Posted: Friday, 17 July 2015 @ 14:44
In less that 24 months, on April 8th 2014 Microsoft will officially end extended support for all versions of Microsoft XP.
What does this mean, after that date Microsoft will no longer provide technical support, or security updates and perhaps just as importantly, it will lose support from third party software vendors.
It is the combination of effective antivirus, antimalware protection, along with Microsoft's security updates that is keeping XP protected in a modern connected world.
According to NetMarketShare.com 41% of all live Windows desktop distributions are Windows 7. What this number also means is that 51% of the remaining desktops are still on XP. That is quite literally hundreds of millions of desktops that will be affected by this policy change.
Mainstream support for XP ended on the 14th August 2009, which ended all future development for XP, ending service packs and iscurrently in a state of Extended Support which has restricted support to security specific updates and paid support.
The end of Mainstream support created challenges for IT managers and decision makers, removing telephone support with Microsoft. Many organisations have been reluctant to move operating systems, it is not unheard of for large organisations, government and financial to still be using Windows NT 3.51 and 4, putting the emphasis on security on the edge of the network with intrusion prevention systems. The end of extended support will but further reason for organisations to consider upgrades to Windows 7 or Windows 8 which is believed to be due for release later this year.
For large organisations, if you haven't already started migrating your XP Enviroment, time is certainly against you. A large organisation with 25,000 desktops would have to average 1,050 desktops a month.
With 726 working days between now and the 8th April 2014, they would have to average 35 desktops a day. A customised PC migration is no small challenge for any business, which can involve months of planning with all line of business applications requirements & licensing, user training and immediate support there after.
As of the 10th of April just passed, Microsoft has ended mainstream support for Microsost Windows Vista, providing only security updates over the next 5 years.
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