What happens when something weird happens and you have to manually change the kernel or your hardware just isn't supported.
I still wouldn't recommend Linux to most normal people. So your stuck with 3 realistic options.
Mac. Chromebook. Windows.
Chromebooks are actually really capable, but forget gaming or serious music creation.
I've been using desktop Linux for over 15 years. It's still much more work than normal people want to do.
Then I think you're making things hard on yourself. I'm a NixOS user, I know I cannot get everyone to install my specific system with all the bells and whistles. But you could walk a middle-schooler through installing Ubuntu or Fedora; it's easier than setting up an email account.
Both Windows and MacOS are slowly rolling down a hill of bloat, surveillance and unusability that will eventually push people onto something else. Modern GNOME is basically just an iPad with more obvious on-screen controls. With distros supporting Flatpak, it doesn't even matter if you misconfigure your base system since all your apps are sandboxed anyways. I think the success of the Steam Deck kinda proves that people don't care what your desktop is as long as you have recent Chrome/Firefox and let them sideload stuff.
It's not just the initial install. Eventually for almost every distro I've installed things get rough and you need to use the command line.
Want to play Fortnight, well you can't. How about Roblox , might be possible but it's a full comp sci project.
The only thing that will ever change this is if Valve comes out with a full laptop. The Steam Deck is the closest thing we have to a mainstream adoption of Desktop Linux.
In my personal life, Linux is where I go to when I really just need to focus and get things done. Less weird background crap going. It's much easier to enter a flow state with Linux.
Those two games put a code that will intentionally stop them from working if it detects them running on Linux. Justified because (at least in Fortnite case ) they can't install kernel level anticheat.
> The only thing that will ever change this is if Valve comes out with a full laptop.
Unfortunately Valve Laptop won't solve this either, unless if Valve goes against the spirit of Linux and lock it down
God forbid they want to entertain themselves without using spyware.
If you mean something else, you never need to do that as a normal user.
Hardware just not working happens on other operating systems too, it just sucks. But normal people aren't swapping out important parts so at most some USB thingy doesn't work.
admittedly I did the installing part, but day to day use is not an issue any more. Ubuntu is hands down much more user friendly than Windows 11