The U.S. Marines are having problems updating their old PCs to Windows 10

A new report says the U.S. Marines are having problems updating their old PCs to Windows 10. The Department of Defense wants the military to upgrade to Microsoft's newest OS by the end of January 2017.

According to Federal News Radio (via WinBeta), the Marines thought they could remotely update about 60% to 70% of their PCs to Windows 10. Brig. Gen. Dennis Crall says that due to the older hardware on most of their rigs, that kind of remote updating will work on just 10% of all of their PCs:

"Our challenges are with hardware, and hardware that is older than a couple years is having more difficulty accepting Windows 10 than hardware that is new," he told an AFCEA DC forum in Arlington, Va. Wednesday. "And when you look at what 'new' means within DoD, we purchase yesterday's technology tomorrow. A lot of our brand-new systems are having difficulty with the upgrade as soon as they come out of the box, and we didn't anticipate that."

He added that the Marines are working with Microsoft on a solution but some of their PCs might have to be replaced with new ones with Windows 10 pre-installed earlier than what they had originally anticipated. While the Department of Defense officially says they are confident that 80% of their PCs will be upgraded to Windows 10 by the deadline, the report says the remaining 20% might not get that upgrade for years, due to the fact they are being used on weapons and vehicles overseas or engaged in military operations.

John Callaham