Well, yeah, the XBox 360 dashboard update has not been a favorite of mine, either. (Though, to be fair, I haven't used it with Kinect.) But, in general, I was having a very hard time trying to wrap my brain around what Microsoft is trying to accomplish with the Metro interface.
I ended up having a bit of time I could allocate to testing at work, and I threw the Windows 8 Consumer Preview on a smallish average laptop (i3, 4GB RAM, Intel GMA), to see if I could make more sense of things.
Short answer: I think I understand Metro more. But I don't think I've seen a good implementation of it, yet.
The W8 preview feels like a complete hack-job. It is almost two competing operational management systems that are stuck together because neither one quite accomplishes everything it sets out to do.
I can see that I could actually like the new Metro home. I'm starting to "get" this a bit. Like the XBox dashboard, it does still feel disorganized. But I think I could sort it out in my brain, and come up with some useful layouts, here. It's in serious need of more live widgets, though. Why isn't my email an actual email window? Show me my most recent message headers, here. Same with the messaging and social networking stuff. And why isn't my Internet Explorer URL shortcut an actual Internet Explorer instance? Show me the webpage, not a big logo. If my Android device easily has enough horsepower to do this, I don't see why W8 can't. Why don't I have a persistent "Back" button to get out of applications in the Metro interface? All I can do is go back to home, and then close them from the finicky sidebar.
I think Microsoft is trying to remove the idea of application management from the user experience. And (I haven't tried it, yet) but I've heard that W8 will cull idle backgrounded applications as it needs to... But I'm a bit paranoid about privacy and like to actually close things I'm done with. And, aside from security, being able to easily close things I'm done with should help ensure that the OS won't automatically cull the browser session I left backgrounded because I wanted to wait until later to read that interesting article I accidentally found.
And, outside Metro, the old desktop is still there, like a strange relic. Except it feels like it's half missing, as there's no start menu launcher, anymore. It almost feels like an old Unix X session without a Window Manager, now. There's just an empty translucent bar with IE and Windows Explorer pinned to it, for some reason. It makes for a strange breaking point separated from the modern context. I suppose you could do like all my users do, and just create shortcuts for all your applications on the desktop (or pin them to the bar)... But, it just seems like a really clunky solution.
So, I guess my biggest gripe is rather ironic. Even though this is one of the largest interface overhauls Microsoft has ever done... And I know how much users are resistant to change... I don't think Microsoft overhauled nearly enough to pull this one off successfully.
ETA: I struck out a part of this post. I was having problems with Windows 8 syncing my Live and Local accounts. Turns out the PC clock wasn't set, and this was causing Windows to fail authorization, as well as causing all syncs to fail.
