Windows 2003 Server more reliable than Linux

Really. Not just because Scoble says so, but also because Yankee Group did a research paper on it. Well, it’s written down and researched so it must be true. Sometimes I get under fire for calling BS on Microsoft too often so allow me to introduce you to my friends at Neowin.net. Mike, please field this one:

I had to do a double take when I saw that. 20% more!? Assume for a moment that you have two servers, one running Windows Server 2003 and one running Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4. Assume that your Windows box ran non-stop, without rebooting (which means you probably are not loading any Microsoft security updates) for 365 days. For your Linux box to have 20% more downtime it’d have to only be up for 292 days. If that is the case, your machine is no longer a server and is nothing more than a space heater.

Looking into the Yankee Group, and the analyst who contributed to this article, Laura DiDio, it can quickly be decided that they can hardly be seen as an objective source for technology analysis. Yankee has regularly been tasked and paid by Microsoft to provide “objective” reviews for its Get the Facts campaign (see all 184 results from Microsoft’s website). The Facts campaign is the same campaign that said one company switched from Linux because they had been effected by the Blaster worm (a Windows worm) on their Linux systems which caused them massive down time and as a result made the switch to Windows Server systems. (read that one for yourself).

Read more about this at Neowin: Editorial: Yankee Group Spreads On The FUD. I wonder who’s wins the next contract to write a Microsoft research paper.