Hi again Dunfir:

So yes, actually, this small company has sold themselves to a larger company.... but just before the sale, the small-company spent quite a bit of money upgrading to Windows 7/8, as well as upgrading servers.

So it's a bit disappointing that Microsoft does not have a solution for this company, in terms of helping them access OLD financial data, in an OLD XP server-computer, just in case they need it in the future.

Essentially, the only thing the owners of this small company are asking of Microsoft, from this point forward, is just that:

to make sure this company can run a virtual version of their OLD XP server, a few years from now, in the future, just in case the government tax department audits them.

That's it. That's all they want.

They are NOT pirates. They have no interest in pirating software. They've always bought Microsoft based stations, and Microsoft based servers...

But I get the feeling Microsoft couldn't care less about their business in this situation.

I actually hesitate to vent against Microsoft, because, I am HUGE believer in Microsoft as the absolute best enterprise and business level software engineering company in the world.

But... this situation has frustrated me, and for the first time ever, has generated some rather strong (perhaps irrational!) negative emotions towards Microsoft!

Again the company I am supporting has spent a fortune in buying Microsoft products for over 20 years...

And now, it seems they won't be able to access their older financial data (to meet government compliance issues) simply because Microsoft won't let them boot their old XP server, perhaps once or twice in the next decade!