This IDC Executive Brief analyzes the implications of the termination of Windows Server 2003 support in July 2015 and suggests best practices for European organizations that are planning to migrate to a more up to date IT infrastructure.

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December 2014, IDC #IDCEB51W
EXECUTIVE BRIEF
Windows Server 2003 Migration: Take a Fresh Look at
Your IT Infrastructure
Sponsored by: Symantec
Carla Arend Andrew Buss
December 2014
IDC Opinion
Microsoft will be ending Extended Support for Windows Server 2003 in July 2015. For Microsoft
customers, this means that standard, packaged support offerings will no longer be available. In
addition, Microsoft will stop issuing security patches for Windows Server 2003 when Extended
Support has terminated. Consequently, European organizations will be exposed to significant risk if
they stay on the Windows Server 2003 platform beyond July 2015.
Windows Server 2003 is a proven and stable IT infrastructure software platform and is still in
widespread use in many European organizations. However, as support for Windows Server 2003
will end in July 2015, IDC advises IT organizations to start planning for a migration to Windows
Server 2012 R2 as soon as possible. This will help to ensure that there will be enough time to plan
the migration, secure the necessary budget, recruit the needed skills, and implement and test the
upgrade.
While carrying out the assessment of the Windows Server 2003 estate, IT organizations are also
advised to take a closer look at their entire IT infrastructure. This is because all IT technology
layers have undergone a significant evolution in the past 10 years. IT organizations can benefit
from updating their server, storage, and data protection and recovery products to the newest
available products to achieve lower operational cost with increased performance and better
protection.
In This Executive Brief
This IDC Executive Brief analyzes the implications of the termination of Windows Server 2003
support in July 2015 and suggests best practices for European organizations that are planning to
migrate to a more up to date IT infrastructure.
Situation Overview: Windows Server 2003 Migration — Why You Need
to Act Now
Microsoft Windows Server 2003 is a very popular operating system that is still in widespread use
throughout Europe. Many organizations that have built custom applications based on this operating
system have not yet felt compelled to upgrade to newer releases of the Windows Server Operating
System. One of the biggest drivers of this has been that these applications, many of which support
critical business functions, run very well on Windows Server 2003. Migrating them to a newer
platform takes time, money and effort away from other initiatives.

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However, the time has come to revisit this strategy, as Microsoft extended support for Windows
Server 2003 will end in July 2015, which means that standard, packaged support offerings will no
longer be available to European IT organizations. This makes Windows Server 2003-based
applications very vulnerable to operational and security breaches and introduces a high level of
risk for European organizations. While organizations can potentially negotiate custom support
agreements with Microsoft to provide security patches beyond the cut-off date, this will inevitably
raise support costs significantly. Ultimately, the workloads in question will have to migrate anyway
in the near-term so this approach is a stopgap for highly critical applications to keep them available
while in transition.
Microsoft will stop issuing security patches for Windows Server 2003 when Extended Support
ends. This will mean that applications and services built on Windows Server 2003 will be out of
support and also out of compliance unless they are migrated to a newer operating system platform.
IDC expects that most organizations will opt to migrate directly to Windows Server 2012 R2, which
has rapidly become established as a popular, stable, and proven server operating system that
allows organizations to take advantage of up-to-date virtualization technologies provided by Hyper-
V 3.
European organizations need to act now to get an overview of all the applications that are running
on Windows Server 2003. Once the assessment is underway, the applications need to be
prioritized, and a plan devised for migration. This might take quite some time, especially in the
development and testing phases. The critical issues are time, skills and budget, as developing and
testing a new system architecture and application design is not a trivial task.
This is made more challenging because Windows Server skills are in high demand. There is a
shortage of software developers that can readily redesign and adapt custom applications for the
new operating system and administrators/consultants that can migrate applications and operating
systems.
While application migration and operating system updates are the most pressing issues,
organizations also need to reassess other aspects of their IT infrastructure. IT technology has
moved on significantly since Windows Server 2003 was introduced over a decade ago.
Virtualization has emerged as the de-facto standard for server and application deployments, with
more than three times the amount of virtual servers out there than physical servers. This trend
alone creates new requirements for adjacent technologies like management, networking, storage,
backup, and disaster recovery.
Consequently, IDC encourages European organizations to start the assessment process as soon
as possible and develop a migration strategy that they can begin executing immediately as July
2015 is approaching very quickly indeed.
Risks Associated With Staying on Windows Server 2003
The biggest risk from staying on Windows Server 2003 is that Microsoft will no longer provide any
security patches and updates to address vulnerabilities that are detected for operational systems.
This is not a trivial fact, as Microsoft still issues double digit numbers of critical patches every year
under the standard support model. Consequently, Windows Server 2003 installations will
increasingly become a target for hackers as unpatched vulnerabilities pile up. Running on
unsupported software will also mean that European organizations will be out of compliance with

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standard industry regulations around data protection or standards such as the PCI DSS. This in
turn will inhibit their ability to do business effectively.
Staying on Windows Server 2003 will not only expose European organizations to security threats
and vulnerabilities and create a non-compliance situation, but also to potential system failure and
higher system management cost, as the IT infrastructure is not optimized for modern workloads. IT
architectures have evolved quite significantly since the days when Windows Server 2003 was
released over a decade ago. Windows Server 2003 lacks both server virtualization — which has
become the foundation for building private cloud architectures — and also lacks the modern
management frameworks or APIs built into newer Windows Server releases that enable the
automation and orchestration necessary for cloud management. This leads to higher cost of
operations generally and silos of management within the IT infrastructure
Windows Server 2003 runs in 32-bit only mode, which cannot adequately address the memory
requirements of modern server workloads. This means it cannot make use of the advanced 64-bit
modes and large memory support of modern hardware platforms to accelerate performance. In
addition, the ongoing cost of maintaining an outdated server platform and the sustained operating
expense required for additional security to isolate the servers from suspect traffic, malware and
advance persistent threats will add up quickly, making it more cost efficient to migrate to a modern
server architecture sooner rather than later.
Finally, all adjacent technologies in the IT infrastructure have also evolved quite significantly since
2003. Storage technologies have evolved, with software defined storage now becoming
mainstream and storage virtualization well accepted. Data volumes continue to grow as more of
the business becomes digitized and supported by applications and information.
Data protection and recovery technologies have progressed significantly to address the capacity
and performance requirements of modern businesses as well as focus on the protection of virtual
infrastructures. Organizations running Windows Server 2003 are running the risk that their data
protection process and technologies are out of date and not suited to the needs of modern
business continuity and risk management requirements.
Benefits of Migrating From Windows Server 2003 in Due Time
By starting the migration planning process now, European organizations will have a chance to
dedicate budget and resources to the migration process and actually execute it before Windows
Server 2003 extended support ends in July 2015. Additional benefits are:
 Security risks are mitigated and compliance with standards such as PCI DSS maintained.
By moving to a modern IT infrastructure based on a current server operating system such
as Windows Server 2012 R2, organizations can ensure that they have a support contract
with Microsoft and get ongoing access to vital security patches. This is necessary to
achieve compliance with industry standard regulations.
 More integrated and efficient IT infrastructure able to be managed at a significantly lower
cost. By moving to Windows Server 2012 R2, European organizations will be able to
create a modern datacenter architecture, with a focus on scalability, agility and
performance, that they can operate efficiently as a private cloud, with high levels of
automation, flexibility and performance, and dramatically lower levels of operating cost.
 Resilience and recoverability of infrastructure is ensured due to modern data protection
technologies. Upgrading the server operating system also requires organizations to

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upgrade their hardware platform to the latest 64-bit server designs, as well as their data
protection and recovery tools to ensure higher levels of infrastructure resilience and
recoverability.
Best Practices for Windows 2003 Migration — Take a Fresh Look at Your
Entire IT Infrastructure
IDC recommends a set of best practices to migrate off the Windows Server 2003 operating system
and onto a newer server operating system like Windows Server 2012 R2, which provides all the
features and functions that are necessary to run a modern cloud-like IT infrastructure. These best
practices are:
 Evaluate your current installed base for Windows Server 2003. The first step to
understanding the magnitude and complexity of the migration exercise is to get an
overview of the number and criticality of applications dependent on servers running
Windows Server 2003.
 Evaluate the technology options for your new IT architecture. Points to take into account
are new server hardware platforms, current server operating systems, a potential move
from physical to virtualized environments such as Hyper-V, and the data protection and
recovery products to ensure resilience and recoverability of the infrastructure.
 Plan for system development and workload migration. Once you have made your
technology choices, you need to design your new IT infrastructure and plan the system
migration, including migrating from physical to virtualized environments such as Hyper-V.
 Assign a criticality to workloads still running on Windows Server 2003. Prioritize those that
have to be moved, and develop a plan to mitigate risk for workloads that do not need to be
migrated.
 Plan the migration, including any tools that will be needed for data migration and
transformation as part of the exercise. Some data protection and recovery products can
actually help with the migration from physical to virtual infrastructure and take out risk from
the migration process by ensuring that you can fail back to an older version of the
infrastructure, application, and data if something goes wrong.
 Update, verify, and test any applications before migrating them, as many of them are
custom developed for Windows Server 2003 and must be redeveloped or modified for the
new operating system. This step might take longer than you expected due to the
complexity of the application, skills shortage, and limited user bandwidth to test the new
applications.
 Upgrade your data protection strategy across backup, restore, and archiving to be the best
fit for your new look IT infrastructure. Data volumes have also increased significantly since
the inception of Windows Server 2003, and it is crucial to choose a data protection and
recovery tool that manages data efficiently, keeps the data footprint manageable, and
ensures rapid recovery performance and efficient operations, for it to be a good fit for your
new IT infrastructure.
How a Data Protection & Recovery Solution Can Support You Before,
During, and After the Windows Server 2003 Migration Process
A data protection solution can be used for more than just backup and recovery. There are several
ways in which you can use a data protection solution to aid your migration from Windows Server
2003:

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 Restore data for test and development purposes. You can create multiple copies of your
production environment for the software developers in order to test changes to any
applications that are being adapted to run on Windows Server 2012 R2.
 Migration from physical to virtual environments. If you decide to migrate from a physical
Windows Server 2003 environment to a consolidated and virtualized Windows Server
2012 R2 environment with Hyper-V, the data protection and recovery solution can facilitate
the conversion of physical servers into virtual machines.
 Ability to roll back. Once you have embarked on the migration, should you run into any
unexpected challenges with the new deployment, you can implement a planned rollback
using your data protection and recovery solution.
IDC believes that a modern data protection and recovery solution provides important features that
can help before, during, and after the migration process and provide greater flexibility and reduce
risk for IT organizations going through this transition.
Conclusion
Microsoft will end the extended support phase for Windows Server 2003 in July 2015. European
organizations need to act now and put a comprehensive migration plan in place for affected
applications, covering all the various aspects of the migration, ranging from hardware and
operating system choices all the way to choice of data protection tools. Leaving the migration too
late may mean it never gets the attention it needs as other initiatives take priority, leaving the
business exposed to elevated risk.
IDC strongly encourages European organizations to act now, as migration takes time, money and
additional skills on top of the day-to-day operations activities. Skills shortages and the need to
redevelop custom applications (that may not have been modified in years), can mean that the
process of preparation, planning, development, testing, and implementation often takes much
longer than originally anticipated.
The improving economy in Europe means that skills and consultants are already getting very busy
and in short supply. Leaving migrations too late can leave you exposed to substantial business
risks, whereas acting now enables you to move through the migration process in due time. This is
your opportunity to move to a modern, efficient, and high performance infrastructure that will
position your organization well for the next decade.

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