Technical information

Reviewer’s Guide Microsoft Windows NT Workstation 3.51 2
Windows NT Workstation – Customer Profile
Windows NT Workstation is the most powerful desktop operating system for the most demanding business needs. It
is a true 32-bit, multitasking operating system that lets users take full advantage of widely available, high-end
applications for software development, engineering, financial analysis, scientific, and business-critical tasks, while
continuing to run the thousands of standard Windows™ operating system-based applications. Windows NT
Workstation also provides the highest degree of protection for critical business applications and their data while
providing a complete security system for desktop computers. It preserves users’ technology investments today while
providing the foundation to build on for tomorrow.
Four major types of customers will be able to benefit immediately from the adoption of Windows NT Workstation:
• Corporate Desktop: Many corporate customers today complain that their end users have to reboot their
operating system far too frequently. Windows NT Workstation offers the robustness, stability, high capacity
and security to minimize end user’s lost productivity and high “helpdesk” support costs caused by
rebooting. For companies that equate this lost productivity with lost revenue, Windows NT Workstation is
the right choice – regardless of hardware platform. To quantify the impact of system reliability, assume you
have 2,000 desktops in your company. If users have to reboot four times a month, a conservative average,
and it takes 5 minutes to reboot, that is 20 minutes of lost productivity a month. That can cost a company
with 2.000 desktops 8,000 hours of lost productivity a year! Windows NT Workstation has been designed
specifically to stay up and running.
• Developers: Using development tools available from both Microsoft and third parties, Windows NT
Workstation makes an excellent development platform for both Win16 and Win32®-based applications
targeted for either Windows NT Workstation or the upcoming Windows 95 product.
• Technical users including engineers, scientific users, statisticians, and others: With their demanding
performance requirements, technical users are finding Windows NT Workstation a natural fit for their
power-intensive applications. A wide variety of key applications are available for these users in vertical
segments such as mechanical design automation, electronic design automation, medical, architectural,
engineering and construction, manufacturing and process control, and geographical information systems.
Originally, many of these applications ran on UNIX® workstations, but have now been ported to the
Windows NT platform.
• Enthusiasts\Power Users: These people traditionally like to have the newest and best software\hardware
configuration for their personal and professional use, yet do not want their early adoption to cost them in
productivity. Uptime of these desktops is critical, as is integration of business applications. Windows NT
Workstation offers the stability and investment protection that everybody needs in an operating system.