>>http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/gadgetbox/windows-8-adoption-rate-reportedly-worse-vista-1C7800805
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>>This should not come as a surprise to anyone
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>Even at $40. Telling. Very telling.

The problem isn't the initial cost - it's the cost of maintaining/supporting the new OS. Many businesses were "burned" by WinMe and Vista that they're wary about anything new. Win8 is too different from previous OS that most IT staff tend to shy away -- too many unknowns. As for me, I'm willing to "spelunk" (i.e. explore the system) -- while applying some basic knowledge of the inner workings of an OS as a guide. Willingness to "spelunk" is probably what let me figure out how to deploy a webserver on Windows Server 2008R2 within a day, while it took the IT staff at one of our customer's a few weeks (but made no headway). I probably did have the advantage as I was familar with what pieces of puzzle I was working with, and how the basically fit -- all I needed to do is figure out where they were (and I ended up finding pretty much the first place I looked -- mainly guided basic knowledge of "the guts" of a server).