USING WINDOWS XP AFTER APRIL 2014 COULD BE COURTING DISASTER

Are equipment dealerships the last holdouts for Windows XP? The extreme reluctance of rental and other businesses to migrate from XP has been a source of much consternation at Microsoft, which for years has been asking their customers to move to more modern versions of the operating system. Now the call to action is critical, as there is much at stake.

According to an article published in the American Rental Associations’ Rental Management Magazine, businesses still using Windows XP as their computeroperating system after April 8, 2014, will be courting peril, according to countless IT experts, given that all Microsoft support for the operating system ends on that day — leaving XP forever vulnerable to new security breaches. IT security analysts predict hackers will have a field day poking holes in XP’s security after Microsoft abandons the system in April, knowing full well that any security vulnerabilities they find will no longer be patched by the software maker.

Like a lot of technology, letting go is difficult because XP was—and is—still considered a very stable and reliable operating system. In addition, XP runs many software programs that simply are not compatible with later versions of Windows— a major sticking point for many rental businesses. But are the savings and convenience of not purchasing new software worth the potenital security risks?

Industry consltants agree that anyone on XP should be actively researching their options and deciding which new operating system they should use.

Read more about the risks of staying with XP, as well as options and resources for planning your migration, including the option of ‘cloud computing.”