Windows narrowly bumped Unix in 2005 to claim the top spot in server sales for the first time, according to a new report from IDC. Computer makers sold $17.7 billion worth of Windows servers worldwide in 2005 compared with $17.5 billion in Unix servers, IDC analyst Matthew Eastwood said of the firm’s latest Server Tracker market share report.
Windows Bumps Unix as Top Server OS
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Eugenia Loli
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its as if a million voices suddenly cried out as one… and were silenced…
No kidding. But, I think you’re seeing into the future.
Once again, this is a.) sales and b.) if you add UNIX and Linux together (not that that has any real meaning) they’re still (22.8) ahead of Windows (17.7).
It should of course say “Commercial Unix” (or something similar) instead of just Unix since there is a lot more to “Unix” as a platform than Solaris, HP-UX and AIX.
Then again, it’s not like IDC ever gets anything right.
not counting all the servers that people buy, and load linux/unixon them, and not preload the operating system. My company has about 10 freebsd/linux servers that weren’t counted, because we didn’t preload them, and loaded them up afterward..
…or servers that only has Windows as a mandatory preload choice and you have to change it after the purchase.
Windows beats Linux at servers!
I think we migh as well call it a day, let’s all go get real jobs and thanks Linus, it was fun for the past 5 years.
I administrate 150 Linux servers at work, they aren’t counted!
And 150 is low compared to others departements!
Edited 2006-02-22 07:51
I administrate 150 Windows servers at work, they aren’t counted! And 150 is low compared to others departements!
You probably didn’t read it correctly: Windows is preinstalled and sold that way Linux isn’t. So: yours are counted if you didn’t troll…
How many ubuntu, gentoo, debian, fedora licenses you must “sell” to match a single win2003 license of $1000+. This is not about the volume but the price at witch the servers are sold.
So the same could read Linux costs less than win2003 and linux has lower TOC (whatever that means for you) than win….
most businesses will only consider Red Hat as a possible Linux disto, so to answer your question, its 2.5 ( red hat retails at $399) Sure small home users and hobbiest use the other distros corprate america only allows Red Hat.
I gues people who read MS tco studies should relate it to how much money MS make on those “cheap” solutions and draw some conclusions.
This is SALES, not installations. Please keep that in mind.
even if Linux beats Windows in Installs, the fact remains that linux developers aren’t getting rich.
Edited 2006-02-22 06:26
It’s not always about making money. If everybody only cared about making money we’d have a lot more companies out there being anti competitive and/or screwing everyone over like the RIAA and MPAA do. There’d be no freeware or open source software, prices would be sky high, and software would be a lot less trustworthy because companies wouldn’t worry about their clients going to open source software (because it wouldn’t exist). We already have companies pushing DRM and other artificial restraits on us the customers, punishing us for “piracy” (I think it’s just an excuse). At least thanks to the volunteer work that went into Linux I can get an OS that doesn’t force that garbage on me.
The world would suck without people doing benevolent work. When people ask you to donate to charity do you ask them “What’s in it for me? Will I get some sort of return on that investment? Will it make me rich?”.
OK, but we speak about market not charity.
And the fact that single company gets more more revenue that the *whole remaining industry* is significant, don’t you think?
Of course I meant a single company earning more than the whole subcategory of industry.
And the fact that single company gets more more revenue that the *whole remaining industry* is significant, don’t you think?
Is that really the case ? I did not know MS was a server hardware vendor really.
I mean, servers include hardware and software right ?
If you talked about Unix vendors I would agree with you, but I thought MS only provided software in these servers !
So what is the “single company” you talk about ?
“even if Linux beats Windows in Installs, the fact remains that linux developers aren’t getting rich. ”
Because we all know that getting rich is the only thing thats important.
even if Linux beats Windows in Installs, the fact remains that linux developers aren’t getting rich.
I won’t say this as global position. But as far as I look at my development earnings. I was piss poor while I was coding for Windows. Positive changes began as soon as I started working on Linux. Now? Well,… I’m very content.
But, it matters what you do and for whom you do it. Same goes for working on Windows. Except that doing work on OSS is much easier, because nobody hides things before you.
That’s right! Linux distro that can be considered into sales is RHEL, Novel. You may be don’t know that RHEL license fee is more expensive than Windows 2000 Server license!
Any “real geek” will tell you that no GUI is needed for a server, but there’s a ton of IT folks out there who grew up with Windows and feel comfortable using it
They don’t. You assume they are the one administrating these boxes, they aren’t. That’s just that they are clueless and don’t know any better.
In every architecture with Windows servers, I’ve seen several appliances (most based on Unix) and Unix servers in front to help the pool of Windows servers to keep up the load (ad they typically needed twice as much Windows servers or more than would be necessary on Unix like OS).
Assuming Unix are still superior on the server, this is somewhat scary, as an indicator that Windows(server) will continue to grow simply because Windows(desktop) is so big and familiar already
Huh ? I think you are mistaken. They did not talk about market share, they talked about sales. You assume all these servers are new things ? Most are there to replace older boxes that could not take Win2003 or Win2000. This is scary anyway.
If the trend continues that means one of two things: a superior OS for the job is getting edged out, or Windows is becoming the superior server OS. Neither sounds like happy news for Unix.
Again, that’s because you assumed wrong earlier.
Of course Linux usage grows , and since Linux is generally cheaper to obtain the numbers in such a study won’t reflect it. Unfortunately such studies are in the public eye, and contribute to the perceptions that help fuel Windows’ growth
As long as they don’t provide sales in term of units, you can be assured it’s not looking good enough for Windows.
Inasmuch as Windows is a well functioning OS, that is not necessarily a bad thing of course. Either way, not the happiest prospect for Unix.
As long as Unix vendors continue to ask outrageous prices, don’t worry for them. That’s because they still can afford it.
I’ve yet to see a big Windows only shop working correctly. Even MS can’t do that.
Linux is not as directly affected, but continued Windows growth pushes Windows towards that critical mass where it is considered by most to be a good number one choice for the server for many of the same reasons it has such a lock on the desktop, and that wouldn’t be so good for Linux either
Wrong again, because these are growth of sales, not units.
It would suck for Linux to have to fight for the server in the same way it has to fight for the desktop, against a large MS supermajority
Linux gained that a long time ago, that’s why now people concentrate on the desktop.
Only people that don’t want to accept the facts (and will be undercut) believe that Linux still has to fight for the server.
>You maybe don’t know that RHEL license fee is more
>expensive than Windows 2000 Server license!
Of course you fail to mention that the RHEL license fee INCLUDES A SUPPORT CONTRACT, which the Windows license does not and costs extra from Microsoft.
Its normal that windows beats Unix in server market.
You must have 10 Windows servers to have the equivalent of one Unix server.
Substantiate your claim that “You must have 10 Windows servers to have the equivalent of one Unix server.” I don’t buy it. Talk is cheap.
That comment was just for fun sake and not a statement.
Though he should have added, “pun intented”.
Besides that, I feel I am totally ignorant about what Windows server offers and cannot comprehend how can Windows go beyond Unix, even in sales.
I think that comment was in jest…with a bit of truth.
hahah – my thoughts exactly duffman – bang on!
THat and the fact that unix sales are probably in decline as people are using linux more anyway! 🙂
good one
MS must be doing many things right for this to happen. Despite issues with security they seem to have addressed many others. Those might include: performace, scalability, deployment, software & hardware support, etc. Instead of the above denial sort of posts, I’d like to see something from someone within the industry who has an insightful perspective as to why MS is doing well in this segment.
My own observations is that MS has taken seriously, many aspects of developing and supporting an OS. Just look at the huge variety of softwares that accompany Windows. If you don’t work with Windows (Server) much, then you probably don’t know how broad the entire softwares MS develops for it. They do take their server platform seriously.
Instead of tearing them down which does nothing except supporting egos, try to look at what they’ve done right. It may be as seemingly simple as developing an OS which runs on a huge variety of hardware. My guess is its far more complicated. The monopoly arguement doesn’t have much wieght with me. In fact, saying they shouldn’t be where they are except for a monopoly is a denial of reality. They’ve never had a monopoly of the server market. Certainly they’ve used their desktop market share as a leverage but that could have failed, especially considering the pure hatred out there for MS in Linux/Unix. Not like hating ever helped them though. Maybe if they just hated MS even more that would solve it? Nah.. Negativity is a dead end.
Despite issues with security they seem to have addressed many others.
Granted, MS still has their fair share of security issues to iron out, I believe they have made huge improvements in 2k3 server from NT4 and 2K.
If you have an unpatched default install of NT4/IIS 4.0, there are literally probably more than a thousand ways to own it. 2K server was not much better.
An unpatched remote install of 2k3 server I believe has….drumroll….zero.
This is due largly in part becasue the services are no longer all on in the default install. Cheating, but still a huge leap forward.
Edited 2006-02-22 06:36
“MS must be doing many things right for this to happen.”
Selling their products at greatly reduced costs behind closed doors, making sure most schools only train people to use Windows when going into IT jobs. Giving away free software to people in high places and schools so it’s all kids use and therefore all they learn. They pulled strings to get where they are, and any company could do that if they had the same amount of cash in the bank.
“MS must be doing many things right for this to happen.”
Selling their products at greatly reduced costs behind closed doors, making sure most schools only train people to use Windows when going into IT jobs. Giving away free software to people in high places and schools so it’s all kids use and therefore all they learn. They pulled strings to get where they are, and any company could do that if they had the same amount of cash in the bank.
I was going to say roughly the same thing, although I wouldn’t put quite such a negative spin on it. They certainly ‘pull strings’ but it’s hard to call it unfair in any way.
I used to program in a very large financial institution that has been paying IBM through the teeth for years (aix, websphere, mq, db2, lotus/domino, huge network, support…). Microsoft came in to demo some of their shiznit: visual studio, biz talk, sql server and so on. They undercut IBM by miles and even paid to put a significant number of developers through a week of .net training. I’ve heard the phrase “You can’t get fired for going with IBM” but in this place it was remarked that that sentence most definitely now referred to MS. There were just cost savings and better support all over the place.
If you take free software out of the picture for a moment, this is perfectly fair, just an ordinairy business process: one company with a lot of money stealing business from another company with a lot of money. Put free software back and it’s easy for the free software supporters to get offended, but it really doesn’t make a difference. Microsoft is simply offering a more attractive product.
Now for the funny bit. My dad works in the same place and he’s one of the ones who switched to .net. He complains about the insane complexity and opaqueness of the dev/deployment environment and he compared it to another department that is still on IBM mainframes/cobol. He said that he honestly thought that the two were on par as far as complexity and power and that he’d be just as productive on the old system. Obviously to be taken with a grain of salt, but interesting none-the-less.
IBM through the teeth for years. Microsoft came in to demo some of their shiznit: visual studio, biz talk, sql server and so on. They undercut IBM by miles and even paid to put a significant number of developers through a week of .net training. There were just cost savings and better support all over the place.
Wrong. Like you noticed later, this was only perceived, and by clueless managers, but I’m not surprised.
Thats’ why companies need architects to avoid losing money. I’m not saying that because that’s my job now. I used to wonder what was so special about architects. Then I understood that in most companies, managers were clueless, and architects are just there to help them make the good decisions.
Look, MS did the same for us. They were in competition against Novell and full FOSS. MS gave us their point of view of the costs, but we quickly discovered that what they proposed would never work, and would need tons of other MS products, doubling the bill, making it the more expensive solution. The managers even came to tell us to lower our estimations, that it could not be possible. I then understood perfectly how MS can sell so much servers and fool so many clueless managers.
one company with a lot of money stealing business from another company with a lot of money
I would rather say they fool the customer. I don’t care, they are my customers too. I tell them like it is, they accept it and they will be all right, they don’t and they soon discover how much they were screwed.
Put free software back and it’s easy for the free software supporters to get offended, but it really doesn’t make a difference. Microsoft is simply offering a more attractive product.
No, only a more attractive short term product.
What you describe about your father does not surprise me, like the Munich decision did not surprise me either.
Wrong. Like you noticed later, this was only perceived, and by clueless managers, but I’m not surprised.
Alright, so when can I expect your report on the relative costs of going with IBM vs Microsoft for this company you know nothing about? I assume you’re one of these knowledgeable architects, but please make it simple enough to convince all the dumb managers!!
Note that I never made any comments regarding microsoft vs. free software, only IBM. I’d love to see some free stuff going in there as well, but big financial institutions like dealing with big i/t companies that can spoon feed them support.
One potential issue with open source platforms: consultancy. Quite frequently, when a project is behind, this company will go out and pick up a developer from a consulting company who comes in and kicks ass for a few weeks. They charge insane amounts of money for this service but, being for .net, it’s at least a commodity market. It makes me cry to think what they’d pay for a linux developer.
Selling their products at greatly reduced costs behind closed doors, making sure most schools only train people to use Windows when going into IT jobs. Giving away free software to people in high places and schools so it’s all kids use and therefore all they learn. They pulled strings to get where they are, and any company could do that if they had the same amount of cash in the bank
And Linux gives everything away for free including the source code. But it’s nice to see you so angry over this.
There is no monolithic “Linux” entity in any sense of the word, and Linux isn’t being pushed of leveraged on anyone, while Microsoft is a monolithic business entity which has been pushing Windows to almost everyone for a decade, often to the exclusion of all other solutions.
That’s a big difference.
Microsoft is the Big Tobacco of the IT world, nothing more.
“But it’s nice to see you so angry over this.”
You misunderstand, just because I may get straight to the point sometimes doesn’t mean I’m angry.
If I was to hazard a guess… I would say that part of it is the simple fact that Windows is what many people become the most experienced with. As a result, when they can influence the company they belong to, they will likely try to convince them to go with Windows.
I would also add that some attempts to “convert” (or simply expose) people to other OSs really don’t seem to work out that well. In fact, I would say some of these attempts only “force” some Windows people further into the “Windows world”. An example of this would be the Macs that we had at my highschool. Macs were perfered by a number of people there including teachers, BUT the Macs that we were exposed to were all black & white and secured very well so that you couldn’t do much with them. That’s not very impressive when many of the students went home to PCs with displays that had color and they could tinker with them to their hearts content. There were more differences, but I think that is all I need to say, when years later I was talking someone who was from a university and had gone to a similar highschool and after all that time he was still convinced that Macs were black & white only. (BTW… He’s not the only example I’m aware of, but he is the most obvious. Clearly Macs are not still only black & white and haven’t been for a very long time.)
Anyway… My point is that some of these experiences give people a false impression and then they probably carry this impression with them into the work world. At which point they then can potentially influence decisions where they work.
Last year Windows and Linux were 2nd and 4th, this year they are 1st and 3rd.
Here are the stats:
Windows $17.7 bil.
UNIX $17.5 bil.
Linux $5.3 bil.
mainframes $4.8 bil.
Some claim UNIX could win back this title next year but I don’t believe this to be the case. Next year I see Linux gaining even more market share largely at the expense of UNIX.
Some other numbers worth mention were that Dell’s server sales went up 13.3% and Sun fell 4.9%.
Windows/Linux on x86 hardware is the new trend in the low end server market. They will continue to dominate the low end making greater breakthrough in price/performance and increasingly forcing big iron systems further into a niche.
This should not come as a surprise to anyone.
That doesn’t explain why isn’t Linux/*BSD replacing the majority od legacy UNIX systems.
Why is it that the comments to these stories are always so predictable?
“Windows beats UNIX in server sales!” — Cue: 30 comments explaining why that can’t, didn’t, won’t ever happen.
Are some of you so bent on eating your own cake that every Microsoft story has to be littered with explanations as to why Microsoft didn’t actually do “it”, or did “it” wrong, or that “it” was counted wrong? Does your life depend on spreading the message of Linux superiority? Does your income?
Who cares — seriously?
Lets ask Microsoft that one next time they pull out another get the facts ad campaign, or another one of their TCO studies or some other bent-truthes like that.
People defend what they believe, and rightfully so otherwise someone could come around uncontested and start telling everyone what to think.
When you overdo it (Microsoft/Windows bashing) , which seems to be a common case in osnews/slashdot “communities”, people get the impression that _you_ are the one who’s telling everyone else what to think.
As for the story, it tells me Microsoft has a pretty healthy business with its OS. Good for them. Competition is getting hot again in this “old” business (operating system).
I think you’ll find a certain amount of Microsoft product bashing in *any* technically-oriented community.
The reasons are varied, but there are some common threads (unethical or illegal corporate behavior, MS solutions driving out arguably superior products, etc.).
The fact that they were found guilty by the US DOJ and then let off without any action at all doesn’t help.
Are some of you so bent on eating your own cake that every Microsoft story has to be littered with explanations as to why Microsoft didn’t actually do “it”, or did “it” wrong, or that “it” was counted wrong? Does your life depend on spreading the message of Linux superiority? Does your income?
Who cares — seriously?
It’s because they sit in their basements and think they’re part of some movement. It’s a sign of severe personality disorders.
Hehe …
Quite well put. I think that answers my question.
You actually have a point there, and I was thinking the same thing. If someone comes out saying Windows does one thing better than Unix, then the comments are flooded with people making the usual excuses that favor Unix.
Erm, because that’s the topic, and people are giving their opinions?
I call it “ambient noise”, because it’s everywhere, all the time.
Impressions of a non expert follow
As others have mentioned, it’s just sales. This isn’t a big event, and isn’t a surprise either, based on past trends. Still it serves to demonstrate what a behemoth Windows is. Any “real geek” will tell you that no GUI is needed for a server, but there’s a ton of IT folks out there who grew up with Windows and feel comfortable using it.
Assuming Unix are still superior on the server, this is somewhat scary, as an indicator that Windows(server) will continue to grow simply because Windows(desktop) is so big and familiar already.
If the trend continues (and why shouldn’t it) that means one of two things: a superior OS for the job is getting edged out, or Windows is becoming the superior server OS. Neither sounds like happy news for Unix.
Of course Linux usage grows (though this doesn’t really help traditional Unix), and since Linux is generally cheaper to obtain the numbers in such a study won’t reflect it. Unfortunately such studies are in the public eye, and contribute to the perceptions that help fuel Windows’ growth. Inasmuch as Windows is a well functioning OS, that is not necessarily a bad thing of course. Either way, not the happiest prospect for Unix.
Linux is not as directly affected, but continued Windows growth pushes Windows towards that critical mass where it is considered by most to be a good number one choice for the server for many of the same reasons it has such a lock on the desktop, and that wouldn’t be so good for Linux either. It would suck for Linux to have to fight for the server in the same way it has to fight for the desktop, against a large MS supermajority.
Oh well, just a study. You know what they say about statistics
We only can hope that the EU rulling will prevent MS from playing the same free road vendor lockin game as on Desktops.
Who cares how many installs of linux are out there, all this stat says is how many companies would rather pay for an os instead of getting it for free or at very reduced prices.
Spin it which ever way you want, MS is making a pretty penny from their P(OS).
I guess the adage stands “vote with your wallet”.
“all this stat says is how many companies would rather pay for an os instead of getting it for free or at very reduced prices. ”
No it doesnt. It only says something about how many companies pays for “Unix”. It says nothing about how this relates to getting “unix” for free.
“I guess the adage stands “vote with your wallet”.”
If 90% of the computers in the world used Linux, MS could still be the company that *sells* the most of their server OS. Even if they only sold to %5 of the remaining users.
IDC is providing some numbers and predictions again? Ha ha, isn’t it the same company that mispredicted the success of Itanium by two orders of the magnitude and is famous for playing favours with large companies by coming up with numbers? IDC is probably full of crap as always…
Every so often a survey comes(mainly from IDC)out with metrics showing Windows outperforming *nix in some if not all aspects. I have read articles about the demise of Unix ever since NT3.1 was released.
I guess it just proves how much ‘spin’ is in these types of groups.
There’s probably a lot of small offices out that are developing the technological knowledge to move away from Workgroup LANs to Windows Server environments (all those MCPs/MCSEs have to do something apart from fixing the odd paper jam and not patching nearly enough – apparently). All these smaller offices are not likely to be jumping to Linux or any other non-Windows environment.
If you could get windows servers for free, they wouldn’t be able to sell so much for them. Same thing happens to Unix: free (open) Linux and recently Solaris. Buying (server) operating systewm is no longer really needed, expect in some special and very narrow areas, or if you really want to do .NET (even this is of recently challenged by Mono).
I work for an ISP, hsoting dedicated and colocated servers. I install about 3 or 4 servers a day with whatever OS the customer wants. In the last year, Linux & BSD have swapped from being about 1/4 of the servers I install to 3/4s… maybe more. Its quite rare for me to have to install windows these days.
This is, of course, only in reference to internet servers, and our bigger customers tend to still prefer to use windows.
I love it when news like this hits OSnews.
The voices of denial are heard far and wide reaching a deafening crescendo. …. Comments like these begin to pour out like endless drivel :
“Then again, it’s not like IDC ever gets anything right”
“This is SALES, not installations. Please keep that in mind.”
“Ha ha, isn’t it the same company that mispredicted the success of Itanium by two orders of the magnitude…”
I think a lot of people , save a few , have missed the issue here. They said that for the first time Microsoft has overtaken Unix server sales. Can’t you see what it’s saying ? Microsoft is doing something right here,regardless of it’s pace, it’s producing servers that can at least compete with Unix servers on some level.
Sometimes I feel that in the linux community we become like the frog slowly boiled to death , realizing not its danger until it’s far too late….
The sales are not a reflection of technical superiority in unix or windows servers. It indicates how much value Windows servers give me for each dollar I spend. If microsoft continues to increase value for each dollar spent on it’s server systems then it could continue eating market share uncontested. …..
Ad hominem… there is far too much of that here than intelligent rebuttals. sigh
ad hominem: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem
>Microsoft is doing something right here,regardless of
>it’s pace, it’s producing servers that can at least
>compete with Unix servers on some level.
It’s NOT SAYING that at all.. How do you know its not saying that Linux is the one doing something right and Windows is sitting still??
Just beacuse there is less UNIX does not mean that Windows is getting it….Linux is gaining as well, and probably MUCH more responsible for this change than Windows.
Windows taking credit for this is pretty dubious.
We all know that over the years UNIX and LINUX will trade marketshare. So one year unix will be 5 and linux will be 4, the next year unix will be 4 and linux will be 5…. does not change the equation though, its just a swapping of factors on the variables of the left side.
So the REAL (non)news here is this:
1) LAST YEAR —- UNIX + LINUX > WINDOWS
2) THIS YEAR —- UNIX + LINUX > WINDOWS
3) NEXT YEAR —- UNIX + LINUX > WINDOWS
4) goto 3