Baring the UI formerly known as Metro, what advantages are there to switching to win 8? Boot time? The hard drive merge thing?
Performance boost, mostly. You do get a slightly larger list of features, including RAID, which is the disk merge/array. RAID is available on Win7, but you need to purchase the pro version.
In most cases, you don't really need to use RAID.
Win7 has better backwards compatibility with programs/games that pre-date the Windows Vista era. But, if you don't use many older games, I would recommend Win8 just for the performance difference.
Windows 8 is faster in boot time and in a few other things but i don't think it gives you an edge in gaming. But if your willing to get start is back i'd say go for it.