Windows 8 is a hot topic right now, perhaps only ranking behind the presidential election, the questionable personal choices of a certain high-profile general, and the onging debate of Red Vines vs. Twizzlers.

OK, maybe not, but the IT pros do have their questions and concerns about Microsoft’s new operating system.

To that end, Dell sponsored a TweetChat last Wednesday for IT professionals that tackled the Windows 8 migration, the best practices of small-to-medium businesses to implement change and the merits of the touchscreen.

The two biggest concerns for any OS migration are training and the compatibility of critical software. Well, we can help with a few hints to get the concepts and training started.

But as for your critical applications, well, that’s a serious undertaking that every business needs to address in its own way. We haven’t run across any problems running Windows 8 just yet, but it never hurts to make sure your apps perform properly even if they appear to be perfectly compatible.

According to one chat participant (I could give you his Twitter handle but that would just look weird in print), Windows 8 “ is an attempt to build an ecosystem with similar look, feel, and usability across phones, tablets and PCs.” And that sums up things just about right. But it also addresses the touchscreen feel and format of 8. Yes, it is a nod toward the direction of the future, and that future has not been fully realized. But hey, that’s why they call it the future.

Even with the lack of touchscreen apps and uses for small-to-medium businesses, the groundwork is being created for a new way to work. A lot of the Tweet participants said they had touchscreen laptops and felt the full keyboard complemented touchscreen use. I confess that it has been a struggle for me to make use of the touchscreen on my laptop, but then again I’ve also been slow to embrace V-necks, Toms and skinny jeans.

The final major discussion point was the effort of small businesses to trim costs by allowing employees to use their personal devices. Needless to say, this was a little bit of a controversial topic, with a lot of participants citing security and compatibility concerns.

Windows 8’s attempts to alleviate those concerns in the form of UEFI Secure Boot, Windows To Go and integrated anti-malware in Windows Defender, among other features.

UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) is intended to replace the BIOS, and when Secure Boot is enabled it makes Windows 8 more resistant to malware by validating boot components. Windows To Go is an Enterprise feature that is basically “a fully managed Windows 8 corporate image that administrators can provision on an external USB drive and can be booted from any x64 PC at any location, regardless of connectivity.” And while Windows Defender isn’t the most popular feature around, it now incorporates the antivirus features from the Microsoft Security Essentials solution. You can read more about these cool features and other security highlights here.

Regardless of what you think about OS migrations and the new feel and features of Windows 8, it’s hard to say there are any wrong answers. It’s kind of like the AL MVP voting. There were a lot of great players and it was tough to go wrong – unless you voted for Miguel Cabrera (just kidding!).

-Joe Garza, Help Desk Technician