The IT Nerd

If you run any of the following Microsoft operating systems, Microsoft has a message for you. Mainstream support is coming to an end. That in short means no free patches and fixes. That also includes but is not limited to security updates. Now once a product exits mainstream support, it enters an extended support phase that usually lasts five years and users get free security fixes. Other types of updates are paid and require specific licensing deals such as the ones that larger companies sign. Once that five years is up, support has ended and the product is basically dead. Windows XP is perhaps the best example of that.

Now here’s the operating systems that are exiting mainstream support:

• All versions of Windows 7 end mainstream support on January 13, 2015
• All versions of Windows Server 2008 end mainstream support on January 13, 2015
• All versions of Windows Storage Server 2008 end mainstream support January 13, 2015

There are a number of other products who’s support statuses are about to change. That includes Office 2010 with Service Pack 1, SharePoint 2010 with SP1 to name two. Check out this document from Microsoft for more info. If you run a organization who relies on any of these products, you’ll need to look over that document so that you can make sure that you’re doing everything you can to ensure that fully supported going forward.

This entry was posted on July 9, 2014 at 12:11 pm and is filed under Commentary with tags Microsoft. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.