>>tonyst+(OP)
I have a feeling that the overall reality is far more hit-or-miss than the author implies. If you happen to be lucky to have all hardware that Linux supports well, then everything does work nicely (which is infact a nice improvement over the early days). If you get unlucky on your hardware, well buckle up, it's gonna be a ride. You are of course more likely to have good hardware support on very old devices.
Windows has its faults for sure, but it's much better in my experience as far as just working on any type of hardware and accessories. If it doesn't just work already, drivers are generally easy to find and install.