Our experience is that Windows 'just works' mostly, and when it does break, the knowledge is there to fix it. The PC spec is also a little misleading in that is depends on what you are doing onscreen. We run 720p HD video almost full screen, with a largely static text bar at the bottom, on little HP Microserver boxes ($150 after rebate, plus a copy of Windows) and they are fine - all on a dual core 1.5G CPU.