Windows 2003 Server reliable as *NIX?

I cannot help but notice the ads on this web site, and one ad boasted Windows Server 2003 has the reliability of *NIX. With *NIX being so different than Windows, I was wondering how Microsoft can make such claims?

In fact, I was reading an article in CPU magazine Windows Server 2003 is not launching as well as expected. Since I could not find the CPU article, I looked to Google:

from http://www.internetnews.com/ent-news...le.php/2196381 :

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According to some industry estimates, between 35 and 45 percent of Windows server customers still run Windows NT 4.0, with the remainder running Windows 2000.

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Industry watchers are keeping a close eye on the release considering Windows operating systems and the hardware packaged with them accounted for about 27 percent of server sales in 2002, according research firm Gartner. UNIX systems still hold about 40 percent of the market. Deutsche Bank Securities calls the launch "critically important at driving increased sales of ancillary servers, enterprise agreements and establishing Microsoft in the back office."

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From those numbers, it looks like "high-end" customers are sticking to what they have. However, what really tickled me was this quote by Ballamer:

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"This means no more toy operating systems," he said.

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Does this mean Windows Servers have been "toys?" :p

Well looking at traditional back office servers, *nix ruled the world long before MS even thought to enter the server arena. Oh yeah, and those pesky Novell folks did crop up for a number of years with the revolutionary IPX protocol - yeah, they really fooled us with that one! ;)

Anyway, like anything else, once you have tons of money invested in training and hardware, ousting legacy systems becomes quite a task. M$ knows this and in the past three years, Microsoft has been reasonably successful in grabbing some of the enterprise systems market. Now with 64bit OSes and intel supported hardware, you'll see an even more aggresive pitch to try and get *nix out of the batters box. Looking at the statement above, I think you have only seen a scratch on the surface on what other claims will be made. Perhaps you'll see things like, MS platforms are more secure than *nix and they are faster at serving up pr0n. ;)

Seriously though, these types of claims shouldn't be a surprise. Anyone who has been in the industry for a while will be able to weed out the BS.

--TH13

perhaps everyone didn't jump to 2003 because it doesn't yet have multiple service packs - it has not yet been put through its paces. why go through the watching, waiting and patching when what you have got is doing fine.

Quote:

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"This means no more toy operating systems," he said.

Does this mean Windows Servers have been "toys?"

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they are toys, because you have to play with them when you get them. the business community wants something that WORKS!

The deal with Windows 2000 and 2003 over NT is a matter of business. Most IT Managers upgrade just to have a new toy. And it is a Toy because it comes down to 2 words - a problem and a solution, problems/solutions. You have a business problem and you provide a solution. Windows 2003 at first look does not have anything that says to me, "my business cannot live without that feature." So it's a toy, it's doesn't bring to the table any significant feature I just can't live wihtout. Some argue that security is tighter because a lot of items are defaulted to a more secure setting, but not much is in there that I don't already have.

Nothing wrong with toys as long as they are limited and you know it's a toy. :D

I believe that 2003 was aimed more at the webserver market. With IIS2, XML and that whole .NET crap it seems like M$is attempting to take over yet another aspect of computers. The thing is, to my knowledge almost evrybody running a good size web site is using linux and apache. Microsoft would just love to erase linux from existance and this is another one of their attempts. Im no conspiracy theorist but it's hard to ignore the obvious.

I know quite a few people that won't even discuss 2003 until service pack 3.

It's goes along with an old saying "Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me."

Except of course this has happened more than twice. ;)

I think Korp is correct we have to wait and watch. Windows 2003 server first was Windows .NET server.etc.......

I agree with waiting on 2003. It is no where near as stable as M$ claims, nor anywhere near as stable as *nix.

I have been working with beta for quite awhile now, and on almost all the installtions I have done 2003, it takes about 5 minutes (10 minutes max) before I crash the entire thing. And thats not even putting it through any tough paces!

chaoswraith, it isn't really fair to say that you're testing a beta and then say it crashes in 10 minutes. The final version is far more stable than that. I'd say that it's at least as stable as windows 2000 with sp3. Having said that however, I would never consider deploying Windows Server 2003 in any kind of work environment before sp1 and that too with major testing. I also like that fact that windows 2003 takes a lot less effort than 2000 before it's reasonably secure.
Cheers,
cgkanchi

All I have to say is, my Windows 2000 Server RC-2 has been running for two months without a single crash as a web server, ftp server, terminal server, Application server, and media server on a $500 box.