Microsoft Issues Another Warning of XP's Demise
By the way, support for Windows XP ends in April 2014... in case you didn't know that already.
Microsoft is reminding customers once again that Windows XP has less than a year to live until life support is switched off. The warning arrives as the Redmond company is gearing up to launch a preview of Windows 8.1 next month during the BUILD 2013 developers conference. The current warning is aimed primarily at small businesses reluctant to upgrade, but it also applies to all users still clinging to the ancient OS.
"Small businesses, we know you love Windows XP. It’s been good to you. But it’s 12 years old, and the time has come to start bidding it a fond farewell," said Microsoft's Jennifer Chen. "The unfortunate fact is that it’s out of date and support for it will end on April 8, 2014 – less than a year from now. Are you ready?"
Many may not be. In fact, many businesses and consumers may still think Windows XP will be supported by Microsoft despite the warnings. While speaking with one local retailer, the manager swore up and down that Microsoft will keep supporting the platform beyond May 2014 given that this particular chain has stores spread out across the country. After arguing back and forth with us over the subject, he still didn't get the message, and said that HP would keep Windows XP supported indefinitely.
The scary aspect of this reluctance is that this chain holds the personal records of millions of customers. Another local business we spoke to was just as reluctant about upgrading, but a quick glance at the screen showed that even security updates issued by Microsoft weren't installed. Again, like the former chain, this company holds personal records of all its customers. Imagine what will happen after April 2014.
"What does end of support mean? It means no security updates," Chen added. "No free or paid assisted support options, and no updates to online content. Using new hardware and software will become increasingly difficult and incompatible."
In 1Q13, Windows XP's market share of the OS market was 38.31 percent, following Windows 7 which commanded 44.72 percent. The usage of Windows XP has dropped to some degree over the past year, but not as much as Microsoft would probably like. In June 2012, the platform owned 43.61 percent of the market, and by December it still retained 39.08 percent. That said, Microsoft has a long way to go before Windows XP is completely out of the picture.

I think the blame is firmly on your company for not upgrading or switching to another OS before now. XP went into extended support in April of 2009 and Windows 7 came out October 2009. MS has been saying since 2009 it was going to end the extended support. You would think 5 years heads up prior to the EOS in 2014 is more than enough. You will be punished because of a lack of planning. As the old saying goes "A lack of planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part".
Same with people using outdated web browsers, it's your computer, you use it any way you like.
I think the blame is firmly on your company for not upgrading or switching to another OS before now. XP went into extended support in April of 2009 and Windows 7 came out October 2009. MS has been saying since 2009 it was going to end the extended support. You would think 5 years heads up prior to the EOS in 2014 is more than enough. You will be punished because of a lack of planning. As the old saying goes "A lack of planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part".
Id say it will be VERY likely there will still be 10s of millions of XP machines running another decade from now.
If you are using business oriented software and not playing games, there really is no need to upgrade. Upgrading just because something is old, is dumb.
Especially when what they are currently offering is the disaster that is windows 8. Buy new hardware with windows7 instead of xp, sure. But upgrade just to upgrade, waste of time/money/resources. (again we are talking about non gamer, or power user who needs modern hardware, we are talking about writing documents, etc.)
I'd say you're only in danger (once they stop updating it) IF you have no protection like I've outlined here. IF you do, you'll likely never run into an issue assuming you keep threatfire/AV software up to date that is. They are aware of the HOLES in the OS and watch for them so no need to patch if you don't wish to. Part of the point of a great AV app is they assume you DON'T PATCH regularly in the OS so they are looking for your laziness so to speak. Threatfire will catch you even if you do it to yourself (I tested by running some exe files I knew would bite my butt...LOL). It detected suspicious behavior and nailed them. Nice
Not sure I believe a company let you come in, discuss this with them and check to see if they had updates installed (nor why they wouldn't have them in). I'm thinking this is just sensationalism at work here. Not that I don't think it happens (it does), just that I don't believe how this went down in the story. Who says "they're going to support it forever, but I don't use the current support anyway...screw updates"? Basically we're to assume this is how this went down? Adamant fighters for xp and business people in this case totally ignore updates? Ok, whatever...This OWNER let you get hands on with his business machine? A quick glance and mine would maybe show the update icon, but not if I have 1 update I need to install or 100,000 of them
Maybe Microsoft's lack of incompetent support won't really make it that much of a difference?
Actually Win 8 was available for next to nothing in the first few weeks of its release.
1) XP was the first genuine multitasking version of WIndows, and after Windows ME and Vista to compare against, XP was wildly successful - and businesses do NOT like to mess with success!!!
2) The upgrade procedure from XP to Win 7 is an unmitigated PITA, a real abortion
3) Win 7 was too expensive, with too many variations, and very confusing
4) Win 8 - no way, Jose! Not for businesses yet
I believe most companies do not want to spend the big money to get new computers for Win 7 or 8 for that matter.
I think an uprise in Ubuntu running on computers that were running on XP when XP finally goes.
But admittedly, I still use XP on some of my older systems, like my laptop and my currently defunct old desktop. The lack of updates isn't a major thing, not like you can't still install and run XP, you just can't promise safety of the OS... As if you could in the first place.
If the time came I had to update my laptop and older desktop's OS, I'd likely switch to Ubuntu (A version before Unity) and work with Wine. No reason to purchase and install Windows 7 on an ancient system with only 64mb of Vram lol.
My primary gaming desktops however use win7. Totally love it^^