I bought my laptop in September, popped out the HD and swapped in an SSD, and installed Linux Mint. No hassle, everything except my secondary videocard worked out of the box.

Following a few straightforward and well-documented steps, the second video card worked as well. Haven't had to change anything since, and I haven't experienced any breakage.

The wasted time and hacks that are required to get and keep a laptop running Linux have plummeted over the past 3 years, and your argument is rapidly losing its value. To me, it has reached the point of being irrelevant.