Kris, I am running 8.1 (forced, no choice) but am happy with it. It actually boots to the same old windows main screen we are used to with a few bonuses thrown in if you move your mouse courser to the right side.
You can also, "grab and drag" your main screen from the top and drop it down, or just mouse over to the right and hit the start icon and use the "app" style windows... kinda the best of both worlds...
I still use the main windows desktop all the time.
Needless to say, you won't have a hard time getting use to it, and won't have to deal with the "we no longer support windows 7" crud that is going to come out next year (well, so the word around town says).
Just look at the offered cpu's, ram, hd space ect.. to find what you really want.
Most of the systems out now will do what you are looking to do, its just that a gaming machine (multiple processors, 10X the ram, large video cards) will run you double or triple.
Heck I actually bought a tablet that will do what most laptops do, except play CD's, and it will do everything I need for the "internet".
I still say you should go with "portability", I leave my laptop on my desk anyway most of the time, and have a little portable roll a round for it when I want to take it to different rooms to watch my you tube or play games while the wife and sis-in-law yak away in the living room (don't have an office, yet...the third bedroom is looking like a man room for me
)
But with the tech that's out now, the newer PC's are bigger with more space to add what you need and more....
So I guess I would tell you...
Buy in your price range, shop online and look at reviews... lots of reviews...don't just look at the stars.... read the reviews..... some folks are heartless when it comes to reviewing a product and I like that.