I really like the start screen, its different and can look nice while offering weather updates and apps like cookbook which is great if like to cook and try new recipes, it gives you access to useful information which at first i didnt know and hated metro but once I gave it a try I found it pretty cool........Im sure microsoft will make program tiles for your installed desktop programs look nicer and give you options to dress the tiles up to make them look better. .....and I assume they will add that feature, for when you install a program and it gets pinned to your start menu. I assume the next releases will let you choose a better tile picture or icon for that program, also they should let you change tile colors too..........If too many changes get made I worry it might affect the final release rendering it far different and less enjoyable then this version.
I agree that there's a whole lot of people who will find the new version prettier, and nicer looking, and everything else you've mentioned.
Then, there are those people who just need it to work efficiently, and who have no interest in the "looking new and exciting" kind of thing, and will pretty much ignore everything you've just pointed out. People in an office, or people doing research, or people simply trying to get their work done won't benefit in the slightest from all the neat things you've pointed out.
.........on the other hand, I think they WILL realize that their older computers, which are too slow in today's world, will suddenly seem a lot faster because of the improvements that has been made in Win8.
You're concerned about Microsoft messing up the things you like, because too many people might complain. I can understand that. The solution, as I see it, is to give everyone the tools they need or want, so nobody has any reason to complain.
[I've spent this past evening on forums, downloading and editing photos, downloading and installing new software, and working with Microsoft Word and Excel. I've done almost all of that using my (quite old, and with only 1 gb of RAM) test Windows8 PC. Everything went fine, and the only times I had to see/use the Metro page was when I log on, just long enough to click <enter> which defaults to "desktop" ever since I put that tile at the top left corner of all the tiles.]
