14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft still struggles to move users off Windows XP and it's a well-known fact that the company is pushing Windows 8.1 as the perfect replacement, but not everyone is willing to do what Redmond says.
As a result, the company has come up to a point when it's ready to offer rewards to those who move from Windows XP to Windows 8.1, thus trying to convince a wider array of users and organizations to start the transition.
The Opua School in the Bay of Islands region in New Zealand is one of the educational institutions which actually dumped Windows XP for Windows 8.1, so Microsoft decided to show its gratitude for this with $15,000 (€11,000) worth of Windows 8.1 devices.
The reward is part of a campaign launched by Microsoft in New Zealand specifically to encourage schools and universities to switch from the old Windows XP to the new Windows 8.1, according to a report by TechDay.
“Every day we see the children benefitting from their exposure to, and familiarity with this technology, which is why computers are an essential part of our school curriculum,” Principal of Opua School, Simon McGowan, said. “It’s also a key reason why we saw it as important to ensure that we had upgraded the operating system from XP to Windows 8.1.”
Microsoft officials say that, surprisingly, some school customers do not know which version of Windows they're running, so everyone is encouraged to search for more information online or contact the Redmond-based tech giant directly to receive assistance on how to upgrade to another and more secure operating system.
“Windows XP was a great operating system for its time, but it was not designed to support the functionality we now see as standard for a modern education, such as ubiquitous internet access, the use of tablet PCs and touch screens,” Frazer Scott, marketing & operations director for Microsoft NZ, explained.
Worldwide, Windows XP is still installed on 25 percent of the desktop computers worldwide, but Microsoft expects these figures to drop as more companies complete the upgrade to a different operating system in the coming months.
Many users, however, have already expressed their intention to stick to Windows XP despite all these warnings, with some of them explaining that an upgrade to Windows 7 or Windows 8 isn't quite necessary in terms of stability and performance. Microsoft claims otherwise, so it's up to the user to decide whether a switch to a different OS version is really mandatory or not.