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Win2k Cheaper than Linux
An anonymous reader writes "According to this story, Win2k costs an average of 11%-22% total cost of enterprise. The study showed that the initial investment takes up less than 5% of the total cost. Linux did beat Win2k in one category, Web-serving." Man did this thing get submitted a lot.
From the comments under the article ('BSD user'):
Reference: Here we read that Mainstream support for windows 2000 servers will end 31 March 2005 That's only 2 years and 4 months from now. I don't remember seeing a 'use before' date on any linux servers. Do you?
Readers might wish to balance this article with the rest of the story, found here.
IDC: Windows 2000 Offers Better Total Cost Of Ownership Than Linux
Win 2000 offers cost advantage in four out of five server workloads
By Paula Rooney, CRN
Framingham, Mass.
4:55 PM EST Mon., Dec. 02, 2002
Microsoft's Windows 2000 offers a better total cost of ownership (TCO) than Linux for most traditional server workloads over a five-year time span, according to an IDC study.
Just a day before the Enterprise Linux Forum gets under way in Boston, Microsoft is celebrating the results of a study that maintains that the Windows 2000 Server operating system offers a better cost of ownership for running network infrastructure, print serving, file serving and security applications than Linux.
According to the survey of 104 companies in North America, the cost advantage of Windows over Linux for the four workloads ranges from 11 percent to 22 percent over a five-year period.
Linux demonstrated a cost advantage over Windows in only one category--Web serving. According to the survey, Linux offers a cost advantage of 6 percent over Windows for running Web applications over that same time frame.
While Microsoft's Licensing 6.0 acquisition costs are significantly higher than those of the free Linux OS, software acquisition represents a small percentage--roughly 5 percent--of the TCO, IDC found.
IDC says factors other than software acquisition cost--particularly staffing and downtime--are the most significant factors when determining TCO over a long-term period. For example, IDC says that IT staffing alone accounts for 62.2 percent of TCO, while downtime represented another 23.1 percent of the costs. Software acquisition, in contrast, accounts for a mere 4.6 percent of the TCO, while hardware represents 4.4 percent.
"The study shows very clearly that up-front costs, including hardware or software, are not the most significant items contributing to the five-year TCO value," said Al Gillen, an IDC analyst. "Think about it. How long does it take to surpass the cost of software when you have a high-paid staff member managing the system? That staff member cost is there regardless of what the original software and hardware cost," he said.
Expenditures for managing, maintaining, troubleshooting and restoring the systems operations of a Linux server were, "in almost every case, higher than for systems running Windows 2000," according to the study, titled "Windows 2000 Versus Linux in Enterprise Computing."
IDC attributed the Windows 2000 win to the maturity of Windows management features and third-party tools in the marketplace. This countered the immaturity of Linux system management tools and low penetration of Linux management platforms in the enterprise.
However, the report also noted that the increasing availability of respected management tools for the Linux platform--including BMC Patrol, CA Unicenter, HP OpenView, IBM Tivoli, NetIQ and Novell Zenworks--will likely improve the installation, deployment and maintenance numbers for Linux servers. "Over time, the gap in support costs between Linux and Windows will contract," the study stated.
IBM thinks differently in this paper and so does CyberSource here.
As a technologist I'm very sceptical to economic calculations. I believe that they can be twisted in any direction.
There is a principle of uncertanty. Of the three items cost, time and product you can only know one. So if you want to know what product you'll end up with, you can't know the price or time...
Anyway, it is good to point out that Linux systems has problems in the management area. But still, people are working on it.
Here is a good commentary from the register.
Firstly, a server license is more than $150. Second, this is a TCO study. You may not agree with it, but you clearly don't even know what TCO means if you just look at the cost to install and configure the OS on a single server.
:)
Considering all the licenses for W2k where I work cost less than one of our tech support guys' salary (and we have several of those guys) the TCO mostly depends on incidental costs from running linux or windows (ie/ if windows requires one competent admin at $60k CAD and linux requires twice as many, which has the lower TCO? But then factor in how much time those admin's are required to patch the servers and it may change - as you can see, it's not a simple thing to calculate!)
I'm no expert on TCO (i'm a programmer/analyst, not a CTO) but you know so little you really shouldn't even be posting on this topic. Shut up and read what some real admins have to say and maybe we'll all learn something
Robots are everywhere, and they eat old people's medicine for fuel.
It depends.
"Between strong and weak, between rich and poor [...], it is freedom which oppresses and the law which sets free"
The story mentions that downtime contributes more than 20% of the TCO of a system. With uptimes of months to years for *nix boxes; whereas you are strongly advised to reboot Windows boxes on a regular basis, where is the logic that 23% of the TCO of a *nix box comes from downtime?
We have linux servers at work that have downtime every 6 months for servicing, and then only for a handful of hours. Other than that, they don't come down at all. I fail to see how less than 1 day downtime/year (planned, at that) can contribute 23% of the TCO of the system.
2 sysadms at ~$70k/yr = $140k/yr. $0 for licensing. That would make downtime cost roughly $32k/day (23% of 140k, assuming 24 hrs downtime/yr). If you house something critical, like your CRM system, on 1 machine, and it goes down, I could see that. Then again, that would be your own damn fault for having 0 backup/redundancy.
There's a lot about that article that doesn't add up, and not just the 5 year study on Win 2000...
The Xserve is a rack based Mac server check out store.apple.com
... but it is crap!
considering those IT employees: fire them! or get them to study some basic UNIX administering which probably will suffice.
I work at a company with about 150 people. We have about 5 large UNIX servers and some Linux servers who are all under pretty heavy load: No problem at all, they're only being rebooted for hardware maintenance.
Since some time the mail and some other administration tools run on Windows servers, which are all 'overpowered' for their jobs. These are the machine which give the most problems... Installing (security) patches, deinstalling them again because they break critical applications, restoring them after a crash...
Now take a guess which machines take most of the time to administer and therefore have the largest TCO.
Every independant study will show that the TCO of Windows (whatever version) is higher than that of most UNIX derivates.
Apparently, the "study" is an exercise in pulling numbers out of thin air then.
How long ago was it that the MS/Hotmail internal paper was leaked showing that administration of the large server farm was a nightmare with Windows 2000 and that with Open Source software (FreeBSD in this case, ISTR), it was vastly simpler and consequently required far fewer administration resources?
If OSS takes a fraction of the admin resources, and is robust and reliable, offering potentially lower downtime, *and* by their own volition these account for the vast majority of the cost (also disputed in the MS/Hotmail paper), then unless they're paying the OSS admins six-figure salaries and the Windows admins are on minimum wage, then it simply doesn't add up.
So who funded this "study" ?
Why do all the Wintrolls always assume that Viruses, Troyans and downtime can happen to everybode except themselves?
Open Business License:
--
"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
I find it amazing that all these instant pundits and press-release-repeaters haven't noticed that the IDC study was funded by Microsoft; this could call the results into question.
At least at eWeek, someone noticed this:
"Study Finds Windows Cheaper Than Linux (continued)
"Many drivers of cost need to be uncovered in such an examination and evaluation, and the 'risk/return' trade-offs of Linux versus Windows may not be as obvious as they appear at first glance," they said.
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The fact that Microsoft paid for the research is likely to be used as a weapon against the findings by some in the Linux community and will also elevate the debate about how valid calculations of total cost of ownership are for any given comparison.
A Microsoft spokesman confirmed to eWEEK that the firm had completely sponsored the White Paper but said that IDC had controlled the methodology, data and findings. IDC analyst Al Gillen agreed, telling eWEEK that the firm undertook a lot of custom research for individual companies and customers."
And Galli also goes into detail about the methodology, so you can have fun picking that apart.
Using a repair disk isn't quite the same as being able to boot the system proper using a floppy or bootable CD. In my experience the recovery console is pretty toothless, you can't install much from it. It's handly if the MBR screws up and if you need to disable a service, but other than that it's a joke. Suppose (for example) you swap your motherboard and the chipsets are different (eg. Intel to VIA). With Windows 2000/XP if you forget to change the IDE driver to the standard IDE controller driver before switching the board you'll find it blue screens when you boot. With Linux it would just boot and if it didn't you would be able to make a boot disk of some kind with another Linux PC.
If anyone did their research they would find out that other news sites (http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104-975848.html) are reporting that this analysis was _sponsored_ by _Microsoft_.
I think there is a important thing that wasnt mentioned in the study :
/user and year - and this is a low price for a corporate with about 10000 Clients under MS EA.
Client access licenses
if one , as our company is forced to an enterprise
agreement with Microsoft the sum for CALs ( file & print, SQL Server, Exchange )to pay to microsoft is about 60 $
That makes in my company with about 20 servers and 500 clients a sum of 30000 $ a year.
I have only one man to adminster all our servers -there are 13 Win2K and 6 linux based servers.
This single man works about 15 % of his time on the linux servers ( web, firewall, SAP Systems) and 30 % for the win2k boxes, the rest is WAN stuff and SAP administration - which would be exactly the same work if the SAP systems are run under win2k
If get permission to use linux based mail and fileservices, it would be possible to save about 25000 $ a year for CALs , spending 5000 a year for commercial support on linux based exchange services, SAPDB ( GPL) and samba for fileservices.
Whats really true:
People who know linux are rare and more expensive,( here : 60000 $ a year, all inclusive) but after my bad experiences with "cheap" MCSE's i prefer to work with skilled people - they are worth their money.
People not skilled in linux, who try to work with linux will definitly need more time than with win2k, so higher TCO will be likely.
If you already have skilled people its another thing - and whats sure, if you force them to work only with windows they will look for another job.
Actually, according to the IBM study I linked to, a Linux admin can manage more Linux systems than can a Windows admin.
Basing the study off of projections for Win2k and the facts of the previous 5-years for Linux invalidates the comparison. In order to compare, you need to do both things likewise. They did not, meaning any conclusions they draw about the TCO of Windows v. Linux are meaningless. To hyperbolize what they've done, it would be like comparing the TCO of Win2k to that of Linux in 1991, when I believe it first came out.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
Specifically, I would like to know who maintains an Exchange server be 5.5 or 2k, that agrees with this article?
I have administered Exchange boxes in one form or another for about 4 years. (i also admin other stuff:-) And just last night... Stop POP3, Error1053, Service is stuck in "stopping", Start options in "Services" and "Exchange System Mgr" are greyed out. So I try to use the Stop option in the SysMgr (only option avail), Error "POP3 is not running"... ARGH! After a few hour joyride on support.microsoft.com and reading Enterprise "solutions" such as "reboot", and delete the instance and recreate. And last Exchange Support call I did cost me $297 bucks (that was two years ago).
Look I could care less Linux, Windows, WinManix, whatever. If it works, I will use it.
By the way that $297 dollar solution... Extract the ExhPubDb as a *.PST thru outlook, and copy it back to the public info store. This had to be done ONCE a week.
These solutions absorb too many man hours, that could be spent on proactive and productive projects. I'm not here saying that Linux is better, but I can't possibly think that the TCO for Exchange in the Enterprise is an acceptable cost.
And for the record I personally think Win2kPro is still the best client!
peaCe
Awesome!
what a crock of shi*.
A cogent argument, supported by this report commissioned by IBM. Note how poorly Solaris rates - something many should be able to sympathise with.
Don't believe the nonsense, unless you hear it from me directly.
Microsoft actually sponsored this study:. htm. Of course, we all know Microsoft to be a bastion of integrity...
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2126953,00
"You done taken a wrong turn."
-Bill McKinney, in Deliverance
Linux people tend to only think of enterprise computing (and all computing for that matter) as web servers. I think the results of IDC's study. However, web computing is only a fraction of all computing. There are a lot of databases big and small. There are many file servers. There are many print servers. There are many APPLICATION servers. There are domain controllers. etc. Microsoft spends lots of R&D on making it all work together for the end user. They also spend a lot of time and effort giving admins tools to manage end users and their desktops. Novell is the only other company/OS in this arena. NDS and Active Directory ring a bell? Software deployment sound familar to anyone? Clue: Big shops don't send PC jockeys with CDs to install applications. They get pushed down with Zenworks or GPOs. Ask a Linux administrator to setup a plan to convert all the company's desktops with little to no downtime for the users. Now ask a Novell or Microsoft admin to do it. Guess who can't get it done fast. Ask a Linux admin to use his Linux servers to lock down the users' desktops to minimize support calls. You don't think of that one often, do you? Developing these kinds of enterprise tools isn't sexy, but it is critical. Without it, Linux will always be a niche in the server room. The next time your boss decides to go with a Microsoft solution indstead of Linux, don't bitch about marketing. Realize that there is this whole other role to be filled out in the enterprise. Now get coding and fill that role!