At this point a lot of the times microsoft will just keep updating the OS anyways even if you never activate it - I guess it is not worth the potential blowback to leave machines unpatched? There will be a small watermark in the corner and they do lock you out of some settings
Gaming is not so bad on Linux but I wish I'd never bought any pro audio plugins for my home recordings. It's going to be a colossal waste of money and unfinished recording projects when I decide to get rid of Windows for good.
I guess I should learn how to develop unity games on linux sooner rather than later.