Microsoft Hatred FAQ 5187

If all of the hardware is known to Linux, that can work, and Linux has gotten much better at being able to recognize and auto-configure lots of devices.

But picture that, when this was less true, you wanted to buy a machine with the newest-whizbang graphics card or disk controller. For Windows, the manufacturer would make sure the proper drivers are installed and configured. For Linux, you the consumer had to find a driver, install it, configure it (the phrase "drive geometry" sticks in my head) and deal with the lack of useful feedback if anything goes wrong.

I haven't tried to install Windows since Windows 95 was current. I recall that as being pretty horrible, but for different reasons. There was a step where, after the basic OS had been installed onto the hard drive, and it was time to sense other devices. Half the time, this would simply hang the computer, and you'd have to start over from scratch. Most of the rest of the time, it would find most of the devices and make really awful guesses about the rest, like thinking the sound card was a CD player. I suspect this works better these days too.