If it works for you is not relevant. You brought up the topic of corporate environments and in a corporate environment not all machines will have the same software installed, due to different machines having different functions. So two images are not enough for a corporate environment, though they might be enough for your purposes.
Funnily, with the comments from you I quoted above, you just have done the same.

Any GNU/Linux system can do exactly as I said.

You said install time was not relevant when clearly for many people in many ways it is.

So me giving an example of 1, even before you joined in, was the wrong thing to do was it?

If you need an OS that is easy for the family, easy to use, and has compatibility with pretty much everything out there,. then Windows is the way to go. Sorry to say, but it is the truth.

Give a 5 year old kid a copy of Windows and a printer and they can get it running in 2-3 minutes. Give a 5 year old kid Linux and a printer and the kid will say 'Dad, I got the printer working with CUPS finally' as he is graduating college.

I do not think so 'pal'(thus between qm) !

Given the description of the requirements: Windows is in fact an OS that has to be considered, if you like it or not. It fits all requirements turboscrew has asked for. If it is an OS he wants to use for that task is of course up to him, and seeing the posts he has made so far I doubt that he will use Windows, when not really necessary, but nonetheless it is a viable option.

I use Windows 8.1 at work and I hate it. I'm not paying that much for a phone OS on desktop.
You don't get XPs any more. ;-)

I'd say that he stated a valid opinion, based on experience, which was ok in the context of the thread (which was not about public schools and whatnot until you "joined in").

Strictly speaking the thread is not about install times at all, and I was not the one who brought that up but rather replied to the OP after he himself brought it up, instead it is about general purpose distros.

While, for him, Tobi's opinion is valid it is not valid for everyone in every case. I don't care if you agree or not with me but to say that install times are not relevant, even in simple home PC cases, ignores the idea that people have different priorities. In no way shape of form would I ever want to spend 5-6 hours setting up the OS on my home PC but Tobi didn't mind doing it at all. If Tobi, or yourself, want to spend 5-6 hours installing an OS for your simple home PC then great, others don't and shouldn't be told their opinions are irrelevant. It is all about personal preferences, Tobi's and mine do not match up in this instance. I hope it is ok with you that I have a different opinion to Tobi on various things, if it isn't let me know.

XP was as a terrible OS. Why people think it was the greatest thing since black coffee, sliced bread, and brewed beer baffles me. 8.1 isn't a bad OS. Once you get used to the Start Screen the rest just falls into place with ease. It's nothing but Windows 7 with a different UI, and 7 was a damn good OS.

I taught my wife to use Linux in less than a few weeks. I don't get why people say it's hard to teach or learn.

XP was last of the "original" NT line. That's why. Along with Vista things started to change, starting with boot manager (boot.ini -> BCD).

IMHO Windows 7 is OK, but Windows 8 (and 8.1) suck - by my about 1-year experience of using it as a work desktop (SW development + administrative errands). If you have a malfunctioning driver that crashes the system, you can't even boot it into safe mode.
(Well, you can, if you have a boot disk, or if you can hit the fraction of a second time-window for the key for boot options.)

There is also the same problem as with Ubuntu - it's hard to browse inbstalled applications.

Many good old applications don't work, and new replacements doesn't exixt (yet?).

And then there is always the safeboot (fortunately not enabled in my machine).
programs
I've been cursing about my net connection being slow, but "troubleshoot problems" is happy because the web pages open (eventually).
My windows 7 laptop in the next cable connector works fine, so it's not the network.
Speestest.net gives 563.44 Mbps / 210.14 Mbps for the T400 laptop and 577.73 Mbps / 1.28 Mbps (yes, no decimal errors) for the Win 8.1 Desktop (HP with i7-3770, would tell better if I recalled, or found some program that shows it). With dual-booted Mint 16 there are no such problems.

If only I knew some diagnostic SW that runs on 64-bit Win 8.1...

Except no one was told their opinions were irrelevant - he just posted this:

What kind of diagnostic you need to run?

Tobi disregarded the idea that other people don't want to spend hours installing an OS however not everyone wants to run Gentoo nor do they want to pre-build everything over 5-6 hours just to install an OS. Some people like to do clean installs for each new release and this is something that was vaguely mocked. Use whatever distro you like, maintain it how you want to, but telling everyone that they should never have to reinstall their system unless they stuff it up is a little harsh. I have no issue with how long people want to take working on their own machine but to say installation times should be irrelevant indicates Tobi's doesn't prioritise time the same way others do (which is fine for him but not for everyone else). It is ALL about opinions.

Now you can nit pick all you like, I notice Tobi hasn't replied so he may have given up, but this is where I end my discussion of this topic with you.
Have a good weekend.