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Survey: 70 Percent of Orgs Planning Windows 10 Move Within 2 Years

• By Kurt Mackie
• June 26, 2015

Enterprises aren't exactly champing at the bit to move to Windows 10, but many are considering making the switch earlier than expected, according to one industry survey.

Microsoft is scheduled to release Windows 10 on July 29, with an additional update also expected sometime this fall. Microsoft hasn't explained this dual-release approach in much detail so many organizations might be unable to describe their specific deployment plans at this time.

Still, a survey conducted by Spiceworks in April and May found that 40 percent of IT pro participants were planning to deploy Windows 10 within the first year of release. The survey also found that 33 percent were planning Windows 10 deployments within two years. Spiceworks' study, "Windows 10: Will it Soar," consisted of 500 participants from North America and the EMEA regions. Spiceworks is a professional network for IT pros.

The combined 73 percent of respondents saying that they had Windows 10 deployment plans within two years was considered to be "huge," according to a Spiceworks blog describing the study. That's because past survey data by Spiceworks showed that 60 percent of organizations had some Windows 7 in their computing environments two years after that OS' release, so interest in Windows 10 seems to be comparatively high.

Another industry survey, conducted by Adaptiva, was a bit more bearish. It found 71 percent of 186 participants saying they'd wait at least six months before deploying Windows 10, with 49 percent planning to wait more than year after the OS' release.

The biggest concern about Windows 10 of the IT pros surveyed by Spiceworks was hardware and software compatibility, as cited by 79 percent. Other concerns were potential software bugs (65 percent), training issues (59 percent), third-party support (51 percent) and the time to complete upgrades (43 percent).

The Spiceworks study described participants as mostly interested in the stability of Windows 10. Top features, according to participants, included the Start Button (64 percent), the free upgrade from Windows 7 Service Pack 1 and Windows 8/8.1 (55 percent), and enhanced security (51 percent). However, despite the security interest, just 5 percent of participants said they were interested in Windows Hello, a biometric security feature in Windows 10 aimed at replacing passwords.

As for Edge, Microsoft's newest browser (formerly code-named "Spartan") that will be arriving with Windows 10 along with Internet Explorer 11, "nearly half" of the respondents said they didn't know much about Edge to have formed an opinion about it.

On the mobile side, 48 percent of the respondents were interested in Windows 10 for smartphones and tablets. In practice, though, most were running OSes other than Windows for mobile devices. iOS (81 percent) and Android (77 percent) topped the list. Windows or Windows Mobile was used by "one-third of organizations" surveyed.

The survey participants were predominantly Windows 7 users. Surprisingly, 44 percent were still using Windows XP, an operating system that's no longer supported by Microsoft. Mac OS use was at 29 percent.

Related:

• Survey: Most Orgs Will Delay Windows 10 Upgrades for 6 Months