Enterprise PCs are unreliable, unpatched, and unloved compared to Macs

Summary

End-user compute vendor Omnissa, the company formed by the spin-out of VMware’s virtual desktops, applications, and device management biz, has dug into the telemetry it collects from customers and painted a picture of the world’s enterprise hardware fleet – and the news is better for Google and Apple than it is for Microsoft. Omnissa’s State of Digital Workspace report suffers from the same problem as all research published by vendors in that its authors conclude its findings demonstrate many fine reasons reason why you should consider the company’s products. We’ll ignore that and consider some other findings instead, such as data that shows users of Apple devices update software faster than owners of other machines. Omnissa found macOS devices are updated 1.5 times faster than Windows hardware, while iOS machines get updated 8.1 times faster than Android. “OS update controls for macOS are centralized, less obstructive, and more reliable than the bifurcated Windows Server Update Services (on-premises) and Windows Update Client Policies (cloud) approach for Windows patching,” the company opined. The report also found “industries that house the most sensitive data are ironically the furthest behind in basic OS patching” and that “Critical industries like healthcare, pharmaceuticals, and retail and wholesale consistently let their operating systems languish.” Healthcare, pharmaceutical, and retail outfits are the worst offenders. Omnissa also assessed the age of endpoints it manages, and found 90 percent of Windows machines in its care are under three years old, and just two percent make it into a sixth year of operation. By contrast, 65 percent of Macs are less than three years old, and 11.5 percent are in use six years after purchase. The company also considered reliability and found Windows users experience 3.1 times more forced shutdowns than Mac owners, 2.2 times more app crashes, and 7.5 times more app hangs. Plenty of the Macs Omnissa can see still run Intel pro...