Microsoft is poised to end support for Windows Server 2003/R2 in July, but the time to act is now. Once July arrives, Microsoft will no longer provide updates or patches. This can result in a less stable and less secure infrastructure if you have not yet migrated to Windows Server 2012 R2.
A surprisingly large number of enterprises—as much as 60 percent according to some analysts—have not yet created migration plans. For those who continue to procrastinate, there are five significant reasons why doing nothing might spell disaster:
- Dependency Management: Today’s application environment is interdependent. Understanding whether the upgrade of an application to comply with Windows Server 2012 will also require a database upgrade is critical to understating the complete scope of work and associated vulnerabilities. Homegrown applications may require recompiles and upgrades to libraries.
- Security: As security patches and hot fixes will no longer be available, exiting infrastructure and applications will be vulnerable to future security threats and downtime.
- Compliance: Outdated software could threaten to create compliance risks.
- Missed Opportunity: Organizations can use the migration to take advantage of modern IT infrastructures, management tools, the cloud and application modernization.
- Higher Costs: If a custom support agreement is made available, the fees after Windows Server 2003 expires will likely escalate rapidly.
For all the reasons above, if you’re running legacy workloads and storing mission-critical data on Windows Server 2003 systems, migrating is an absolute necessity. To help take on the challenge, Logicalis has created a no-cost workshop to help inventory your applications and understand application interdependencies with each other and the underlying infrastructure.
To learn more about this workshop and Microsoft Windows Server 2003/R2 migrations, visit http://ow.ly/ELleA.