Windows 8 Migration Station

IT Handbook Windows 8 Migration Station Don’t migrate to Windows 8 simply for the sake of migrating. Instead, understand the implications for touch devices, legacy applications and licensing. By Serdar Yegulalp

q Why Migrate

to Windows 8

q How to Handle Legacy Apps

q Which Migration Tools Can Help

q What to Know About

Windows 8 Licensing

book Why Migrate to Windows 8

Why Migrate to Windows 8

the introduction of a new Microsoft operating system always serves as Why Migrate to Windows 8

something of a milestone for IT leaders, providing them a chance to stop, evaluate one of their organization’s key building blocks and contemplate changes. With Windows 8 making its debut, one such moment has arrived.

How to Handle Legacy Apps

Now that enterprises have had their first good look at the new Windows OS, the serious discussions about how—or if—to implement it have begun. Much

Which Migration Tools Can Help

of the talk has been about the new touch features of Windows 8, but enterprise decision makers should be just as curious about a slew of management and usability features that Microsoft has put significant effort into developing.

What to Know About Windows 8 Licensing

Making a migration, of course, is no small task. In addition to the complexity of such a move, Windows 8 itself has been fairly divisive. Some people love it, others hate it; and there are serious questions about how widely it’ll be adopted on non-tablet hardware. Organizations that see value in moving to Windows 8 should look at four key areas as they proceed: where Windows 8 fits into the enterprise; how to handle legacy applications in the new OS; tools to use for the migration; and details about licensing. Windows 8 stands apart from its predecessors—Windows 7, Windows Vista and Windows XP—in that a big portion of its design and engineering philosophy was influenced by the rise of touch-centric computing devices, such as slate PCs and tablets. Previous editions of Windows had some touch-oriented functions, but Windows 8 revisits all of them. It also provides an entirely new desktop environment for running apps—called Metro—specifically designed to make the most of a touch-based user interface. One easy conclusion to draw from this is that Windows 8 isn’t for “regular PCs.” There’s a kernel of truth to that. Many of the new user interface behaviors are optimized for a touch environment, and while touch devices don’t re-

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Windows 8 Migration Station

book Why Migrate to Windows 8

quire Windows 8, they tend to benefit most from it. Still, the general rule of thumb is: If it runs Windows 7, it’ll run Windows 8. A great deal of Windows as we have come to know it still exists in Windows 8. It’s just presented differently—like the Metro version of the Start menu,


which no longer lives in its familiar home in the screen’s lower-left corner. Another important thing to bear in


mind is the number of changes made in Windows 8 that have nothing to do with its user interface. These include


memory management refinements, hypervisor/virtual machine functional-


Windows 8 may provide the most benefit when deployed first on devices where its touch functionality will be readily available and useful.

ity and the capability to boot Windows from a thumb drive with Windows To Go. It’s unlikely many of these features will be back-ported into Windows 7, because of technical feasibility and Microsoft’s own product-development strategies. To that end, Windows 8 may provide the most benefit when deployed first on devices where its touch functionality will be readily available and useful. It’s less of a priority to deploy it on conventional desktop or notebook systems, unless there are other, under-the-hood features of Windows 8 that make it vital to do so—and if you’re building a sizeable chunk of your future infrastructure on top of that functionality. n

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book How to Handle Legacy Apps


when word spread about the Metro desktop in Windows 8, concerns Why Migrate to Windows 8

emerged about how legacy applications would behave in the new OS. That worry was short-lived. With the circulation of the first beta versions, it became clear that the vast majority of existing 32- and 64-bit Windows apps would in-


stall and run without incident on Windows 8. Enterprises, however, face problems not seen by end users, such as having


to keep legacy or custom 16-bit applications running. Windows 8 is similar to Windows 7 in this regard: the 64-bit edition of Windows 8 will only run 64and 32-bit apps, while the 32-bit edition of Windows 8 will be able to run 32-


and 16-bit apps. Note that the ARM version of Windows 8 (aka Windows RT), shipped as a preload with certain devices, won’t run anything except software compiled for ARM. Relying on the continued presence of the 16-bit subsystem isn’t a perfect solution for a couple of reasons. For one, it doesn’t provide flawless 16-bit compatibility. (Users have reported a problem with 16-bit COM-based apps, for instance, although the problem cited there can be worked around.) Since there’s no guarantee the 16-bit subsystem will continue to be available in future versions of Windows, the best long-term approach is to have any such components either replaced or rewritten. Finally, there may be situations where the 64-bit version of Windows 8 must be used, which means one less place where the 16-bit subsystem can be present. Another common approach to legacy apps is virtualization, something Windows 7 handles via XP Mode. This involves installing a copy of XP to run in a virtual machine via Microsoft Virtual PC, along with licensing for that separate copy of Windows. Windows 8 no longer has XP Mode, but a number of parallel solutions exist. One possible alternative is Microsoft Enterprise Desktop Virtualization (part

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book How to Handle Legacy Apps

of the Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack), which allows virtual machine images to be made available to client PCs. It also has specific tools to allow individual apps to be virtualized and delivered to desktops via the virtual desktop infrastructure. Another option is to directly migrate the existing Windows XP Mode VHD files to a new virtualization infrastructure, although you may


want to consult with Microsoft beforehand about the licensing implications of doing so. If you’re working on replacing existing custom legacy apps with newly writ-


ten versions that are forward-compatible, Microsoft offers a package called the Windows App Certification Kit (ACK), a replacement for the former Windows Software Logo Kit. ACK lets you ensure a given app can work in Windows 8,


either as a standard desktop app or a Metro-style app. Microsoft maintains a forum on the TechNet site for Windows 8 application


compatibility issues. Microsoft also has guidelines for how to create line-ofbusiness apps specifically for Windows 8. n

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book Which Migration Tools Can Help


microsoft has long had a slew of tools to simplify the job of migrating users Why Migrate to Windows 8

and desktops to a new version of Windows. The exact toolset has changed over time, but at the core are tools for two kinds of jobs: upgrading an existing machine to a new OS, and moving a user’s settings to a new machine with the


new OS. Microsoft calls these “PC refresh” and “PC replacement” scenarios, respectively.


The refresh vs. replacement scenario may be a little more crucial with Windows 8 than with previous versions of Windows. For instance, there might be tentative plans to migrate an existing fleet


of notebooks to touch-enabled devices to make that much more use of Windows 8’s touch features. This isn’t to say that an existing nontouch PC won’t work well with Windows 8. It’s more that the most compelling use cases for Windows 8 involve touch-based hardware, most of which might well be a new addition to the hardware fleet in your organization. A major component in upgrading to

The most compelling use cases for Windows 8 involve touch-based hardware, most of which might well be a new addition to the hardware fleet in your organization.

Windows 8 will most likely be the User State Migration Tool (USMT), provided as part of Microsoft Deployment Toolkit 2012. USMT allows a user’s state—account information, local files and application and OS settings—to be captured and stored as a file, then migrated to an entirely new installation of Windows. The newest edition of this tool (Version 5) adds in support for Windows 8 migrations, so you must use this version if you want to start staging user migrations to Windows 8; earlier

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book Which Migration Tools Can Help

versions won’t work. For moving user data between individual, unmanaged PCs, there’s the Windows Easy Transfer utility, which was introduced back in Vista. It’s used to create an archive of the user’s files and application settings, which can either be transferred directly over a network to the target PC or saved to a file and then


re-opened there. Note that when migrating to Windows 8, you need to use the version of the tool supplied with Windows 8 itself (in the \support\migwiz folder of the installation media), rather than a version supplied with previous


editions of Windows. n



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book What to Know About Windows 8 Licensing




in april 2012, Microsoft announced Windows 8 would have four different

SKUs, which are the stockkeeping units used for tracking inventory. That’s a major trim from the many licensing choices available for Windows 7. The four are Windows 8, Windows 8 Pro, Windows 8 Enterprise and Windows RT. Since RT is for ARM-powered devices only and isn’t available on its own, it’s


the first three that matter here. As the name implies, it’s the Enterprise SKU of Windows 8 that’s intended for corporate use—those dealing with fleets of notebooks or departments full


of desktop PCs. The “vanilla” SKU of Windows 8 is for home users; Windows 8 Pro for people sometimes called prosumers, a term that describes knowledgeable individuals who choose to buy professional-grade gear. Enterprise, however, includes everything from Pro, along with some features not found anywhere else—but is only available through Microsoft’s Software Assurance volume-licensing program. One adage of commerce is “don’t pay for what you don’t need,” and some business users might conclude the consumer version of Windows 8 is all they need. It doesn’t have many enterprise features, such as full-disk encryption via BitLocker. This encourages the idea that one could use the consumer SKU, save some money up front and make up the difference in features by way of a third-party product (e.g., TrueCrypt). It’s possible to do this, but one big argument against that approach is that some third-party feature replacements (including TrueCrypt) don’t have native Group Policy management features. Such things would need to be supported manually, at greater effort and cost. Will such cost offset the savings brought on by using a cheaper SKU of Windows? Also, Windows volume licensing is available for as few as five devices at once, which makes it more difficult to

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book What to Know About Windows 8 Licensing

argue for non-volume licensing in organizations. Finally, some of the other new features available only through volume-licensed versions of Windows 8 make it possible to do things that would require buying additional Windows licenses. Chief among them is Windows To Go, which allows a full, separately bootable and centrally manageable copy of Win-


dows 8 to be installed on a USB storage device. Microsoft didn’t wait for Windows 8 to come out before making revisions to Software Assurance. Most of those changes revolve around how clients—


phones, tablets, Windows RT devices—can work with fully licensed instances of Windows 9, which will likely arrive in 2015 or 2016. For instance, up to four “companion devices” (a tablet, a phone, etc.) can be used to access a given cor-


porate desktop installation of Windows 8. This means any scenario where you remotely access a licensed copy of Windows running in one place, whether


in the cloud or on a client PC, is going to be all the easier to deploy and license properly via volume licensing. To sum up, the places where Windows 8 volume licensing won’t work mostly exist in the low end: where fewer than five devices are in use; where no central management is used; or where the enterprise features available only through volume licensing aren’t going to be in use. Those may prove to be the minority of scenarios for a Windows 8 deployment. While Windows 8 has been designed to make the most of touch systems, it’s been outfitted with features clearly designed to expand its appeal beyond those devices alone. That said, touch devices may be the best first line of deployment for Windows 8 in your organization. The way legacy applications are handled—especially 16-bit ones—is still reminiscent of how Windows 7 worked, but don’t assume that’ll last forever. The toolset for migrating to Windows 8 is also a direct descendant of the tools used for previous editions of Windows, although only the most recent revisions of those tools will do the job. And finally, enterprise-level licensing works best for enterprises, where the full gamut of professional-level Windows 8 features, as well as the added management functionality, become truly useful to end users and admins. n 9


book about the author

Serdar Yegulalp has been writing about computers and information technology for more than 15


years for a variety of publications, including InformationWeek and Windows Magazine. Check out his


blog at GenjiPress.com.

Windows 8 Migration Station is a SearchEnterpriseDesktop.com e-publication. Margie Semilof Editorial Director Lauren Horwitz Executive Editor Christine Cignoli Senior Features Editor


Phil Sweeney Managing Editor


Eugene Demaitre Associate Managing Editor Laura Aberle Associate Features Editor Linda Koury Director of Online Design Rebecca Kitchens Publisher [email protected] TechTarget 275 Grove Street, Newton, MA 02466 www.techtarget.com © 2012 TechTarget Inc. No part of this publication may be transmitted or reproduced in any form or by any means without written permission from the publisher. TechTarget reprints are available through The YGS Group. About TechTarget: TechTarget publishes media for information technology professionals. More than 100 focused websites enable quick access to a deep store of news, advice and analysis about the technologies, products and processes crucial to your job. Our live and virtual events give you direct access to independent expert commentary and advice. At IT Knowledge Exchange, our social community, you can get advice and share solutions with peers and experts.

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