As I said, that was my experience. OS moja inaweza kufanya kazi namna tofauti depending on hardware, RAM na hata internet connection speed. My thing is my hardware is certified for Windows 7 and actually the machine came with it, but you would think it was some bootleg install.
I don't use Microsoft Office anymore, it is vendor specific and does not provide the interoperability needed by a power user.I'm into OpenOffice where I can create files that can be opened by my friends in the MS Windows world as well as the Linux/ UNIX geeks.
See the thing that everybody needs to understand is, different users have different needs, and in your case for example, you may not need the interoperability because all your friends and family are using windows.Your IT skills may not be adequate to use Linux and far from being an enhancement, Linux will actually daunt you and prove counterproductive.
Kwa hiyo hii habari ya "this is best" au "that is best" is largely subjective and must be followed by "best for what?"
Ms Windows is best for ease of use and most people are familiar with it, but horrible when it comes to security.
Something like Ubuntu is robust and secure, but the user interface takes some learning, and you may end up going into the terminal to do quite a few sudo apt-get by command line, although it is now streamlined to dumb down the installation and interface to the extent that the installation is better than windows and the interface is almost as easy.
Despite the specification detailed above, you cannot argue that you will have security concerns with Ubuntu as you have with that Swiss cheese like holed Windows.