The organization I work for has issued a memo stating that they will not longer support network connectivity for PCs older than 5 years to our Windows Server due to potential network issues. I believe that we are running Windows Server 2003 with 250 clients. My questions are: regardless of computer age, if the client is running Windows XP Professional with all current SPs installed (1) are there any potential issues that would effect connectivity to the Windows Server or Exchange Server and (2) is there anyway that the > 5 year old client could cause issues with the Server infrastructure by connecting to it? Thank-you for your replies and please include your job title and size of your network so that I may submit this to my superiors.

Hello, never heard about issues connecting to servers with older OS versions. You have to make sure that servers and clients are up to date patched and that you use firewalls and Anti Virus programs to secure the machines. Never had seen problems with older machines on newer networks or connecting to newer servers. Networking in that case is different from used OS versions and how to secure them. TCP/IP will not take a look into used OS versions, it just handles the traffic within the network.Best regards Meinolf Weber Disclaimer: This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties or guarantees , and confers no rights.

Hello, who said that in your organization?? I don't see any relation between old machines / OS and connectivity problems. Just make sure that all is okay with your hardware equipments, that latest updates for your NIC cards are installed and that latest Microsoft Windows Updates are installed. This is what I recommend to reduce crashes / problems on your servers / client computers and to avoid connectivity problems. You have nothing to care about. It is just recommended to upgrade your environment to benefit from new features, more performance ... This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties or guarantees , and confers no rights. Microsoft Student Partner Microsoft Certified Professional Microsoft Certified Systems Administrator: Security Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer: Security Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist: Windows Server 2008 Active Directory, Configuration Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist: Windows Server 2008 Network Infrastructure, Configuration Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist: Windows Server 2008 Applications Infrastructure, Configuration

Yes, I agree with Meinolf and Mr X. If you have proper patch managment WSUS or SCCM then their should not be issue for Windows Server or Exchange Server from XP clients. Regarding the older OS version with the new server infrastructure there should not be a problem connecting to it. If you have remote clients, then you can implement the NAP. It is recommended to upgrade the infrastructure to get benefits from new technologies.