We all know the arrival of Windows 8 is on the horizon and there's some big hoopla coming with it.  And rightfully so--with the promise of a cool new user interface (especially optimised for touch screens), native USB 3.0 support and great new tools for developers to create a  new generation of apps among just a few of the sweet new features coming with Windows 8, it's totally understandable that people are licking their lips in anticipation.

But hold on, wait a minute, most of our Enterprises have only just recently converted over to Windows 7, let alone Windows 8.  Or maybe your company has just begun the migration process to Windows 7, coming off of XP or Vista. You might be one of those questioning the value of investing time and resources to getting your Windows 7 deployments up to scratch, and ensuring your IT staff who support it have the deep admin knowledge on the product, when Windows 8 is approaching over the next year.  It's a fair conclusion at first glance, but to hold off getting the know-how you need on Windows 7 doesn't really make good sense.  From a cost and support perspective for the enterprise customer, Windows 7 doesn't even reach the end of mainstream support until January of 2015.  Yes, 2015.  That's still 3 years away.  Unless there is some unique, compelling reason to leap-frog forward to the future in the OS world, the majority of our companies will be looking to postpone increased investment in OS deployments until it becomes absolutely necessary from a support perspective.  And...Windows 7 is pretty sweet itself:

• Easier to install and less power hungry than Vista
• Less annoying notifications and pop-ups
• Designed with mobile devices in mind so Windows 7 is more energy efficient
• Networking has been made alot easier.  Share a printer and several machines
• Searching for documents and files is even easier
• 32bit and 64bit versions available
• Strong backwards compatibility with Windows XP programmes
• Superb data backup features

“Providers of IT services can no longer afford to focus on technology and their internal organization;
they now have to consider the quality of the services they provide and focus on the relationship with customers.”

Last week Irish customers of Microsoft Premier Support Services gathered at our customer event and had the opportunity to watch demos of some of Microsoft’s latest technology as well as insights on how to better manage the IT services delivered within their own enterprises.  Of particular interest was a great demo on integrating system Center to monitor and manage across the IT service lifecycle. 

System Center’s built-in processes are based on industry best practices such as those found in Microsoft Operations Framework (MOF) and the IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL), so it makes sense to leverage the technology you already have to start driving the IT service management improvement you are looking for within your enterprise.

Want to learn more?  Check out some great demos available to see what you can accomplish with the System Center suite.  Then contact your Service Delivery Manager to see how you can leverage your Premier Support agreement to get started.

Sources:

IT Service Management Forum (2002). van Bon, J.. ed. IT Service Management: An Introduction. Van Haren Publishing. ISBN 9080671347.

http://blogs.technet.com/b/servicemanager/archive/2010/01/13/system-center-service-manager-demos.aspx