Last time (10 days ago or so) it took me a full week to download the blockchain.
Hope the new client is on its way indeed.
RC1 of .8 is out and being tested. If you addnode and connect to a high speed node, you can download the blockchain in less than an hour and have a full node up and running on a fast computer. Older ones with random connections to random peers may take a few hours still but much better than a day to a week.