Here's a good article...
November 01, 1998, Issue: 911
NT: Who Needs It? -- Look before you leap into NT 5.0-it's not for everyone.
John D. Ruley
You're running Windows 95 or maybe 98. You hear all the talk about NT 5.0 being the next business operating system. And you wonder: Do I need to switch?
I wish I had a blanket answer for you. But it's not that simple. The first thing to keep in mind is that NT 5.0 is probably at least seven months away. That's a long time to wait when Windows 98 and NT 4.0 are out there now. And even if NT 5.0 lives up to all of Microsoft's promises, it won't be the best choice for everybody.
I've been running NT since version 3.1, and I'm going to take my time before moving to NT 5.0-I'll probably wait for the first service pack before I switch full time. Before anybody makes the change, there are several important factors that should be carefully considered.
What do you need NT for?
The real question is, do you honestly need NT? If not, you're probably better off with Windows 98. It's cheaper and easier to set up, and you won't have to deal with esoteric things such as user accounts.
If you think you do need NT, ask yourself why. Even Bill Gates once said, "If you don't know what you need NT for, then you don't need it." He was right then, and it's still good advice today.
If your performance needs won't be met by a single-processor machine running today's fastest Intel CPU, then you need NT. That covers a limited number of people working with special applications such as CAD and software development. If you need local security on your desktop, then you need NT. If you work in or support a corporate network environment, NT offers compelling advantages for remote administration and management.
Standalone use
If you're not networked and you only use your PC for simple things such as e-mail, word processing and financial applications, don't wait for NT 5.0. You can get by just fine with Win98. If your needs are more advanced, though, NT has advantages. For example, if several people in your office share a computer, you can give everybody their own Desktops, private directories and so on. You can also restrict certain information to authorized viewers. You can do all this with NT 4.0, and NT 5.0 will increase your ability to keep data safe and private with disk quotas, which prevent unauthorized filling of the hard disk. If this kind of customization and control will serve your business well, you don't have to wait for NT 5.0-you can implement many of these measures with NT 4.0 and upgrade later.
While NT offers advantages if several people use your computer, setup and administration involve extra work. If you're the only user, the security features just get in the way. And older systems designed for Windows 95 probably use old DOS-style drivers, such as MSCDEX for the CD-ROM drive. Those drivers work with Win98, but not with NT 4.0 or NT 5.0.
NT 4.0 or NT 5.0?
Here's an example of a current NT 4.0 user who should upgrade as soon as NT 5.0 is available. I have a friend who's a biologist-a department head at a university-who uses NT Workstation and NT Server. He favors NT for its reliability, and since his computers are in areas where any student can use them, security is also a key consideration. So NT makes sense. Unfortunately, much of the biology classroom material is in the form of images-and NT 4.0 isn't exactly the cat's meow of imaging systems, with drivers for scanners and digital cameras still scarce. So he has one system set up to dual boot to Windows 95 when he needs to run a scanner or camera. NT 5.0's improved hardware compatibility should eliminate the need for the dual-boot setup.
I plan to upgrade my own systems to NT 5.0, including my primary PC-eventually. Indeed, I'm looking forward to it, because I hope to eliminate the need for a Win95 dual-boot on that system.
I currently use NT 4.0 for almost everything, but it isn't compatible with the serial cable support in Casio's QV-Link software for its QV-300 digital camera, or with the Logitech WingMan joystick I use with Microsoft's Flight Simulator. To run either of those, I have to dual-boot Windows 95. I hope that NT 5.0 will clear up these problems. If it does, I'll do away with the dual boot.
Why not switch to Win98? My years of working with NT probably have a lot to do with my decision to stick with it. Back in the days of NT 3.1, switching to NT on my primary system eliminated the near-daily reboots I had under Windows 3.1. I had to give up a few applications that weren't NT-compatible, but keeping my computer up all day was more important. If I were in the same boat today, I'm not sure I'd make the same decision.
Win98 is a lot more reliable than Windows 3.x. It doesn't match NT's management and security features, but while I connect to a corporate network through NT's Remote Access Services and an ISDN modem, I work mainly from a home office. Under those conditions, Win98 would work just about as well.
Networked NT 5.0
Many of NT 5.0's features rely on running NT Server and therefore might not benefit many smaller businesses. BackOffice Small Business Server (the version of NT Server Microsoft markets to small and midsized businesses) makes sense for single-server networks, but the version for NT Server 5.0 probably won't be available for several months after NT 5.0 ships.
Microsoft is aiming NT 5.0 at big corporations. All the talk about reducing Total Cost of Ownership and setting up a corporate-wide Active Directory focuses on a corporate-wide NT rollout.
While I understand some benefits of NT 5.0's Active Directory (AD), I think anyone contemplating an NT 5.0 rollout needs to think through the implications carefully. NT 5.0's manageability features not only use AD, they require it, and converting a large organization to AD is daunting. AD uses Internet-style Domain Name Service (DNS) as the overall structure for a corporate directory.
Let me give you an example: Because WINDOWS Magazine is part of CMP Media, that would presumably mean that we'd become part of CMP.COM. But for historical reasons, we're WINMAG.COM. Do we need to change that? Should we become WINMAG.CMP.COM? We're part of CMP's Business Computing and Communications Group, so should we be WINMAG.BUSCOMM.CMP.COM? How far do we carry this kind of thinking before the resulting domain name becomes too clumsy to live with?
CMP also isn't about to rip out its existing Novell NetWare servers and drop NT Server 5.0 in their place. Just evaluating NT Server 5.0 means it will have to coexist with the NetWare servers-and the X.500-based directory that was set up for them. How will this be managed? I don't know, and at this writing, Microsoft's only answer to this is a one-way migration from the NetWare directory to AD; that strikes me as a great way to get laughed out of CMP's corporate IT department.
More features = more resources
Even organizations that deployed earlier versions of NT Servers all have problems with NT 5.0. Active Directory is different from the LAN Manager-style domain system used in older versions of NT. To benefit from NT 5.0's advanced features, NT 5.0 Workstations must log on to an NT 5.0 Server configured as a domain controller. And when you add an NT 5.0 domain controller to an existing NT domain, it replaces the existing primary domain controller (PDC). All the extra features require RAM, processor cycles and disk space. If you're using a low-end PC as your PDC now just to validate user log-ons, you'll have to upgrade to at least a 233MHz Pentium II with 64MB of RAM to run NT Server 5.0.
Storage requirements will soar because the NT Server 5.0 Registry will contain four times as much data per user as past versions. If the network deploys management features such as IntelliMirror (a scheme to automatically back up desktop data on server hard disks), you have to wonder how much hard disk space it will take. Granted, the result will be a more manageable network, but with considerably greater hardware costs.
While NT 5.0 is the fifth major revision to NT, it is the first version of Active Directory, IntelliMirror and other new features.
How many IT directors (the people NT 5.0's management features are aimed at) want to bet their company on Active Directory 1.0?
NT 5.0 defenders argue that the benefits of central administration and a more manageable operating system outweigh the costs. In the long run, I agree. But for the next year or so, I'd take the slow approach. Make sure you understand everything that needs to be upgraded and the costs before making a commitment to NT 5.0.
If you're a corporate administrator, you'll also want to think about how you'll manage in 1999 while you're neck-deep in Year 2000 issues. And it's not only corporate administrators who need to take a cautious approach. The advantages of being first on your block just aren't worth the risk of tripping over one of the inevitable version 1.0 bugs.
Don't get the idea that I'm down on NT 5.0. It is cool-but it's months away from being released. If you need it, take the time to roll NT 5.0 out in a controlled, thoughtful way. You can start with a dual boot and make sure everything's working properly before dropping your old operating system. That's what I'm going to do-and in future columns, I'll tell you how it's going. |
