Are You Ready to Move Up to Windows 7 ?

Windows 7 (Win7) has been available for almost 6 months now, and we're seeing more and more instances of Win7 in our clients' networks. We thought it was timely to review some common questions and misconceptions about Win7.

You do not need to upgrade all your PCs to Win7 simultaneously, and, yes, Win7 can connect to Windows 2003 servers just fine.
Most new PCs will come with Win7, so there is no need to upgrade. Almost every vendor of PCs, especially those aimed at consumers, have switched almost their entire lines to Win7 making it the operating system of choice.
Businesses will have to choose whether they will buy new PCs with Win7--and it probably comes down to applications. If you run primarily general applications, Win7 is a good choice now. There are changes in the user interface, but in our experience, most users have adapted very quickly. If you have special applications, check that your applications work. If it runs on Vista, it will most likely run fine on Win7 but it's worth a check.
The typical computer user probably should not upgrade an existing machine. Yes, we're biased, but we would recommend leaving a Vista-to-Win7 upgrade to an experienced IT person. Currently there is no official direct upgrade path from Windows XP to Win7. A clean install of Win7 is the way to go on newer machines currently running Windows XP that can support Win7.
The other thing to keep in mind is that a typical new Windows system costs a lot less now than it did when Windows Vista came out nearly three years ago. You can get a reasonable mid-to-high-end desktop with Win7 for under $1,000 and a decent mid-range system for $500. A reasonable consumer notebook can sell for $800 or less. Instead of spending $200 for a Windows upgrade, save the money until you can afford a new machine on which it's preinstalled.
If you're thinking of going with Win7, be sure to order carefully. One client inadvertently ordered new machines with the Windows XP downgrade option (as a fallback) and ended up with 5 new machines running Windows XP. We had to upgrade them to Win7 for him, and now their network is humming along on Win7 machines.

Source: http://goo.gl/Fh79C