Microsoft will end support for the now-antique but still extremely popular desktop OS on 8 April next year, after which date no new patches or bug fixes will be issued.
Research conducted in October, in the U.K. indicates that:
– only a third of the IT decision makers who planned to migrate their remaining Windows XP devices before April next year are “extremely confident” that they will complete the migration in time.
– another third said they were “not even close” to having the migration complete
– a fifth said they are only partway through the project and would complete it after Microsoft support had ended.
Only six percent of respondents said they had already migrated all their devices from XP.
Nearly three-quarters of respondents to the survey said they would migrate their devices to Windows 7.
Reasons for not migrating so far include the level of disruption it would cause to the business – mentioned by 42 percent – as well as the cost, cited by 34 percent. Analysts warn that organisations that delay migration from XP too late, they risk security threats to the unpatched operating system and may make rash cloud choices as result.
However, it’s also possible that because they need to move away from XP, companies may be more willing to adopt cutting-edge technologies previously unavailable.
What is also important to consider is what support you will get from application vendors if you are running the application on an unsupported operating system. Chances are you will be asked to upgrade as the first response. 8 April 2014 will be here soon be ready – now is probably the last chance to get an upgrade into your next year budget.
