I built a desktop for my parents (75-ish years old) over 5 years, running WinXP, very stable and runs well for their needs (primarily surfing the net, reading email, looking at pictures, etc).

They've been asking me about my laptop (with Win7) and last week, they bought a nice Lenovo touch-screen laptop with Win8. I visited with them on Saturday and WOW! Win8 is totally different, I didn't even know where to start. They said they haven't even used the laptop since they bought it because they can't figure out how to do anything, and to be honest, neither could I.

Without investing serious time, I can't help them transition. I'm very comfortable with XP and Win7.
They asked me if I can remove Win8 and install WinXP or Win7 on it. I've built / re-built over 2 dozen PCs: 98, XP, Vista (yuch!), and Win7. So I'm relatively confident I can install it, but I don't know if this is a good idea.

Any gotcha's? Will they lose touch-screen abilities (I don't think so)
Any Pros / Cons, would be greatly appreciated.

I would like to learn and use Win8, but don't know if this is the right choice for them, now.

Thanks