Unless Microsoft were to some how try to legally force us not to do something to Windows, there's no real technical way for them to prevent us from doing what we'd like.  We know the system internals of Windows as well as anyone at Microsoft at this point.

Thanks for that!

Nah, no offence taken, I just realised that 'minimalist' does have some negative connotations, and explained/sold it a bit more.  What I really meant was a 'smart' interface that by default, just shows you what you need to survive today.  I would even just go for a feature like this on Fences 2 that rotates in certain shortcuts on a certain weekday.

I don't know why anyone would miss the start menu. It's been unusable since XP anyway.

Start Menu isn't a huge deal thanks to the task bar and jump lists. "Bins" doesn't hurt either.

I thought DesktopX had gone the way of the Dodo...

My biggest shock ever was when i unsuspectingly installed the latest version of Start8 and was confronted with a metro menu of squares forcing me to scroll like a maniac to find what i was looking for. 

I'm not against change,  i am not stuck on having things staying as they where. I am open to trying out different paths. But Metro is by far the worst ever interface i ever had to work with and that's saying something having started out computing on a 2 5.25 CPM Wordprocessor. It is like having your desktop cluttered with icons but limited to only a few due to them being large ugly squares in the most horrid colour scheme ever invented.

Perhaps if you use only 5 applications regularly and that's it, it could be workable, but still butt ugly. What a nightmare. And for a tablet...This is how my tablet looks now

  and i should change that for this ? 

That graph showing predicted sales in 2013 was great, as it shows an increase in desktop sales.  That means that the intelligence in the market is increasing!  Methinks all these small, expensive gadgets are breaking.  I've already seen some new Iphones with broken screens (lol) and even sadder, a new Ipad that was totally broken.  All I know is that my desktop is at home, safe, downloading some steam games and skyrim mods.

There is hope!

Now with the Win 8 info i've been reading, i'm already deciding to purchase my new computer now so as to avoid it ever going onto my harddrive.

Now, an Iphone that allows me to access my computer remotely via hotspots so that I can manage simple functions, like installing games remotely and such would be nice.  Yet, I wouldn't be willing to sacrifice an iota of security, so it would have to have some amazing security.

probably not going to happen.