this post was submitted on 09 Nov 2023
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Sadly this is just how it goes for Windows sometimes. You're right in your suspicion that Linux's driver infrastructure is miles ahead, and this wouldn't have happened on Linux.
Still, if I were you, I'd try doing an in-place reinstall, then double checking the driver package is the correct one, and then try to apply it. That should be the closest to a clean install without deleting any data.
Failing that… I'll be honest. I hate troubleshooting Windows. Hours of headaches spent with vague error messages and no documentation. When I have an issue on Windows and an in-place reinstall doesn't do it, I just take a quick backup and reinstall the OS clean. It's not worth fighting with. It's so complex 1 thing may have gone wrong out of 10 thousand different things and you don't have the tools to properly trouble-shoot it anyway unless you're like a senior Windows sysadmin. It's more time effective, and it also gives you the benefits of a clean Install - all the small errors and things that pile up over time on Windows just go away, any unnecessary software you didn't really want to uninstall is no longer there, etc.
Tbf, DOS and computers back then were simpler than today, making it easier to troubleshoot comparatively.
Win 3.1 added a bit more complexity on top of that. Basically we built more complex structures on top of older simpler ones to make it more and more user friendly. The more user friendly, the more complex the underlying tech to make it user friendly (harder for techie people to troubleshoot since there is so much more going on).
That's why SBCs like the RPi are gaining traction. It's like going back a few steps so people have an easier time learning some of the underlying basics of computing.
I had not really thought about that, but you're right. The example holds throughout my experience. I use Linux daily nowdays, but I used to be a Windows power user.
I can confidently claim Linux is easier to use than Windows. And I mean it seriously, I'm not trying to be controversial. It's nowhere near as complex as Windows and structurally many things are easier, it has less abstraction, so, whereas it might require a bit of a learning curve in some places, when you've done it, you're done because you fundamentally already know how it works. Also, while the GUIs are now slowly starting to get better and cover more of the experience, for the most part, Linux distros don't make many attempts to hide the underlying workings to the end user, and documentation is provided for anything, so if you're curious to know how anything works, you can just read up on it and get a decent grasp.
Windows tries to hide how it works from the user, and that is what causes it to be so hard to debug. When something breaks on Linux, after a few years of experience and a "clinical eye", I can pretty much always accurately guess where in the stack the disruption has happened. Maybe it takes 2 or 3 takes to get it right, but at the end of the day, I have a honest grasp of how a modern Linux system is put together and I can get my hands dirty. On Windows it's… not that simple. I feel like I am talking multiple shots in the dark and just guessing semi randomly hoping that the next attempt will fix it instead of leaving my system in an even more broken state. Because the admin tools are there - regedit, powershell, event log, performance monitor, whatever you want - but it feels like doing surgery "blindfolded" in a way. Trusting what you read on some forum and hoping this long ass powershell command will do it.