I work in the software industry. If they won’t update their software to work on the new OSes then they’re doomed. Now they might not update old versions for it, but they’re going to have to make SOME version do it. Which, according to this link: https://www.chem.agilent.com/Library/usermanuals/Public/G2170-90235_Upgrade-to-B0403_ENG.pdf , they have done. Now if you don’t want to upgrade that’s on you. But software that works on the new OSes exist. So now the choice is yours, stay on the old software and the old OS or upgrade both.
It’s already expanded if you’re willing to do the effort. With various VM tools you can install ANY OS on top of ANY OTHER OS. There’s no reason for MS to do it, resurrecting 20 year old OSes has no margin.
They DO have a way forward. You just think it’s too much work. Which is a valid decision, but not MS’s problem. You’ve got 3 options:
hoard license and equipment to stay on XP machines with XP forever
get better equipment that can run VMs of XP forever
buy new machines and put new OSes on them
It isn’t a widespread problem. If there was a large group unwilling to follow any of those 3 paths it would be profitable for MS to offer a 4th. There isn’t, so they didn’t.
Which is precisely the problem. We're talking about HARDWARE.
"Now they might not update old versions for it, but they’re going to have to make SOME version do it."
No, actually they don't.
"Which, according to this link: https://www.chem.agilent.com/Library/usermanuals/Public/G2170-90235_Upgrade-to-B0403_ENG.pdf , they have done. Now if you don’t want to upgrade that’s on you. But software that works on the new OSes exist."
For some things. I can guarantee you that there is a large amount of hardware still out there, and still working for which the "software on new OS's option DOES NOT exist".
"So now the choice is yours, stay on the old software and the old OS or upgrade both."
No, actually it isn't. The lab that my wife works in has a number of GC's that are still labeled "Hewlett-Packard", whose control software WILL NOT RUN and IS NOT AVAILABLE for the newest OS's.
"You’ve got 3 options: hoard license and equipment to stay on XP machines with XP forever,get better equipment that can run VMs of XP forever buy new machines and put new OSes on them"
None of which are viable options for the GC's my wife uses.
"It isn’t a widespread problem."
And I'm telling you that it is. You're not a chemist, and have probably never been inside the doors of an independent laboratory in your life.
"If there was a large group unwilling to follow any of those 3 paths it would be profitable for MS to offer a 4th.
And yet that market is large enough that some PC hardware companies are beginning to build NEW PC's, with NEW HARDWARE, designed from the ground up to run (for example) Windows 98.
"There isn’t, so they didn’t.
Unless you work for Microsoft, I doubt that you can know if the option has ever crossed management's mind (which I very seriously doubt).
And the my whole point is that "they already did" (Windows 7 & XP VM).
This is like the "long tail effect", where the effect isn't huge in any one place, but when examined in the aggregate turns out to be a significant market segment. There are many other business categories with this same problem other than chem labs. I doubt whether anyone has ever thought to examine the effect.