First things first: You cannot go out to the store and buy Windows 10. So if you don't have Windows on your system already... it can be very confusing to try and figure out how to get it. If you have Windows 7, 8/8.1, or the Windows 10 pre-release then you're in good shape: you should have a Windows symbol in your task tray asking you to update, or at the very least asking if you want to reserve a copy.

Unfortunately, this is very much an upgrade. If you want to do a clean install of Windows 10 you first have to upgrade TO Windows 10 from another Windows version, which will take about 3 hours on an AMD 7850K, Samsung 850 EVO, and a 50mb download speed connection. After you have successfully upgraded to Windows 10 you then have to re-download the installation files, have the installer copy them to the USB-- assuming it can, apparently a lot of people are having problems with that part-- then reboot using that USB, wipe the drive, and have Windows re-do everything it just did, adding another hour and a half or so to the install time. Then you get to set your system back up all over again.

Granted, if you just want to do an upgrade then this process is a lot simpler. Reserve your copy of Windows 10, you'll be notified when its your turn to upgrade and the process will handle itself. The upgrade process is split across three reboots of the system, each dedicated to specific task. For me, with two systems, the upgrades themselves went fine. Each upgrade did take about three hours but when I was done the system was perfectly fine-- which is more than I can say for my last "sudo fedup ?network 22."