say is more than just an upgrade.
"In our environment, we haven't done much with Active Directory services yet, and we're just now planning to migrate our domain controller to Windows 2000," said Jason Lochhead, vice president of research and development at Data Return Corp., an RDP in Dallas founded by three former Microsoft employees.
Data Return's application hosting business is running on Windows 2000 with some Windows NT 4.0 mixed in. "I felt like I had a good grasp on Active Directory, and even then it's daunting," Lochhead said.
Also daunting to users will be the amount of conflicting information regarding the cost of upgrading to Windows 2000.
Cost-effective ... or not?
Giga Information Group this week released Windows 2000 research claiming that the benefits of migrating to Win2000 outweigh the costs. Giga based its findings on its Total Economic Impact metric, which measures cost alongside benefits, flexibility and risk.
Giga found that installing or upgrading to Windows 2000 Professional will cost approximately $970 to $1,640 per desktop system. Installing or upgrading to Windows 2000 Server -- once the product has been stabilized -- will cost approximately $107 per client for a typical network of 5,000 users.
For an enterprise with 5,000 users, the total expected cost of upgrading to Windows 2000 Professional and Server would be approximately $1,077 to $1,747 per user even if an organization replaces all of its desktop hardware.
But Those findings run counter to a study published by the Gartner Group, whose analysts said fewer than 30 percent of enterprises will adopt the first iteration of Windows 2000 and cited much higher deployment costs.
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