What? You got something against mainframes? 
The computer I had in college came with WinME. I didn’t have a copy of 98SE available, which was easily the best version of anything Microsoft released using that kernel. WinME was just so unstable–I actually downloaded and ran a piece of software that somehow made the OS more stable. To be fair to ME, it had some upgrades that in theory should have made life easier–better USB support, some better networking, and System Restore did come in handy when dealing with hardware. I eventually went to dual-booting with WinXP a couple years later, as there was some software I used that would not work with XP.
Vista had issues because of it being installed on a lot of underpowered hardware when XP would have been fine. I run it on a laptop built a couple years after Vista came out and it works fine, especially with the service packs installed. Win8 is ugly and has UI problems, but there’s no reason in theory that the UI couldn’t be fixed. ME was just a bad product.
Win NT took a few versions/years to become usable.
We had an enterprise client that chose NT as their official corporate platform very early on, but had to continue to purchasing as400’s, Unix and OS/2 servers because NT simply didn’t work (was not stable). They kept trying, but ultimately the CIO did not survive that decision.
Windows 8 is the worst of the lot because, after 28 years of Windows, and after 17 years of taskbars and Start menus, they should have known better than to replace half of the features without even including a tutorial.
Windows ME. It was just Windows 98 with a load of shitty, broken, resource hogging extensions piled on top. It was sort of possible to strip these back and end up with something almost as usable as 98, but it was a definite step backwards in terms of reliability and performance.
Despite being a Windows user since 3.1, I actually quite like Win8 (now 8.1).
I’ve used Windows since v1.03. Prior to Windows 3 they were dogs. Windows 95 was a 32-bit shim over 3.11. Windows 98 was fine, particularly 98SE. I saw no reason to move to ME. When Windows 2000 came out in beta I dropped OS/2 completely. After that it’s been a steady progression. I never had any problems with Vista - I liked UAC. I’ve stayed with Windows 7 and not gone with W8 because I don’t have a touch-screen system and the W8 UI is a right pain on my WSE2012 box, but may have to move because W8 supports separate DPI settings on each monitor.
Wow, I’d completely forgotten OS/2. The OS that killed WordPerfect (because they were stupid and had to die).
I loved NT and 2000 in the day - much of the power and stability of later versions in the day of 98.
I have never really had a problem with any of them once I adjusted to the changes. I use my computer mostly for online activities and saving pics and recipes though, so I guess my maneuvering is pretty basic.
I go back to the DOS days and have used everything except for 8. ME was, by a huge margin, the worst OS that I have ever used. It flat out crashed on me a couple of times a week. Vista wasn’t all that bad. I liked XP and like 7 a lot, relatively speaking.
None of the ones I’ve used were all that bad, though I’d say Windows 98 was the worst. Granted, that’s the earliest Windows I used full time. (Windows 3.1 and 3.11 don’t count because I spent a lot of time in DOS.)
The versions I’ve used full time are just Windows 98, Windows XP, and Windows 7. I also spent a lot of time with Windows 3.1 and Windows 8, spending at least a third of my time on therm. The rest I’ve only used occasionally, save for ME which I never used. And, yes, that even includes Windows 1.0 and 2.0, though not the NT line prior to 2000, which I consider to be almost a separate OS.
Wait, I haven’t used 8.1, either. I keep forgetting that came out. That’s one thing Windows 8 did for me–it soured me on getting the latest OS. No one uses the Windows-8-only features, and, otherwise, there’s no point. Still, that just makes it mediocre, not bad. Bad would involve crashing.
I’ve never used ME or Vista so I don’t have any complaints. I was too young/inexperienced to know whether or not I disliked 3.1 or 95.
I think I’ve used NT 4 on a workstation for a bit. Didn’t particularly like that.
NT and to a lesser extent 2000 were steps backward at the desktop level - would not play some games or run some apps that depended on “fancy” UI features. They also had some driver issues, mostly with low-end hardware. But they were the first heavy-duty kernel options for Windows, and if you ran muscular programs they were wonderful.
I don’t get the hate for Windows 8. It’s just Windows 7 (a version that boots faster with a much better file explorer even) minus the start menu and with an RTE that can run apps. I get that people are attached to the start menu and that removing the start button was a stupid decision, but if you stay in desktop mode it’s legitimately better than Windows 7 (the best OS ever).
The entire metro interface is a work in progress and not that useful yet, but it’s just extra stuff tacked onto Windows 7 that you can flat out ignore if you want. MS probably would have been far more successful if they’d have done 2 things, 1) leave the start menu alone, 2) only enable the metro interface for people with touchscreens. I just bought a touchscreen ultrabook and suddenly I find myself using the metro apps fairly regularly in comparison to my upgraded desktop which I live entirely in the desktop.
I can’t fathom that you’d use Windows 8 a 1/3rd of the time but haven’t updated to Win 8.1. It pretty well mitigates the no start menu problem.
All of them?
Even though I’ve been OS X for the last decade, I loved XP. Surprised there’s four votes for it. Never had a major issue with it. ME got my vote. Just a useless piece of shit OS.
I tried fashioning a music workstation on a ME system. It was an unstable mess. XP came along and everything fell into place perfectly.
I think that really is what the hate is. If you have a desktop or laptop, you shouldn’t have to make changes and (initially) download a 3rd party app to get a desktop/laptop interface no matter how easy it is- it should be automatic. If they had done that 90% of the hate would have been gone, but instead the haters get the idea they’re trying to force people against their will to the new tablet interface.
I’ve also tried a laptop with a touchscreen, and personally wonder what the point is. It’s like hardware makers have include tablet like features because the OS now has a tablet interface, even though there’s a perfectly good keyboard and trackpad that are a lot more efficient than touchscreens.
I never used Windows Me, and only used Windows 8 in ‘Release Candidate’ state, and only for a short time in a VM just to ‘take a look’.
Of the versions I actually have experience with, Vista is the clear ‘loser’.
I generally avoid the versions with bad reputations so I have no experience with them. But I got stuck buying a new computer last year. So while I don’t know if Windows 8 is the worst version ever, it’s the worst I’ve had to deal with.