[WomBom]

I bought a new PC and I HATE the new version of IE

[Pearls Before Swine]

I’ve heard it’s actually quite good; it was only the initial interface was disliked by laptop users, and they are fixing that in 8.1 for free.

[max americana]

stick with 7, our receptionist cried one time because it 8 was a mess. Back in December, the pc makers had 7 offered still on their sites but if you go to the retailers like Best Buy etc, every one of these clowns push W8 and ignore 7.

[Georgia Girl 2]

Mr. GG2 just bought a new laptop and he hates Windows 8.

[ziravan]

Win 8 made the laptop I bought in Dec a brick.

In June after trying to get functionality out of Win 8 for 6 months without much success, I bought my first Apple product, an IPad. Microsoft made me an Apple customer.

Without a doubt go with Win 7.

[Excellence]

My son built a desktop from the ground up and installed Win7 from his Dell laptop to the desktop. He's had not one problem with it. He gave me the Dell and I installed Win8. I like the increased security and the way it re-installs itself if necessary without damaging files. (Something went wrong with a USB port; reinstalling fixed it.)

[MtBaldy]

I don't have much hands on experience with Win8 but based on what I've read the last two computers I built I put Win7 on them. Supposedly Win8 is pretty good once you get past the GUI, and the GUI is fixable, but Win7 has been all I need in a home computer so I see no need to change. Win7 is getting harder to find. The last computer I built was a media computer for a church. I bought a new copy of Win7 off of Ebay for that one.

[SERE_DOC]

avoid it like the plague

[The_Victor]

I have Windows 8 on my wife’s tablet and a laptop. Realize that the Windows 7 desktop is in Windows 8. The only real difference is the start menu being changed to that tile page. They have some very good apps, so it’s not bad, just different. Since Win 8 set up to have relatively uniform functionality across platforms (most of which are touch screen), getting use to one, two, and three finger operations on a laptop finger pad took some getting used to, but now that I know the gestures, it’s actually quite nice.

[TomGuy]

Win 8.1 is supposed to be released in October. It is supposed to be more like Win7.

I have read that upgrading from 8 to 8.1 is not a smooth process.

Some companies are offering laptops with both Win7 and Win8.

I just started with Win7 last year. I still prefer XP, but it is old technology. Win7 handles much more memory, etc. Web pages got slower and slower to load on the XP because of all the graphics. I am okay with Win7 now, but it still has some ‘features’ that drive me up the wall.

[Mr. K]

Get the W8 version and try it!

If you don’t like it (you won’t) you can PAY EXTRA to get an ‘upgrade’ that will allow you to PAY EXTRA to purchase a copy of Windows 7

[Mr Ramsbotham]

I’m not familiar with Windows 8, but I just installed 64-bit Windows 7 on my desktop, which had been running XP, and I’m quite impressed by the increase in speed and responsiveness.

[McGruff]

We just bought a new Acer Laptop with Windows 7

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834314104&nm_mc=TEMC-RMA-Approvel&cm_mmc=TEMC-RMA-Approvel-_-Content-_-text-_-

and are very happy with it. Got it 2 days with standard shipping. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

[muir_redwoods]

I bought a refurbished MacBook online six months ago and haven’t looked back. It cost about $600 and I added a new battery for about $75. I download software upgrades online. It just out performs any of the many PCs I’ve owned, works with my inkjet printer and apps are cheap or free. I’ll never own a windows device again.

To each his own.

[dangus]

As a general rule, Microsoft’s operating systems always push the edge of the newest machines’ memory and processing power, but manufacturers always put the latest version of Windows on their machines. The result is that the operating system takes far too many resources for many of the machines it initially runs on.

Windows 7 was largely Windows Vista made more scalable, and sold on machines which had become more powerful.

So my advice: If you’re buying a top-of-the-line computer with the absolutely newest motherboard/CPU and stacked to the gills with memory, buy Windows 8. If your computer did not cost more than an electric car, stick with Windows 7.

[relentlessly]

I just went through the same thing, only with a new desktop. Not only does W8 get bad reviews, but the primary issue is that W8 is a touch screen system - great (I suppose) for tablets, perhaps workable for laptops, but lousy for desktops.

[isthisnickcool]

Windows 8 is absurd on a non touch machine. It is just crummy on a touch screen system.

With IE 10 you have an F12 function that allows you to regress back to previous IE version emulations. Which is good because millions of web sites have active-X still running on them and IE 10 does not support it.

It is like Microsoft decided that they had been using a steering wheel to drive their OS for years and thought it was sensible to take the wheel out and install foot pedal steering without taking in to consideration the people steering things.

I would much rather be using an Apple machine or a Linux box instead of Windows 8.

[quimby]

Windows 8 works fine for me. I installed a freeware (totally free, not a trial) program called Classic Shell. This allows you to bring back the windows start button like in xp/win7.

Change brings fear. But don't fear. If you can use any version of windows, you can learn to use Windows8. Windows 8 has some real advantages in speed, security, functionality.

[The Great RJ]

Definitely go with Windows 7. I recently rebuilt my desktop and went with Windows 7, a worthy successor to the venerable Windows XP. My brother-in-law bought a new laptop with Windows 8 and I had a tough time even installing a free anti-virus program. With Windows 8 pretty much everything you were familiar with has changed. The touch screen features are not at all intuitive like on the Apple I-pad.

[Personal Responsibility]

I didn’t like Windows 8. Windows 7 works perfectly fine (all Microsoft hate, government spying caveats apply)