You're assuming people care to evaluate Linux in the way Linux advocates want to evaluate it. They do not.
"Hardware just works" is a characteristic that normal people consider important to an operating system. If you don't do it, you are deficient in that area. "But all these other also-rans fail at it too" is not an excuse. The standard, for better or for worse, is Windows, and you either meet the standard or you don't complain that people get tired of dealing with your failures and move on.
And it's certainly not surprising that even a Linux enthusiast gets tired of dealing with substandard, broken hardware after a while. I know, I was one. Eventually I got tired of trying to balance having decent, modern hardware with having hardware that supports an operating system that, on the desktop, is essentially a novelty (it affords me nothing that Windows or OS X doesn't), and I tubed it. Because it wasn't worth the effort.
"Hardware just works" is a characteristic that normal people consider important to an operating system. If you don't do it, you are deficient in that area. "But all these other also-rans fail at it too" is not an excuse. The standard, for better or for worse, is Windows, and you either meet the standard or you don't complain that people get tired of dealing with your failures and move on.
And it's certainly not surprising that even a Linux enthusiast gets tired of dealing with substandard, broken hardware after a while. I know, I was one. Eventually I got tired of trying to balance having decent, modern hardware with having hardware that supports an operating system that, on the desktop, is essentially a novelty (it affords me nothing that Windows or OS X doesn't), and I tubed it. Because it wasn't worth the effort.