Testing positive for software apathy

Sometimes it takes powerful motivation to overcome an apathetic user's inertia. Does Windows 2000 have the momentum?

I've always liked new stuff, especially software. The latest and the greatest bits always have the latest features and the latest bug fixes. (That it also has the latest bugs is irrelevant and proof you're just trying to burst my bubble.) I used to sign up for every beta test of any product that sounded interesting and useful, from operating systems to development tools to e-mail clients.

Perhaps I'm just getting older (and therefore wiser, right?) but I no longer jump at the chance to beta test like I used to. In fact, I no longer install the latest and greatest released bits the first day they're available for download. Let those younger and braver souls blaze the trail while I wait comfortably behind until the survivors return with their tales of horror and the first service pack or .01 release is announced. I'm still running Service Pack 4 on Windows NT because I've heard rumors about problems with SP5. I think I'm suffering from a mild-to-severe case of software apathy.

Apathy in the year 2000

These days, most of my apathy is toward Windows 2000 Professional, which is currently in beta at the release candidate phase. It's safe to say that Windows 2000 will be released to manufacturing sometime this month or next. Microsoft started pushing Windows 2000 months ago, by making Beta 3 available for purchase as part of its Corporate Preview Program. For US$69, the CPP gave you Windows 2000 (Professional and Server), updates, no-fee tech support, and documentation.

I installed Windows 2000 betas, starting with Beta 2 when it was still known as Windows NT 5.0. I didn't get very far with them, though. They were buggy enough on my system that I couldn't imagine myself using them anywhere close to full time. So I returned to the safety and comfort of Windows NT 4.0.

The new features of Windows 2000 just aren't as compelling as previous versions of Windows. For example, moving from Windows 3.1 to Windows NT 3.1 gained Win32 support (granted, at the cost of a lot of legacy hardware and software support). Windows 95 gave us a shiny new user interface and brought Win32 to the masses. Windows NT 4.0 gave us the Windows 95 UI and NT's stability. Windows 98 gave us more support for the latest hardware standards.

Windows 2000 basically catches up to where Windows 98 brought us a year and a half ago. Hardware support for things like USB and multiple monitors is important, of course. I fell in love with multiple monitors on Windows 98; it makes sense for almost any user but for developers, no single monitor is ever big enough for all the editor, help, and other windows needed simultaneously.

USB is fairly important now and quickly becoming more so as more peripherals are coming out in USB versions. Mice, keyboards, Zip drives, scanners, cameras, and so forth are already available with USB as an option. The new Visor handheld organizer from Handspring comes with a USB cradle for synchronizing; a serial cradle costs extra.

Therein lies the key to my apathy. I'm comfortable with Windows NT 4.0 and so far, nothing has yet convinced me that I'd be more comfortable with another operating system for my day-to-day work, whether it be Windows 2000 or Linux or BeOS. Eventually, something -- probably a peripheral I just gotta have that is USB-only -- will come along to sway me. Until then, I'll just sit back, play with Windows 2000 and Linux and BeOS, and wait for the ones with arrows in their backs to report in.