As I sit here, I am running a system with each OS: Windows 10, Windows 7.1, Windows XP, Windows NT 4.0.... I am reply here using the XP Pro system. Last year I took a solid look at putting a new system into place and determined that everything I use won't run under the new operating systems.
Most of the stuff I use is shareware or equiv that I've licensed or code I've written myself. I was able to re-compile 2 programs to run under Win10, but most would have to be severly re-coded and there's little ROI for me to do that. The only thing that might be pushing me to "upgrade" is web browsing. I just don't use other stuff that requires someting newer.
The older WIN programs work on NT because they look for COM ports. But the newer scanners (lol-PSR-500 and later) require the newer USB cable and that requires XP or later. I do have WIN500 working on some Windows 10 laptops. But now the heavy lifting has moved to Sentinel; which I have installed under XP (and later). The key is having the correct USB driver installed for the OS you're using.
