Microsoft has, according to ComputerWorld, said that it will no longer sell Windows XP after the June 30, 2008 deadline – or next Monday, as of this blog’s posting.
However, Microsoft has, according to InformationWeek, pledged to support Windows XP until 2014. Microsoft has also, according to NetworkWorld, confirmed a ship date of Windows 7 in January 2010.
Other than the significance of Microsoft landing IT-oriented public relations trifecta, the question is – are networks going to bother with changing over to Windows Vista at all, knowing that XP will be supported for four years after Windows 7 comes out?
The buzz among technology columnists is that Vista has never provided a compelling reason to upgrade for businesses. (While there are benefits to upgrading Microsoft-based servers to Windows Server 2008, Vista is a desktop/client based OS.)
Additionally, considering that any changes can impact the network, changing operating systems across multiple desktops is a significant risk for no benefit. So, even assuming that businesses test before deployment and move into major changes like operating system upgrades with trepidation, four years should be plenty of time to migrate to Windows 7, which should include a more advanced feature set. Why would any company then not choose to skip this generation of desktop Microsoft OSes, wait out 2009 while still getting support, and upgrade to Windows 7 when it comes out?
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