This is exactly my reasoning — I love tools that do amazing things with minimal resources. I have a ten-year-old Thinkpad X300 running Debian with JWM. I mostly work in Emacs, terminal emulators, and a browser, so it performs very well indeed. Why would I want to spend a couple thousand dollars to have 3D titlebars on my terminal windows and run an OS that takes three times as long to start, when a $70 system does exactly what I need? It's not for everyone, sure — if I did a lot of video editing, or played games, it would be different — but it's more than sufficient for me, even with minor photo editing and CAD work.
If only I could find a car that adheres to the same principles!
If only I could find a car that adheres to the same principles!