Sorry but I can't agree there. XP was the first NT-based OS for consumers, and it was a major change from previous 9x-based OS's. Win2000 was actually meant to be the one that merged 9x and NT lines, but because there were so many problems, MS had to rush WinME to give consumers something new instead of Win2000.
With WinXP they managed to fix many problems, but it was plagued by compatibility and performance issues in the beginning. I think people have forgotten just how many problems XP had in its early days. It has been a long time, after all. Vista wasn't nearly as big a change, though it did get a new driver and security model that caused some problems in the beginning.
I agree with this post! When people I knew first got XP in 2001, things were a mess. SP1 broke some things for me, but made the OS more secure (was really needed). By SP2 I dropped most legacy software (as did most people I know) and I didn't notice any issues.
Also... When are we getting our Win 8 Beta?!