Though AMI's announcement of the report said that VIsta has "already begun to grab the attention of SMBs internationally," only 17% of midsized businesses are interested in upgrading by the end of the year, and the number drops to 7% among small businesses. The biggest catalyst for moving to Vista will come from regular, periodic machine upgrades – all new Windows PCs will ship with Vista – which AMI's report predicted would happen every three to four years.
SMBs will upgrade more in 18 to 24 months, according to Charles King, principal analyst at Hayward, Calif.-based Pund-IT Research. But if they're forced to go through the hassle of a major upgrade, some may use the opportunity to switch over to other desktop platforms, like Linux, he said.
The original version of this story appeared on TechTarget sister siteSearchSMB.
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