While I personally can't stand the way Win 8 is set up, The Pro version has Win 7 bundled with it. Win 7 was compatible with Vista and Vista was compatible with XP.

Apple stopped developing firewire 1394 and there is no apple support for it, yet the companies making firewire hardware have developed working drivers and there are PCI cards for firewire and Windows still works with them. So yes the companies that supply outside hard and soft ware have a certain obligation to keep up.

I agree with Slim that most people will never use the full capability of their software. I personally record very old school and generally record full tracks and seldom use clips. I may use a lot of tracks before I get the right one but till I get the right take for each part there isn't a single plug-in used, so I'm not overworking my computer. And once I get all the takes done I just keep one or two alternatives and then start to mix the full tracks. I'm not looking for the perfect recording, just the perfect song.(Like that will ever happen)