I'll keep 7 for some time as well, but that's the end of ms for me.. Nothing to hide here ; )
I did try Mint but that's not the one for me, I'd rather take my chances with debian and configure it the way I want. I have a very little experience with linux and still gaming doesn't seem like a much of pain. No complaints on my side : )

To be fair though you're talking about running Windows games on Linux... games which were never meant to run on Linux in the first place. Try running Linux or Mac games on Windows :p

However as more people start using Linux more games will be released for it and Wine will be needed less & less as time goes on. Hopefully it'll reach the point where Wine will only be needed for older games, but that will depend on the Linux userbase growing enough.

The plan is to do all the online purchases, social networking, private information on a Linux system and use Win7 just to download and play games.

Horde more games and by the time Win 7 expire, retire from gaming scene. Anything that must run on Win 8 above is ignorable since I have such a sizable backlog.

With all the Win10 crap and the backporting, I've finally made up my mind to switch to Linux. Yeah, sure there are tools to get rid of the bad stuff, but I just really don't want it to be there in the first place.

As for gaming on Linux, it's definitely not on par with Windows yet, but it's improved a LOT in the past few years. Not like I don't have a huge backlog, so I can easily wait until some problematic games get fixed.

So my money's on Arch with KDE 5. We'll see how it goes, but I'm very optimistic.

Even by that time i'm sure there will be more games that are compatible with win7 or before. There will be no end of games probably...

Yes, you are right. I talked about Windows only games with no Linux setup. But I don't want to miss games if they don't come with a Linux port. So I just stay with Windows (for now).

You know that if you gamers made an effort and move to Linux and live a few months without your precious Windows only games, the game publishers would had no other choice than offering Linux ports also.

This could be. I don't have a problem if this happens. And I don't have a problem with Linux users. People should use the system which they prefer. For me it is Windows and for others the MAC OS or Linux.

all this "backports" are their updates so i disabled windows update and now install everything after googling what it actually is.
linux is better anyway - yes... guess ill have to use it when my win7 will become outdated =(

I don't know. After support for XP ended I did not see new games that support XP and there is an increasing number of games that use 64Bit window only.

So hopefully when Win7 ends I can save some serious cash for not buying games. Sure there may be more games on Linux and Steam OS like thingy, but I hope I won't have to go on a shopping spree like now.

I don't like it but that doesn't mean it sucks. You should give it a try so you know for sure, if it is your cup of tea or not.

No major issues, works fine for gamers. Prevents draconian rootkit DRM from infecting your computer.

The OS itself is still rough around the edges, so staying with Windows 8.1 is a perfectly valid move to make.

And they say the American education system sucks...

People driving for that long didn't have to start out fixing their own engines, replacing their own tires and actually interacting with it the way that somebody who has been using computers as long as I have has.

Seriously, you try using an Apple ][ or DOS PC and remain ignorant of how to work a computer.

My verdict:
Since it's Microsoft, you don't really have a choice anyway. Might as well get used to it and customize how you like it.

true, but ... regarding ... they do, but with win7 and older they would always do it after a patch/update, now with win10 you never know for sure
if it will and more important how long it will keep on working , but we have lots of time before its 2020.

i hope for a miracle that a company stands up and has a new OS, that looks like windows but without E.T onboard cause E.T phone home is not very wanted or needed.

Its time mickeysoft retires.... cause were already forced to do things we cant change by our government, so let us please have some control on our OS we use.

I know for certain many of the users that 'complain' about the " ET phone home" also dont like Goole snoopinbg around, drm loaded games and more privacy 'violations', so why take this from mickeysofts' win 10? just because we have to and there's no alternative?

i dont like it but i never said it sucks, and you cant take the general phrase we been calling all our lives: "windows sucks" serious.

point is mainly the privacy part: like i said before if i want to go public it should be my choice, not mickeysofts who thinks its necessary to collect all possible info about us.

Sure if i was a gazillionair or biliionair i would not mind that all the world knew about me, cause thats what you become when having loads and loads of cash.

The 'funny' thing is tools/patches/apps that are beeing created to 'fix' the ET homephoning.
Just google on it and you be suprised.

There never was any reason to do this since win95 start till win7, but it seems it is needed now with the arrival of
win 10.