The Tech Report's Cyril Kowaliski took the plunge last week and installed Windows 8 on his main desktop PC

So, I installed Windows 8 on my desktop PC last week.

It was late on the eve of the launch. The download link for the $39.99 Win8 Pro upgrade had just gone live. I felt that familiar twinge in my stomach—the one that always precedes major upgrades, especially those conducted when they really shouldn't be. My rational side tried to argue against clicking the button. It made some pretty good points, too: I had to work in the morning, and if something went wrong, I wouldn't have time to fix it. My work PC would be hosed for the next day. However, my impulsive side retorted with an extremely persuasive argument: "Dude, you could upgrade right now." And so I clicked.

I lucked out, because everything went without a hitch. I downloaded the installer and ran it straight from Windows 7. It asked me to uninstall a couple of incompatible applications, rebooted my computer a couple of times, and showed me a fine collection of progress bars. Oh, and I think I had to answer a few questions, too, like whether I wanted to install right away or make a bootable USB thumb drive first. (I chose option A.) Finally, at 10:50 PM on the evening of Thursday, October 25, my PC booted into Windows 8 for the first time.

  My six days with Windows 8