What Windows is overall the best to you and why?

[DudeBeFishing]

I don't have much experience on operating systems older than XP, so I can't say which is the best. I've used 3.1 95, 98, ME, 2000, just not enough to experience the quirks of each. I stopped liking Windows, and instead tolerate it, when Windows Vista came out. As a home user, Vista is pointless. It uses more system resources, with no improvements for daily tasks. I stayed on XP 64 Bit until Nvidia's drivers stopped being written well for it, then moved to 7.

Windows 7 wasn't any better with resource usage, but at least the task bar was a little better. I didn't like the icon only taskbar at first, but I've grown to like it. It's like a quick launch bar, without wasting taskbar space. I hate the Aero theme. I switched to the Classic theme, and turned off all the animations and other useless ricing that Microsoft added. Even if I liked Aero, it was incompatible with many apps.

Windows 10 is ass. No other way to describe it. There's too many issues to go over. Terrible game performance, and updates constantly breaking the OS, are the main ones. The only reason I use Windows 10 is because some games are artificially soft locked to it with their useless anticheats, and I like playing with friends. If LTSC didn't exist, I'd probably run Atlas OS or some other barebones unofficial version of Windows.

I haven't used 11 myself, but just seeing the GUI makes me hate it. The AI screenshot datamining feature doesn't make it any better. It's so bad looking, that I've contemplated buying a few licenses for Redhat, so I at least have some basic support when the OS breaks. I decided not to go that route, because Redhat spams your email with promotional garbage if you register an account with them.

 

[thesmokingman]

10 has been fine, can't stand 11 and then its spying sheesh. We get what another year on 10 till 2025 and then... yikes.

 

[wNotyarD]

Unironically, I'd say the Windows I had the LEAST issues with was 8.1. It worked way better than 7 on weaker hardware and fixed many shortcomings 8 had.

98 had lots of issues, so much that 98SE was launched. ME was crap because MS couldn't decide what it would make of DOS and it'd crash right, left and center. Both 2000 and XP were good from start but needed some service packs to reach greatness (XP overshot and SP3 wasn't well-liked). Vista was revolutionary, but driver support and hardware user base didn't follow until it received a SP. 7 was great from conception, using what Vista established. 8 tried and failed to reinvent what Windows should be due to MS misreading the market, but otherwise worked fine. 10 and 11 are further refinements of where 8.1 ended, but the ever increasing telemetry is a PITA.

 

[A Computer Guy]

Windows 10 has supplanted my previous opinion of Windows 7 as the best although I detest the creeping intrusiveness that has crept into 10. You forgot to put Windows NT4 on that list btw. For the Windows 98 era NT4 (I think it went to service pack 6) was great to work with.

 

[thesmokingman]

Windows 10 has supplanted my previous opinion of Windows 7 as the best although I detest the creeping intrusiveness that has crept into 10. You forgot to put Windows NT4 on that list btw. For the Windows 98 era NT4 (I think it went to service pack 6) was great to work with.

I remember being in college and NT4 with Pro chips was unobtanium ah those were the days.

 

[micropage7]

still running win 7 on my desktop and still pretty good, nothing to worry

 

[FoulOnWhite]

Voted 10, tried 11 a couple of times now, was on it for ages once until it shat itself as it seems to do sometimes. So back on 10 for now, even though 11 is probably better for the 12700k. Win 10 boots so fast compared to 11 though, maybe less than 10 seconds for 10, but seemingly ages, 30 seconds plus for 11, what is it doing that takes so much longer. I might do a dual OS, 10/11 for a while so I don't have a unrecoverable win 11 again which is reeeeally irritating.

 

[mb194dc]

2000 was most revolutionary and its not even close. Before that Windows NT didn't have the latest directx or many other features.

It was nearly perfectly stable and about 10x as good as 98se and Me. The latter of which is probably the worst ever due to frequent bsod.

All OS since 2000 have just been building on it.

 

[AusWolf]

My vote is on 7.

10 isn't bad with all the updates, but 7 has a nicer, more classic Start menu. I never liked 10's alphabetical grouping, not to mention the tiles which are more annoying than useful.

I didn't vote XP because it had issues with stability/BSOD, and the standard blue-green theme wasn't as nice as some of us seem to remember.

I also loved 98, it was a simple, down-to-earth OS, but it didn't get my vote for the same reason XP didn't (stability/BSOD issues).

 

[ARF]

So, it seems that if 10 is something like 8.2, then 11 is something like 8.1.1. Absolute failure...

 

[FoulOnWhite]

My vote is on 7.

10 isn't bad with all the updates, but 7 has a nicer, more classic Start menu. I never liked 10's alphabetical grouping, not to mention the tiles which are more annoying than useful.

I didn't vote XP because it had issues with stability/BSOD, and the standard blue-green theme wasn't as nice as some of us seem to remember.

I also loved 98, it was a simple, down-to-earth OS, but it didn't get my vote for the same reason XP didn't (stability/BSOD issues).

I use start is back plus($4.99) on 10 and get the nicer win 7 start menu