One third of IT managers struggling with XP SP2

A third of IT managers have admitted that they have "no idea what to expect" when deploying Microsoft's Windows XP Service Pack 2, new research has claimed.

According to a survey conducted by independent research firm InsightExpress for IT support firm SupportSoft, the remainder expect that the SP2 upgrade will dramatically increase the number of end-user support calls they have to deal with.

The report also found that 63 per cent of the IT managers surveyed believe that SP2 will be the most difficult Windows upgrade ever undertaken. Three per cent said that their "blood pressure rises just thinking about it".

Steve Kleynhans, analyst at Meta Group, warned that help desk staff must be made aware of the changes and provided with training to handle the inevitable initial increase in calls that will follow implementation.

But he added in a statement: "Despite these potential issues, we believe organisations should move as rapidly as possible to implement SP2 across their WinXP systems."

The report surveyed 117 IT managers at companies with 500 or more employees.

See also:

Microsoft: Windows XP SP2 downloads 'on target'

Redmond confident of 100 million upgrades by end of next month, despite slow start  24 Sep 2004

XP SP2: the business angle

What IT managers need to know about XP SP2  15 Sep 2004

Microsoft removes key feature from Longhorn

Future Windows version cut down to size to ensure delivery schedule is met  31 Aug 2004

Businesses show themselves wary of XP SP2

'Significant minority' have no plans to implement OS update  24 Aug 2004

Windows XP SP2

XP Service Pack 2 provides some security improvements which users cannot afford to ignore, but some existing apps may need to be tweaked to run at their best  17 Aug 2004

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