I was an Apple user and when I decided to move my design/art/web business here to Europe 20 years ago the worst item and shock about moving here was the sticker price of Macs. Apart from the mountains of bureaucratic red tape and hoops I had to jump through - when one is starting out then the last thing one needs is to find out that Apples here can cost as much as double or triple the price of that in the states - it's enough to break you.
I had the talent and drive to continue but the cost of each machine was killing me and especially when they went down. The cost of maintenance and upkeep of those 4 Macs was a continual financial struggle for 18 long years. Then 2 years ago by sheer coincidence I found myself at CeBit, perhaps the largest PC/Mac Convention in Europe (Hannover Germany) and there I gave the Windows 7 a test run.
I was sold immediately and now two years later I have sold all the Macs except for my personal notebook. I now have 18 Windows 7 machines, 16 employees and after so many years of struggle we have hit gold, even in this hard-luck recession - our business is thriving.
Windows has not been the entire answer but it was the switch and a combination of some really savvy moves - the ability to purchase more PCs, hire more employees and finally making ourselves incredibly competitive without the loss of one single moment of efficiency or design quality. My question after reading your 8 reasons is that I don't really know where we fit in on that list.
Windows runs and uses every single Adobe product as the Macs did and I been hard pressed to name one single ill effect or hardship suffered or quality lost since the switch. Do I miss the Macs? In a word, No. Personally, they will always represent the many years of struggle and hardship. And when I want to play with my Mac I always have my notebook but to be honest - lately, I have really been toying with the idea of trading this in also. After using Windows 7 I have really found it so limiting.
8 Reasons Windows Users Don’t Switch