Vanderburgh County, Ind., with a population of just over 180,000, faces a bill between $500,000 and $1 million to upgrade its computer systems from Windows XP. The police department in Washington Township, N.J., faces $70,000 in upgrade costs. Over in Monroe Township, the police department there is looking at upgrade costs in the vicinity of $100,000. That’s a lot of money for small counties and municipalities still trying to crawl out from under years of fiscal hardships.
On April 8 – one week before the annual tax filing deadline – Microsoft will no longer support its long-running operating system (OS) known as Windows XP. What that means is that Microsoft will stop all technical support for the software, including updates and security patches. Windows XP has been running since 2001, and has become the workhorse operating system for major enterprises, including all levels of government. Today, nearly 30 percent of the computers in the world still run XP, including 95 percent of the world’s automatic teller machines, according to NCR Corp. Nobody knows how many computers in government still rely on XP, but the fear is that far too many will still be using it when the deadline passes.
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The government is still using XP because they don't have the budget to upgrade. Are you willing to provide the tax funding?
ReplyDeleteXP is one of the most reliable version of Windows ever put out there. For many, it hasn't been upgraded for years so why fret over MS stopping support?
ReplyDeleteIn a lot of cases, upgrading the software will also require upgrading the hardware. If they've been using it on the same machines since it came out - the old hardware will not support Windows 8 - or even Windows 7 for that matter!
ReplyDeleteThey didn't listen to me when I told them either....
Microsoft is really shooting itself in the foot if they decide not to support their product.
ReplyDeleteThe product is over 15 years old. XP is a great system but it is nowhere near as useful as Windows 7. The indexed search function on Windows 7 is reason enough to switch not to mention the speed of the system itself.
ReplyDeleteits because of vista. It would also cost a fortune to replace all the XP desktops that cannot run windows 8.1
ReplyDeleteI have a perfectly good desktop at home and downgraded it from Vista to XP. I'm not getting rid of it.
XP was great, 7 is maybe better, but I'm an old school fan, have one of each. Understand w8 is a total waste, so I hope that's not a wasted upgrade! Seems like Misrocoft gets it right on every other upgrade; let's hope there's another one upcoming; meanwhile, it's 7.
ReplyDeleteMicrosoft blackmails the whole country to spend billions. Why do we let these tech companies control the whole country. That is what it is coming down to. "Buy our stuff or we will put you out of business"
ReplyDeleteI bet the NSA is not running XP. Once you go MAC, you never go back!
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't get all worked up about the ATMs running XP. Those computers do not convey account information to and from the back office over the public Internet.
ReplyDeleteSand Box John