Windows very much still has gaming by the short and curlies. Valve have done a ton of work with Proton that makes it considerably better, but if you enjoy anything competitive Windows is mandatory for anti-cheat.

Can't say I've shared your experience in terms of programs hanging more often, with the exception of Steam and games. Productivity apps and browsers run perfectly fine for me. That said, Windows has its own frustrations. I'm not sure if it's all fixed yet, but Xbox Game Bar and Game Mode for Windows came with awful performance penalties. When it first came out they had this Game DVR feature which was like Shadowplay but limited your FPS to half of your refresh rate. Enabled by default.