Once again, it's all about user preference. I definitely empathize with your thoughts on Win11 and wondered if the reason for changes wasn't exactly as you suspected. For example, clicking on the computer icon to get to "manage PC" now requires two clicks instead of one. How is that an improvement? Or the classic TPM2 requirement when security keys are still being stolen with TPM. That sure doesn't strike me as being very "secure". More like a ploy to make users run out and buy new hardware for no good reason.
Your problem could be bloatware if you're running that sluggish with Win11 on your new hardware. Myself, I'm staying put with my old octocore. This old beast never saw Win10 either. I had to run Win 10 on my AMD build because it refused to run 8.1 and I only have two main desk tops. That aside, I practically have a whole data center in my basement running about 12 different PCs (long story). I like your comparison of Win 8 to Win ME. Then again, they also had to slog away with VISTA before they came out with Win 7. I was really hoping Win 10 would be the "Vista" for Win 11 but nope... They flubbed it again. So now I'm jaded. I've pretty much accepted the fact that those good ole days are gone forever. At least I found a good place to get help if I run into any issues.
I'm the grumpy old guy resistant to change so that position is already taken.
Oh I forgot about Vista. Not worth the memory space I suppose
I really do think the old timers worked out the most efficient ways of doing things and any further refinements are just excuses to keep being employed. If they said "here is the perfect OS", they'd have to retire or find something else to do. So they'll keep shuffling the furniture around as long as they can get away with it. Honestly, I'd rather they be paid to take naps; it would be more productive.
Back when I was younger win95 and 98 were toys I'd fiddle with, like cleaning the registry with a list of various apps, watching my drive defragment hoping to get a bit more speed and stability, but now hardware is so fast, software is so far above my head, and learning new things is getting harder as I get older, that I just want something that works without me needing to understand it. I want a tool, not a toy. 10-20 years from now my capacity to learn will have diminished more while technology expands exponentially that I'll have no recourse other than to comply with whatever they're shoving down my throat.
An effort delay that inevitability is why I spared no expense with this rig, hoping it would endure the remainder of my days. I went down the list getting the best of everything, as far as I could understand it. Even my 128gb of DDR5 ram is a matched set that can be interleaved, or whatever it's called, although I wouldn't think that necessary considering how fast this machine should be, so I was quite disappointed that my archaic i5 is faster at everything except video conversion.
I'm not sure what bloatware I could have. I went down the list uninstalling everything I didn't suspect I'd have a use for. I have Explorer Patcher and Shut up 10 and I can't really recall all I've done in the last year. It's gradually getting faster, the more tweaks I do. I haven't touched the bios yet, as that's going to be a monumental endeavor teaching myself all the new lingo.
One thing I have discovered is my el cheapo walmart laptops with older win11 versions seem snappier than this newer 23H2. But I also disabled and deleted all the defender stuff on them. I left it running on the super pc, figuring it should be fast enough, but perhaps that's the problem. This is the first time in my life I've ever run AV software as it's always seemed the AV was worse than the virus. As far as I know I only had a virus once or twice and I kinda knew I was taking a chance when it happened, installing some dodgy software. It wasn't that hard to lookup the steps to get rid of it. Nowadays I don't know how to weigh the risks.
