You can do that under W8 too: no icons on my desktop. There are two things in W8: the "home" where there are tons of apps (that you can remove anyway) and the desktop. You can set W8 so that it automatically switches to the desktop at start, ignoring the "home". Anyway, at one point, everyone will have to use it. Don't be mistaken, if I could use Windows 7 on my current computer, I would.
As for Malewarebytes, I gave up using it. I use Windows Defender, that comes with W8, and that's it. I'm not downloading dubious stuff or visiting ****ty web sites, so I shouldn't get viruses that much.