What's your favorite Windows Version?

[Frisco]

Not including Pro versions like Windows 2000 which was very good. I think Win 7 is a beautiful OS. On the Mac side my favorite is 10.4--Tiger! Oh how I miss my Tiger.

ps: Hated ME--nothing worked. Vista sucked but liked the introduction of Aero. Win 8--can't stand it. Win 10 better than 8 but less than 7.

Testing Windows 10 last week, made me get another Windows 7 machine while you still can. Windows 10 still has the Windows 8 flavor, yuck!

"An ex-Microsoft employee who was tasked with the removal of Aero Glass stated the removal to be related to power consumption of ARM devices such as the Surface tablets, which were to be launched with Windows 8, rather than being primarily motivated by a design philosophy." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Aero

 

[MartinAppleGuy]

In order;

Windows 10
Windows XP
Windows 98 SE
Windows 7
Windows 8.1

 

[Shirasaki]

In order:
Windows Server 2008 R2
Windows 7
Windows 10
Windows Server 2012 R2
Windows XP
Windows Vista
Windows 95/98
Windows ME

PS: Windows 3.11 was the first OS I used.

 

[SoyCapitanSoyCapitan]

10. But if Windows 2000 had a built in firewall, modern Direct X, and modern security it would probably be the best.

 

[z31fanatic]

1. 10
2. 8.1
3. 7

Didn't care for the others (98-Vista). I thought they were all crap except Vista which was tolerable.

 

[pastrychef]

I don't really like any version of Windows, I use Windows because I must because there are some tool and/or apps that just aren't available for Macs or just run much better in Windows. I feel the same way about Linux.

My biggest gripe with it is the UI. I much prefer the UI of Macs. Everything just makes more sense to me on Mac OS and OS X. Over the years, I've gotten a little more used to how Windows does things but I don't think I'll ever be as comfortable as I am on Mac OS or OS X.

That being said, contrary to how most people feel about Windows 8.1, I liked it. Mostly because of the live tiles. I liked having the live tiles automatically update and show me the latest news headlines, stock quotes, etc. On Windows 10, I can get back the start screen along with the live tiles but I would lose the start button in normal desktop use. If I keep the start button, I can retain some of the tiles but in a miniaturized view. This isn't very practical when using a monitor with 4K resolution or higher.

Therefore,

1. Windows 8.1
2. Windows 10

 

[S.B.G]

I'll have to go with Windows 10. I've been using it since October when the public beta was released and have grown to enjoy it quite well.

 

[dusk007]

Windows 10
Windows 8.1
Windows 8
Windows 7
Windows Vista SP3
Windows XP

I never considered the Windows 8 UI to be a real problem. I could work with it just as well and if you do most of your searching via keyboard it is completely unnecessary to have a start menu icon. I think most people are just too point and click oriented and Windows 8 tried to get users to be a little more efficient. Obviously you cannot force anything on users they don't like, but the general design philosophy wasn't as horrible as some made it out to be.
Besides the UI Windows 8 performed perfectly well and better than 7. Vista SP3 was besides the UI basically on the same level performance wise as 7, it just had a horrible reputation.
10 is the best because they finally improve the UI other than just change it in Win8. Virtual desktops, where have they been for the last two decades? I found 7 always lacking in the UI department compared to Linux and OSX, mostly because of that feature being absent.

 

[happyfrappy]

Windows 7
Vista
WinXP
Win98SE, sure I liked Win95 but even after OSR2 edition it never quite got USB 1.1 flash drives working on most PCs of the time period and Win98 1st edition was just a mild upgrade(SE improved performance of USB scanners, USB AIO printers, USB storage such as Zip/Jaz/Clik/Orb/SparQ cartridge drives & early external HDDs)

Funny thing is those of us who had hardware which was built with Vista in mind(Core 2 Duo) never had all the lousy performance that many people complained about, however it was hard to avoid Vista when OEMs pre-installed Vista and finding a dealer which sold Vista Business/Ultimate with XP Pro downgrade rights was fairly hard in 2007(only Microcenter & Frys took action by carrying downgrade rights equipped models).

Why not Win10? Faster than 7, yet ramming a Microsoft Account down the throats of users like Windows 8.x to use OneDrive is an unnecessary requirement considering SkyDrive/OneDrive sync for Win7 didn't require being logged into every MS Live service bundle(Live Messenger, Bing Bar, etc). Windows 8.0 allowed installing the OneDrive sync to avoid a MS account but after 8.1 it disabled it then required a Microsoft Account, only way around that was setup a local account if you wanted to avoid accidentally launching MSN/Bing crap.

...still prefer OS X, Apple hasn't butchered UI experience to the scale of Windows and leaving iCloud services optional.

 

[ocabj]

Windows for Workgroups 3.11

 

[Atlantico]

Favorite is Windows 8.1 with Windows 10 being a close second, simply because Windows 8.1 is far far better polished and stable. Windows 10 will get there one day, and I am using Windows 10, but when I boot back into Windows 8.1 I feel more at ease.

In a year or so, I'm sure Windows 10 will be my favorite.

 

[macenied]

Not easy to say ( voted nothing ). I am using MS products since early MS-DOS. Windows 10 has the potential to outperform a lot of OS'es but it is not there yet. As of now, Windows 7 has been the best desktop OS for me. I upgraded to W10 to don't miss the train. Everything ok so far. On the server side I like zOS and Unix. OSX is still nowhere, not relevant. Sorry for that but true.

 

[snorkelman]

NT4 workstation for the improvements it brought to NT (and the level of engagement MS had with testers during development and beta stages)

XP

Oddly enough on the limited occasions I've had to use it I found 8.1 a nicer/slicker experience than Vista or 7 (though I managed to avoid having anything to do with the original 8.0 completely which might help explain it)

 

[SoyCapitanSoyCapitan]

NT4 workstation for the improvements it brought to NT (and the level of engagement MS had with testers during development and beta stages)

XP

Oddly enough on the limited occasions I've had to use it I found 8.1 a nicer/slicker experience than Vista or 7 (though I managed to avoid having anything to do with the original 8.0 completely which might help explain it)

And NT4 was a 50MB install. Amazing.