@Kevinjohn Gallagher - Your blog post rant there, while entertaining, misses some of the point.

IE6 and IE7 are actually insecure. There are known security issues that can happen because somebody is using IE6 and IE7. This is why they are being deprecated.

Even Microsoft wants people to stop using IE6.

Other points such as the problems with browser detection and so on are well-taken, however there are still fundamental underlying problems. Some older browsers really are actually insecure. We know this. It has been demonstrated. This is one of the reasons IE6 support was dropped from the WordPress admin entirely, and also why IE7 support is slated to be dropped as well (not in 3.3, it didn't make that.. maybe in 3.4 or 3.5).

Windows XP is 10 years old, and will be at its end-of-life in a bit over 2 years from now. It's time to upgrade your OS too. I realize that you don't like the whole idea of upgrading, but it's a fundamental fact in computing that isn't going to go away just because you and your clients don't like doing it.

Adapt. Or die. Either way is fine.