I am using 8.1 and am happy with it. I use the Live Tiles as a quick launch bar so to speak. It is a PITA to get certain things to "pin to start menu", but once you get them there, I find it ok to use. I like a clean desktop. Otherwise a classic desktop full of icons would be fine.

Other than the minor UI changes, I did not have any difficulty adapting to 8 coming from XP. It does multi-tasking just fine IMHO. The taskbar behaves just like it did in XP if you tell it to. :)