[Dalberg-Acton]

Windows OS degrades over time.

[dayglored]

> Windows OS degrades over time.

Well, in fairness, they ALL do with regard to security, in two senses:

1. Bugs and flaws go undiscovered for months or years, and later appear. and
2. Environments change, threats that weren't conceivable a year or 5 years ago appear.

I patch my Mac and Linux systems just as often as I do Windows Updates on my Windows systems.

Now, as a separate, non-security related concern, any given installation of Windows is good for somewhere between as much as a few years (for a lightly-used system) and as little as a few months (for a heavily-used system). Windows gets "stale" faster than any of the other major OSes. I find for my production systems, that I have to re-install Windows to "freshen it up" about every 15 months, otherwise it starts acting strangely and eventually goes unstable. My Linux and Mac installations are typically good for the life of the computer (or VM), which in my case is 6-8 years.