I do like 8.1 better than 8.0, not as if that says very much. I was ticked that I had to go through the store though, I would have been happier with media or an ISO because if I blow a disk, I will have to repeat the process and it was no quick upgrade.
I agree. If you clone your Win 8 hard drive, it can quickly be replaced with the clone.
My fav clone maker is this. FRee, of course. I've cloned hundreds of disks with nary a problem. Quick. No muss. No fuss. It just works.