Posts Tagged ‘xp’

Prepare for Windows 7

Published by technicalguy on December 18th, 2009 - in Small Business Technology

The next business computer you buy will most likely come with Microsoft Windows 7 – are you ready?

Windows 7 is the newest Operating System from Microsoft, replacing Vista. It is more efficient than Vista and comes in 3 versions. Which one is right for your business?

**IMPORTANT! **

Don’t just drop in to your local computer store and buy whatever is there! For maximum effectiveness your business needs the right version!

Many small businesses, including my customers, avoided Vista as much as possible so they are still running Windows XP Professional. However due to the normal rotation of computers, Windows 7 will be coming in your door shortly.

What version of Windows 7 should you buy?

As in XP and Vista, the version of Windows 7 you want for business is:

Windows 7 Professional.

Windows 7 Professional

Why? Windows 7 Professional allows you to do three things the Home Premium version does not:

  • Run programs in XP Mode (for those legacy systems)
  • Be part of a Windows Domain (provides better security)
  • Allow Remote Desktop connections (great for remote support)

Unless you have very special requirements there is nothing in Windows 7 Ultimate that you need for business, why pay the extra money? Here’s the official comparison chart from Microsoft: Windows 7 Editions

Stay with XP?

Mainstream support for Windows XP already ran out in April 2009, extended support runs out 2014. Vista mainstream support runs out April 2012. At some point you’ve got to bite the bullet and upgrade. The question you need to ask is, “What is the best way to upgrade to Windows 7?”

Two Ways to Upgrade

Neither upgrade path is “better” than the other, it just depends on how your office works.

1) Upgrade through attrition

As computers die, purchase the new ones with Windows 7.

For cash flow, this is the most cost-effective way to upgrade. Spend the money when it is needed and work out the wrinkles on the first one or two. In the long term you will probably spend more money due to individual staff training and support costs, but you won’t break the bank.

2) Upgrade office-wide

Purchase new or upgrade all computers throughout the office at one time

All staff can be trained at the same time and prepared for the cutoff date for the transition. Staff can help each other out with questions – efficiencies are gained here. There is a higher up-front cost to this and you may feel nickle and dime’d a bit as some computer components may have to be swapped out, but you will have spent less in the long run.

Resource Links

Easier to hack apple than Windows

Published by technicalguy on December 10th, 2009 - in Security

Until now, the general consensus has always been that Microsoft Windows is a hacker’s paradise and the Apple OS is more secure.

Apple’s push about security may no longer the case, as is shown by this article from ZDNet in their interview with Charlie Miller, 2009′s winner of the Pwn2Own contest.

Here’s the quote:

” Safari on the Mac is easier to exploit. The things that Windows do to make it harder (for an exploit to work), Macs don’t do. Hacking into Macs is so much easier. You don’t have to jump through hoops and deal with all the anti-exploit mitigations you’d find in Windows.

It’s more about the operating system than the (target) program. Firefox on Mac is pretty easy too. The underlying OS doesn’t have anti-exploit stuff built into it.

With my Safari exploit, I put the code into a process and I know exactly where it’s going to be. There’s no randomization. I know when I jump there, the code is there and I can execute it there. On Windows, the code might show up but I don’t know where it is. Even if I get to the code, it’s not executable. Those are two hurdles that Macs don’t have.

It’s clear that all three browsers (Safari, IE and Firefox) have bugs. Code execution holes everywhere. But that’s only half the equation. The other half is exploiting it. There’s almost no hurdle to jump through on Mac OS X.”

For all you people out there that are looking to the Apple Mac systems as an alternative to Microsoft Windows, and use the “it’s safer” argument, you may want to reconsider.

I’m pretty neutral when it comes to Operating Systems and have used Windows, Mac, and Linux. If you are looking to move to a particular system, you want to evaluate it based on what you want it to do for you, not the coolness factor or perceived protection from threats.

As far as protection from hackers goes – more is better and multi-level security is recommended. You want would-be hackers to fight their way through the router, and also your desktop or laptop firewall. In your Windows environment don’t rely on what comes with Windows, get a separate program.

Other articles in our Apple_Windows series:

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