The decline
in usage share of Windows
XP, which is slated for
retirement in 53 weeks, has
slowed significantly, hinting
that millions of its users will
hold onto the operating
system much longer than
some, including Microsoft,
expect.
Data published monthly by
California-based Web
analytics company Net
Applications indicates that
XP's long-running slide has
virtually stalled since Jan. 1.
In the past three months,
Windows XP's monthly drop
in share has averaged just
0.12 of a percentage point.
That's less than a fifth as
much as the 12-month
average of 0.68 percentage
points.
Windows XP's decline in the
last six months (blue line)
has slowed significantly from
the prior period (red), as its
flatter trend line (black)
shows. (Data: Net
Applications.)
Other averages point to a
major deceleration in
declining usage share: XP's
most recent six-month
average decrease of 0.42
percentage points was less
than half the 0.94 point
average for the prior six
months.
Likewise for longer
timespans. In the last 12
months, Windows XP has
dropped an average of 0.68
percentage points, while in
the 12 months prior it fell by
0.83 percentage points.
In other words, in the second
half of a 12-month stretch,
XP's decline slowed by 55%;
in the second year of a two-
year span, it slowed 18%.
The slowdown paints a
picture that must depress
Microsoft, which has been
banging the upgrade drum at
Windows XP users for nearly
two years, and has repeatedly
warned them that free
security updates will stop
after April 8, 2014.
Net Applications' data can
also be used to roughly plot
XP's future usage share.
If the average decline of the
last 12 months holds, XP will
still account for 30% of all
personal computers at the
end of April 2014, or 33% of
all systems expected to be
running Windows at that
time.
Recent estimates of XP's
future by analysts, however,
have been more conservative,
with experts from Gartner and
Forrester Research predicting
that 10% to 20% of enterprise
systems will still be on the
aged OS when support stops.
Microsoft has not pegged
XP's current corporate share,
but the Redmond, Wash.,
software developer clearly
knows it's large: In January,
during the company's last
quarterly earnings call, CFO
Peter Klein said 60% of all
enterprise PCs were running
Windows 7.
Since few businesses adopted
Windows Vista -- and with
Vista's usage share now
under 5%, some that did
likely ditched it -- the
remaining 40% must, by
default, largely be Windows
XP.
Windows XP will not suddenly
stop working 53 weeks from
now; it will boot, run
applications and connect to
the Internet as it did before.
But it will not be served with
security updates. Minus
patches, and knowing how
frequently cyber criminals
uncover vulnerabilities,
security experts expect
hackers to exploit XP bugs
that users will have no way of
quashing.
Those same experts have
split on whether Microsoft
will extend Windows XP's
support to protect what
increasingly looks to be a
major chunk of Windows
users. But Microsoft has not
signaled any desire to do so.
Granted, Microsoft will have
supported XP for 12 years
and 5 months, or about two-
and-a-half years longer than
its usual decade. That will be
a record, as XP this month
tied the previous Methuselah,
Windows NT, which received
11 years and five months of
support.
But Microsoft could still
rethink its XP policy, and
mimic rival Apple, which has
continued to support OS X
Snow Leopard, an operating
system that, like XP,
maintains a robust usage
share.
Apple, which has never
spelled out its security
update policies, typically has
stopped supporting "n-2,"
where "n" is the most current
edition of OS X, around the
time it releases "n."
Snow Leopard -- "n-2" in
that formula, having been
superseded by Lion and
Mountain Lion, the latter
representing "n" -- has
continued to receive security
updates, most recently on
March 14, or about eight
months after Mountain Lion's
launch.
By continuing to update Snow
Leopard, which powered 27%
of all Macs last month, Apple
patched 91% of all Macs last
month.
Microsoft could do even
better -- cover 96% of all
current Windows PCs -- by
continuing to support XP
after April 2014.
But one expert thought that
very unlikely. "I think they
have to draw a line in the
sand," said John Pescatore,
then an analyst with Gartner,
now with the SANS Institute,
in an interview last December.
"They've supported XP longer
than anything else, so they'd
be pretty clean from the
moral end."
To track how long XP has
before retirement, users can
browse to an online
countdown clock maintained
by Camwood, a U.K. firm that
specializes in helping
businesses migrate to newer
operating systems.
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