Linux for Human beings ?

Some years ago I was already getting sick and tired by constant crashes of my pre-installed OS: you name it, Windows 98. I was using a budget computer bought from the local supermarket, and like the overwhelming majority of desktop users, I just asked my machine to flawlessly perform sipmle tasks like word processing and internet browsing. (Back then, I couldn't even dream of playing videos and all that fancy stuff I've got now)
I spent an awfull lot of time trying to install and re-install, tweak my OS but I could never reach a quite stable configuration and therefore was stuck in the cycles of "format-reinstall" every 3 to 6 month. In a moment of deep despair, I called a friend of mine wich already told me about Linux and its qualities.
So, we painfully tried to configure Debian on my machine, but the X-server wouldn't configure right (apparently my intel vga chipset was not suported out of the box) and I couldn't picture myself using my computer with a Konsole instead of a nice graphic interface.
So, I carried on with Win98 until I bought myself some new hardware and installed Win XP.
I must admit I was impressed by the newly acquired stability of this product, but was also surprised by the huge amount of RAM used by the sole system start up !
Later on, I also discovered the "format-reinstall' cycle was not complete history...the most irritating part of this whole thing, is that when I had a tiny problem with a component of the OS or one of the software, Windows won't give me the opportunity to see what's really going on and provide me with an appropriate way of fixing the problem adequately...you want an example ? ok, here it is: For no reason that I could think of, the file manager 'explorer.exe' started to crash every now and then (which is REALLY a pain in the a**) so I tried to find a solution on various tech support forums but all these cheap hacks didn't work..so, I tried to repair the OS by
re-installing the system files using the installation CD. I did it..and it crashed at boot up with a neat BSOD !Man, I was soooo angry..lucky me my data are not located on my C:, but I had to reinstall the OS, all the programs + the drivers...I couldn't take it anymore!
So I decided to try the much-talked-about Ubuntu distribution..and this was really a BIG surprise: The installation was really neat, no fancy screens like one can have with Mandrivia, but very clear instructions, network and most of the harware recognize out-of-the box (except scanner and webcam, didn't try printer yet).
The installation of the various media players and codecs was also straightforward...I was fully operational with usual desktop applications (word processor, dvd and media players, browser, IM client and mail client) in less than a day. This was really a big difference with all the hassles I encountered when trying to configure Debian a few years ago...
So, for the time being I still boot win xp for applications such as cd-burning and Photoshop, but I really enjoy the rock solid stability of my Ubuntu sytem and its REAL mutlitasking abilities..
So, if you always thought about using Linux but thought it was not worth the hassle, try Ubuntu.