New Dell KACE K2000 Speeds Windows 7 Deployment

Dell KACE announced today its latest version of its Dell KACE K2000 Deployment Appliance can quickly help organizations with their deployment projects such as Microsoft® Windows 7, Microsoft Office 2010 and Mac OS X Lion. Additionally the company announced the results of its annual customer survey which shows customers experience quick return on investment (ROI) and project deployment times with the Dell KACE Family of Appliances.

The survey conducted in November 2011 by Dimensional Research revealed that leveraging appliance-based systems management solutions helps organizations speed deployment projects and achieve fast ROI. In fact, 71 percent of respondents reported ROI in six months and more than 60 percent reported full product deployment in less than one week. In addition, 74 percent responded with a high satisfaction level of Dell KACE solutions.

In addition to achieving quick ROI, deployment times and high customer satisfaction, other key survey findings included:

• 46 percent of Dell KACE K2000 Deployment Appliance users cited ROI within three months.
• Windows 7 came in as the highest (42 percent) IT initiative respondents have already secured budget for in 2012 with Office 2010 coming in at 39 percent.

Many organizations are working feverishly to complete Windows 7 migrations amid an uncertain economic climate. IT teams are turning to Dell KACE to help address Windows 7 migration challenges by reusing existing assets to deploy images across a variety of OS environments.

"Our organization provides tablet computers running Microsoft Windows 7 and Office 2010 to 1,050 students and faculty. Our process is to upgrade, repair, and reimage each computer during June and July, a heavy load for our small IT staff,” said Tom Wyman, director of IT for Mary Institute Country Day School. "We rely heavily on the Dell KACE K2000 Deployment Appliance to help us manage our 16 PC and eight Mac images. The K2000 allows us to quickly and cost-effectively reimage our PCs and Macs. A strong advantage for us now is that with the Dell KACE imaging tools we can modify the images up until the last minute. This reduces our post imaging tasks, allows us to accommodate late version updates, and frees up my team’s time to focus on strategic IT projects.”

The new Dell KACE K2000 Deployment Appliance release helps accelerate migration to new operating systems such as Microsoft Windows 7 and Mac OS X, as well as new software suites such as Office 2010 through support of native image formats and offboard storage. The latest version now includes:

• Support for native OS imaging tools for Mac and Windows to allow IT managers to quickly deploy servers, desktops and laptops without the need to develop custom scripts.
• Offboard storage to enable organizations the flexibility to store the larger native WIM and DMG images and migrated documents and settings across a variety of OS environments.

"Today’s global economic uncertainty means that more and more organizations simply can’t afford labor intensive and error prone manual processes to migrate to new operating systems or application suites,” said Lubos Parobek, vice president of products for Dell KACE. "It’s critical that IT teams be able to automate migration and easily leverage existing assets to accelerate their deployments. The Dell KACE K2000 Deployment Appliance allows our customers to get up to speed in days to begin deployment projects, migrate user data and store images across a variety of OSes in a centralized and automated manner that accelerates ROI.”

The Dell KACE family of systems management and deployment appliances fulfill the systems management needs for organizations of all sizes, from initial computer deployment to ongoing management and retirement. Dell KACE products are available as both physical and virtual appliances, directly from Dell or through its partners.

To learn more about how Dell KACE can help organizations quickly complete their Windows 7 deployments, join Dell KACE’s free "Microsoft Windows 7 in 2012: Deploy Now or Pay Later” webinar scheduled for Thursday, Dec. 15, 2011, at 10 a.m. PT/1 p.m. ET. Register here.

Survey Methodology

Between Oct. 13 and Oct. 24, 2011, Dell KACE invited customers to participate in an email survey by Dimensional Research on the topic of Dell KACE technology user satisfaction. A total of 243 respondents completed the survey. Participants included front-line IT professionals, IT managers, IT executives and others. Participants represented a wide range of company sizes and industry verticals and were all current KACE customers. Respondents were not compensated for participating in this survey except to be offered a copy of the final report.

About Dell

Dell Inc. (NASDAQ: DELL) listens to customers and delivers innovative technology and services that give them the power to do more. Dell provides system-management solutions for customers of all sizes and system complexity. The award-winning Dell KACE family of appliances delivers easy-to-use, comprehensive, and affordable systems management capabilities. For more information, visit http://www.dell.com/KACE or follow the conversation at http://twitter.com/DellKACE.

Helpful Links

• Dell KACE Management Appliance
• Dell KACE Deployment Appliance
• Dell Small and Medium Business Solutions

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