Storing up such animosity in your customers has to be the most stupid way to behave.

One of the big reasons we are making the shift to OS X is exactly that reason: we can create standard versions of our Foliovision bundle to clone out to new Mac Minis as we acquire them. At each stage modifying the image is not difficult.

This is why corporate-class Lenovo, HP, Dell, etc. machines are equal or more expensive than equivalent Apple products – they have to lock in long term commitments to a specific set of hardware, in a rapidly changing technology.

OS X does not require a separate disk image for each machine. The minimal hardware diversity combined with a far more effective way of creating a consistent install, allows a single disk image to be deployed to every machine, regardless of age (within limits – the major Intel transition is a break from the older PPC world, but not a problem with new installs anymore).

As far as licensing, compare a Dell Server with a similarly configured XServe. The XServe hardware is cheaper than the same Dell, AND, when you add in all the Windows CALS licenses, an XServe is a fraction of the cost of the Dell.

And this is acquisition costs!! Life cycle maintenance costs on OS X are 20% or so of Windows, so the required IT support staff is greatly reduced.

The big issue with migrating from Windows is a massively proprietary nature of the Windows environment; each and every Microsoft product stores YOUR data in proprietary formats that are not easily transferred to non-Microsoft solutions, intact. Microsoft products are engineered in such a way, that if you buy into one product, if you want to extend that functionality, it has to be with another Microsoft product; the interfaces and data formats are al closed, so they hold your data hostage, and as a result, create massive cost barriers to migration.

Virtually every Apple product either stores the data in an open, published format, or provides extensive capability to move that data into non-proprietary formats.

Apple is willing to compete on capabilities; Microsoft knows they could not compete in that arena, and locks up the data formats, making migration costly.

Buy the minimum configuration and do the upgrade yourself if you are price sensitive.

Sure it’s a little harder to pop a Mini but how often do you have to do it? There’s some nice video guides to servicing your own hardware over at OWC. With the help of their video I was able to swap the hard drive inside a Macbook Pro with no difficulty.

I’m not joking. That’s flat out rape. Which you can expect more of, now that you have bonded yourself to karmic nightmare Steve “Resident of Tennessee” Jobs.

I suspect that a third to a half of the XP users would stay where they are, if Microsoft didn’t push them. The reason they would hold fast is they are on old hardware and software that functions adequately for now. The business climate does not encourage buying new computers or upgrades.

What Microsoft wants is a new computer purchase, because that locks the Enterprise market in for another decade. The game with the confusing licenses is to exasperate you into going along with the crowd. If they can’t blind you with brilliance, then they must baffle you with bullsh*t. How much time can you devote to this junk? You have a business to run.

The problem with this strategy is that once you start cranking numbers and looking at options, you are likely to look at Apple and Linux as well. If the Windows XP users hold off long enough then they represent an opportunity for someone, besides Microsoft, to service.

Frankly, we don’t have enough evidence to know if others are following your lead. It will take another four to six months to see how things are shaping up.

The Vista users have every reason to upgrade, since their computers are less than three years old. About 15% to 25% of the XP users have computers which are three to five years old. Those computers are less likely to be upgraded, even though Windows Seven will work well. A new computer should be budgeted to replace them, but there is little hurry.

The computers which are over five years old are the problem. They have been relegated to minimal use. There is little reason to replace them until the hardware breaks.

We don’t know how this will work out. The people who have intensive computing needs, or need to maintain local files, are likely to stay with Windows or go with Apple.

You can stay with Wintel for lower initial price, but the smart money is to buy Apple for its lower total cost of ownership since you can keep Mac for an expended period to wring out the last buck.

Small to Medium sized Business owns report that their employees are 20% more efficient on a Mac. It certainly looks as though the move to Windows Seven will cause Microsoft to lose market share and Apple is making it very easy to migrate.

One of the more interesting solutions is Google’s Chrome OS. The reason is not that Enterprise users would move to the “Cloud,” but that Chrome would be hijacked for older businesses to use.

As you know, Google is designing the Chrome OS as a, very secure, HTLM 5 Web based operating System. Google is intentionally making it light weight to keep it from being hijacked.

The problem is that the Chrome OS is Ubuntu Linux under the hood. Normally, Business owners would not be attracted to Linux, because it is too geeky and technical. But, there is nothing to keep a canny Linux Distro from taking the GUI from Chrome and placing it atop a more robust Linux base.

Then, you could run your old XP programs in WINE. This keeps your old computers in use for a longer period at a minimal cost. By the time you are ready to buy a new computer, inexpensive Chrome OS Laptops and Desktops will be readily available. They will have Intel Atom computers-in-a-chip in them, but these will be fast enough for your light computing needs.

I suspect that the lower half of the consumer market could be stripped away from Microsoft as well as much of the lower half of the Windows XP computers. But, it’s too soon to say.