And some of those partners -- ranging from resellers that do custom installations and upgrades to independent software vendors that create third-party add-ons to Microsoft software -- are wondering what to do now. "Every [value-added reseller] wants to hear how we're going to bridge the gap and continue to make money," said Ric Opal, vice president of Peters & Associates Inc., a 50-employee Microsoft systems integrator in Elmhurst, Ill.

Opal, who plans to attend the conference, which runs from Tuesday through Thursday at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center, said his small to midsize enterprise customers tend to hold off on major Microsoft software upgrades for several years after their release in order to assess reliability and impact.

Microsoft's oft-delayed Vista, which at one point was due out in late 2003, as well as delays in the release of Office, aren't helping his cause.

"Sure, there are always early adopters. But right now, a lot of [Windows] NT 4 has been updated, a lot of NetWare has been updated," Opal said. "There is still ample opportunity, but it's less than there was a year ago."

An independent study conducted by Yankee Group Research Inc. last October of 700 companies with fewer than 1,000 employees showed that about half were already running some version of Windows 2003 Server on the back end. Just 15 percent were still running Windows NT 4.0 Server, and less than 5 percent were still running Novell Inc.'s NetWare.