Windows Server 2003: End of SupportA Guide for Federal Agencies

Over the past year, it’s been impossible to miss the warnings about Microsoft® Windows

Server® 2003 end of support on July 14, 2015.

Gartner estimates 8 million instances of the Windows Server 2003 operating system

in operation. Though many agencies are in the process of working toward migrating,

SI Avanade approximates that 1.6 million will miss the end-of-support deadline.1

The commotion isn’t without reason. Failing to upgrade integral

systems — especially for federal agencies — comes at a huge cost.

After July 14, Microsoft will no longer provide critical support, automatic fixes,

updates or technical assistance. For agencies with particular compliance

requirements, the only options are to upgrade to a newer operating

system, replace servers or transition IT operations to a cloud-based service.

Keep reading to learn some common misconceptions about upgrading

from Windows Server 2003, reasons to start your upgrade now and

migration guidelines for moving to the cloud.

Others are ignoring the deadline for three reasons:

We have a limited budget right now.

No matter its size or financial status, your agency may be getting pushback or facing delays from the finance department when it comes to funding the upgrade. One reason may be the request is coming as a surprise.

“As a gross generalization, we’ve found that IT departments exited 2014 without including the costs associated with the appropriate initiatives needed to address Windows Server 2003 end of support in their 2015 budget,” explains David Mayer, practice director of Microsoft® solutions at Insight.

Common misconceptions Disk space was measured in megabytes. Random-Access Memory (RAM) was quantified by single gigabyte increments. Processors that delivered the highest performance computed 32 bits. That’s how the IT landscape looked when Windows Server® 2003 first launched more than a decade ago.

Today, most agencies and organizations with the operating system should be looking to migrate from a 32-bit physical server infrastructure to Windows Server 2012 R2, which has a 64-bit, cloud-based infrastructure.

We’ll migrate to the cloud soon — it’ll be easy.

One-third of Windows Server 2003 users report they plan to upgrade to the cloud. This is a sound solution and a strategic change in many regards. Where they go astray is in believing this process will be as simple as powering down Windows Server 2003 servers and installing the application in the cloud. It’s not that quick or easy.

“If you decide to use Azure™, it runs on Windows Server 2012. So if the application won’t run on Windows [Server] 2012 servers on premises, it won’t run [in the] cloud either,” Mayer explains. “You still need to do the work to migrate the applications to the correct operating system, regardless of where it lives.”

Resources aren’t available to tackle the complex tasks.

This is not an unreasonable rationalization. After migrating email, Web hosting and file servers, the workloads left on Windows Server 2003 are intricate in nature and massive in size.

But there’s good reason for taking our eyes off the low-hanging fruit and focusing on what may seem harder to reach first. “Generally, the complicated items are complex because they’re running some type of business application that’s either revenue-producing or hosting customer data,” Mayer states.

In taking the misguided approach of overlooking the intricate tasks, agencies are putting their mission-critical applications at risk. “I would say the ones that you would want to tackle first are the difficult ones,” he advises. “If an outsider were to gain access to the data contained on those complex applications, that’s what’s going to be incredibly detrimental to your business.”

With so much on the line, it’s vital for federal agencies to act now and begin the process of upgrading and/or migrating your servers to the cloud.

While many agencies may see the current state of Windows Server® 2003 as an unwelcome imposition, the fact remains that upgrading comes with a wide array of benefits:

Reasons to upgrade now Increased server

performance

Convenient refresh at your pace

Simplified path to virtualization

Smart return on investment

Protection against the newest threats

Servers based on more newly released processors can deliver performance many times greater than previous generations.

New servers can provide hardware-based protection against the latest malware, denial-of-service attacks and other intrusions. Additionally, pervasive encryption technologies help keep your essential data private in ways older systems can’t.

A server refresh can not only shrink your data center footprint by consolidating servers — it also reduces energy expenditures with fewer and more efficient servers relying on automation to use only what’s necessary. In addition, you can reduce IT costs through remote management and extending server refresh cycles.

New servers can be your opportunity to speed migration to a virtualized environment. Server processers with virtualization technology offer built-in hardware support for Input/Output (I/O) virtualization, leading to improved performance, increased system reliability and enhanced memory protection.

A well-planned server refresh is preferable to a rushed reaction. By deploying new server capabilities, you can extend your server refresh cycle to help ensure continued reliable performance, resistance to the latest security threats and cost-effective innovation to streamline your data center.

Although there is no one-size-fits-all approach to refreshing your outdated servers, we’ve created a list of best practices that can help your agency breeze through planning, implementation and ongoing maintenance.

1. Research and test. While agencies can research app compatibility prior to migrating, Insight recommends you also verify your congruence through testing. There are a variety of tools you can leverage to verify application compatibility.

“For example, BDNA does data augmentation, and once the inventory of what the organization has is created, it can be plugged into the data augmentation tool and it will identify your options,” explains David Mayer, Microsoft practice director at Insight. Plan ahead to avoid complications or disruptions.

2. Develop a remediation plan. Once you’ve migrated, you may find certain applications aren’t compatible. If that occurs, the best route is to purchase extended support from Microsoft to provide your agency with more time to determine the best approach. It also pays to assess if upgraded or newer versions are available, to avoid disrupting the pace of business.

Best practices

3. Don’t take shortcuts. It’s tempting to migrate your easiest cases first, but it’s the complex workloads that are likely to have greater impact on your business — positive if upgraded, and negative if ignored.

“In the application world, you also have to look at the application updates and version changes,” says Trent Viavattene, senior manager of the core infrastructure practice at Insight. “Those are going to take the longest, so you need to start addressing those in the beginning.”

If you identify an application that needs to be upgraded as part of the Windows Server® 2003 migration, Viavattene recommends asking yourself a few questions:

• Are there licensing changes?• Are code changes required?• Is it a custom, in-house application?

4. Remember, hardware matters. If your agency is considering repurposing old

hardware, you’ll find that after installing

a new operating system on an existing

machine, it won’t allow for the migration

of applications. This will increase your

downtime and complicate the migration

because you’ll need to go through a lengthy

data-copying process.

5. Migrate side by side. Your agency should choose a side-by-side

migration instead of an in-place upgrade.

Why do we recommend avoiding in-place

upgrades? In-place upgrades present a lot

of challenges because they leave machines

in a nonnative state for the new operating

system.

“Paths have to be rewritten, files have to be

changed and items left from the old operating

system have to be addressed,” explains

Viavattene. Failing to do these things can

produce functionality problems within the

new operating system.

A side-by-side migration, however, involves

setting up new servers next to your old

servers, and then migrating the application

and associated data from the source server

onto the new target server.

To learn more, contact the Insight federal team at 800.862.8758, or visit www.insight.com/federal.

1. Clarke, G. “Why 1.6 million people will miss Microsoft’s Windows Server 2003 data with fate.” The Register. Feb. 10, 2015.

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