I just bought a Lenovo all-in-one running Windows 8.1. So far, I'm very 
happy with it. I think the computer is a Lenovo 440C and costs about 
$600 on Amazon. Basically, it's a 21-inch monitor with built-in 
speakers, a CD/DVD drawer, and a bunch of ports. It comes with a 
keyboard and mouse, so what's sitting on my desk is a monitor and a 
keyboard. The sound is really good.

XP is a little different from Windows 7, and windows 7 is a little 
different from Windows 8.1. If you go to the 8.1 desktop, the 
differences between XP and 8.1 are much smaller than they may at first 
seem. That said, there are a couple of things that are weirdly 
unintuitive in Windows 8.1. One is that My Computer is no longer on the 
desktop, and the process for finding it and putting it there is pretty 
obscure. fortunately, the Windows+e key works. Also, having just spent 
two weeks setting up my new computer, I've become suddenly aware of how 
much tweaking we do over the course of our time with a machine. I've 
been doing things like telling Windows to show me file extensions, 
telling Word to turn off smart quotes, telling Thunderbird not to ask if 
I really want to send that message, etc.

For your twelve-year-old son, you might consider a little notebook 
computer, the kind that are almost small enough to be netbooks. They 
cost about $300 and can be bought at places like Target and Wal-Mart. I 
have an Acer Aspire One that I use on the go. It's a little slow, but 
being about an inch thick and roughly the size of a large magazine, it's 
small enough and light enough to carry around without much fuss. My 
college freshmen have similar computers though more and more are 
bringing tablets, like iPads and Nexus 7s, to class and using them for 
notes and drafts.


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