Get rid of that stinking 8 or 8.1, to start. It’s NOT cross-platform and it’s hellacious. I’m self-employed and I have to work at a desktop. It was beginning to fail so I finally had to get a new one...with Win 8 installed. I upgraded to 8.1 and downloaded the thing that is supposed to make it look like 7 and it still stinks.
They’ve also screwed up all the old reliable programs and Outlook will not even accept mail from ISP accounts (I have both web and ISP accounts).
I have several Apple devices and am a big touch-screen app user and purchaser...which I gather was the group that Microsoft thought it would impress.
But I’ve gone back to using my old rackety PC running Win 7. At least I can do my job on it and it actually communicates with all my other devices and accounts.
I have told everybody I know not to buy a new PC until Microsoft has remedied this, and not to “upgrade” to Win 8.1 if they’re already running 7.