I haven't checked it out, but a recent article says that Microsoft intends to keep support for Win7 until 2020. Since I may not last that long, I think I'll stick with it for a while. I would recommend that anyone still using Vista should probably look at Win7 whenever any change is needed, as it does do lots of things better that the Vista mistake. WinXP is still considered better than Vista by many, but it's not well supported even now.

For those who only use a computer for web stuff (mostly "social interaction") and very light production, Win8 may be a good choice, now or as soon as more usage reports are in.

With the recent "improvements(?)" in productivity programs (i.e. Office) that may be about the only thing one can do with a "computer" fairly soon, so I guess I'll still have to watch what's going on.

Pending things also to watch:

a.) It's difficult - or very expensive - to find a new desktop equipped with more than 6 GB RAM. I got "insufficient memory" messages frequently at that level, but then found that 8 GB, where I'm running now, is the maximum my newest machine can install. Lots of others can't be kicked up above what comes with them. Some lowest priced machines have only 3 GB out of the box, and can't take any increase. Machines most readily available now are not keeping up with the file/system bloat we've all noticed.

b.) NTFS formatted HDs (the recommended best available for Windows) can't keep up with management of the larger file sizes and numbers of files many people now add, move, edit and delete in the process of daily productive work on available larger HDs. So far as I've seen there's no confirmable loss of files (although some suspected), but lots of "crashes." Most complaints come from PhotoShop users, and that program set is sort of a notorious space hog, but I don't use the big version and still get lots of balks.

There's a lot less recognition of user input by the builders than with previous systems/hardware, and the "social solutions" they're trying to substitute simply don't work well enough to be very useful.

John