(I say this as someone whose been using KDE for nearly 20 years, and who LOVES KDE).

KDE is GREAT, if: you like tweaking and customizing things. The out-of-the-box KDE is lacking. It's like it wants to be a mix between GNOME's opinionated setup while giving you a lot of flexibility. This means, at least for me, KDE needs a lot of stuff "undone" to get it back to a usable point.

If you hate tweaking, and want something akin to the Win2k UI feel, XFCE will get you there effectively out of the box.