People make a big deal about the tile approach. In all honesty, you would only use those, I think, if you had a touchscreen. In Windows 8.1 you can open to the Desktop just like you always would. I have all the apps that I use regularly along the bottom of the Desktop screen. One of those is Control Panel so you can access all the Windows stuff. On the far bottom left is a link to the tile view where you can see all the apps you have in a much better way than Windows ever showed it before (IMHO).

Don't waste your time with 7, go straight for the latest OS, it's the approach of the future, with a lot of advantages.