my point of view on windows is that as long as they charge alot of money for the os that hackers will target it and find the exploits i prefer open source linux over windows any most distros are free of charge and the apps are as well
ubuntu is a really nice very stable distro with updates on a regular basis to keep the system running smoothly and securely and as far as the looks there are so many themes to choose from and to run windows programs in linux use a free app called play on linux to install your favorite games from windows internet explorer on linux as well as direct x and .net services mono for silver light run ms office i have ubuntu on six of my pc at home they never crash never need to reinstall unless the upgrade says to then use the back up or apt on cd feature to reinstall all the current apps and config to the new os version
very easy to install found it easier then windows intall and quicker 15 min verses half hour
I recommend ubuntu 9.04 oh yeah even windows media player can be installed on linux i stripped the new media player 12 from a beta copy of 7 and ran it