Windows 7: after installing any framework version higher than 4.0, it went into an infinite restart loop. If not installing a framework it worked fine but as you can imagine, you can't play games without that framework or without drivers (they too install a framework). The weird part is that exactly the same Windows 7 edition used to work perfectly fine with the same .Net Framework version 3 years ago and with the same drivers from 3 years ago. That makes me think Windows 7 has "pre-programmed aging" in order to force you to use the latest crap in Microshit's inventory.
Windows 10: you gotta constantly tinker the damn registry to do even simple settings that used to be easily accessible in Windows 7. On top of that there's absolutely no way to disable the antivirus, therefore - no cracked games. After a long tinker in Group Policies and registry, you think you have disabled the antivirus but in fact you havent. An antimalware process keeps running itself and there's absolutely no way to disable that process. Adding insult to injury, you have no rights to change anything about your own admin account, not to mention the rights to choose a default program for the file types you want. The most popular file types had no "browse" button in properties to change the program used for opening them.
Windows 11: you could easily disable the real time protection but the antimalware process is still there when you boot the system. The registry tinkering continues for even simple things like assigning shortcut keys to change the keyboard layout.
Windows 10 & 11: both refused to be installed the traditional way because the disk was MBR. When I changed it to GPT, both refused to install the traditional way for the same reason - because the disk was GPT! There's no pleasuring the damn Crapindows, no matter what you do! I had to use the Shift+F10 for Crap 10 to install it but that method no longer works for Crap 11.
When I bought a 4TB HDD and formatted it for first use, I made it MBR NTFS because back then I still hadn't reasearched what GPT was, so I did what I knew better. Linux properly detected that hard drive as a single 4TB hard disk. Crap 10 & 11 detected it as a hard disk consistent of two inacessible partitions, 2 TB each.
So after Crap 10 & 11 "told" me that they can't install on a GPT disk (after crying about MBR for months), I had a surge of Klingon rage because of the constant Microshit's idiotism and kicked almost everything related to Windows in its ass, including the ISOs I had and made all drives to be ext4.

These are my reasons to abandon Crapindows for good. What are yours?

P.S. I was using Windows only to run some more capricious games that wouldn't run in linux. My main OS is and always has been Linux in the past 7 years.

Remember Windows 98? Remember the Windows Update that became Windows 98SE? Windows 98 users could not update, they had to BUY WINDOWS AGAIN just to get the update of the SAME WINDOWS! That was the end of it for me. I used OS/2 WARP, AIX, OpenVMS, SCO, HP-UX, Solaris, RHEL, and Windows (98, NT, XP, 7, 8, VISA, 10, and all of the server editions) at work, but at home I dropped all but OS/2 (I had a licensed copy work provided and knew I could run a killer BBS on it), several good versions of DOS, and Red Hat Linux (Pre RHEL versions). I now run Linux distributions Debian, Manjaro, Sparky, Q4OS, Elementary, MintDE, TinyCore, Puppy, and an occasional test release of anything else that catches my eye. (having dropped Ubuntu- it killed me on updates once too often, VSIDO - love the concept but too cutting edge, and CentOS - when it went CentOS Stream) I run those along side KolibriOS, ReactOS, FreeDOS networked, and on occasion OpenBSD.

I find EVERYTHING more intuitive and useful than any version of Windows. Yes, even Android: although not the crippled android used in some devices (Amazon, I am looking at your KINDLE FIRE HD line right now!)

I bought my first computer (second hand computer) in 2006 when XP was ruling the world. I've never used 98 or older, so I never knew about their adventures. Before I got my first computer I was a frequent customer of internet cafes which all used Win95/98 but I doubt that they were updating them.

I haven't used Windows since the 1990's and that was Windows 98SE. I'm not familiar with the later editions. Actually I liked Windows 98. Yes, it gave you BSOD from time to time but it was quite easy to use.

As to antivirus that can't be switched off, that sounds reasonable to me. If it could be switched off, couldn't the viruses themselves switch it off? And what use would it be then?

i have love / hate relationship with windows 10, to be able to play "triple a" games i have to have win 10.

atm i dont have win 10 at my boxes.

M$ blocked a superior word processing program, WordPerfect 5.1, from running efficiently on its OS -- this was the first straw.
The OS requires hardware upgrades -- now it is screwing with new hardware so Linux cannot be installed.
Window OS is a parasite on whomever uses it.
Now it is also a dicator, violating SEC sanctions, the U.S. Constituion and other 'laws' at will (I'm glad the EU cracked down somewhat).
Besides, Bill Gates III, M$ founder, is a eugenicist and comes from a family that supported Sanger in her efforts to reduce/eliminate the U.S. population of 'undesirable, inferior humans.'

I long ago gave up on "dual booting." Virtual machines work just fine for me.

No major catastrophic reasons... It simply got to the point where woke up one day and realised that I hadn't booted Windows natively in years, and I needed the space on my laptop. I was carrying Windows around for absolutely no reason.

I started using Linux (Slackware v. 10.x) 17 years ago because an acquaintance told me that I could self-host my website with Linux. I started with Slackware quite by accident; whatever distro I tried to install first didn't. And I did self-host my website for several years before moving it out to a hosting provided. (When I remember how little I knew back then, I'm mildly surprised that I pulled that off!)

Six months later, I put Slackware on my primary computer, which, at the time, was a Dell Inspiron laptop. I have never looked back. I had wired my house for networking at the time, so I didn't need to struggle with the Broadcom wireless.

I did keep Windows in the house on the family computer and have tried to stay familiar with it over the years, but I haven't used it (to borrow a phrase from the Going Linux podcast) "to get things done" for years.

I think one reason I felt comfortable with Linux is that I started with DOS on a 286 box, so I was comfortable with the command line. I learned early that the command line is always faster, as long as you know the commands.

Hey man, me too! Did yours have a "turbo" switch which made it run at 16MHz? Ours had a 42Mb hard drive, and DOS 3.3 had a partition size limit of 32Mb...

My reason(s) are simple. First I like Linux (using since downloading Slack on a stack of floppies). Can't deny that! Second, by moving to Linux back when, I eliminated the pocketbook bleeding. No more $$ for OS/software upgrades, no more $$ for virus checking, no more $$ for compilers, no more $$ for office apps. etc. Third, got to the point where Linux did everything we needed to do, so finally got rid of the last Windows machine running Win7 a few years ago now. Last OS I'll ever buy. I did create a VM for Win7 but it rarely gets run. So servers, laptops, SBCs, desktops all are Linux based and am love'n it. No going back... and I didn't mind using Windows mind you. Just no longer made sense to put up with it and M$ shenanigans (registering, must create an account with them, auto updates, etc.) . I don't see how people put up with that nonsense even now . So it goes. Oh, I started with DOS, CPM/86 back when.... Primary job (programming) at work is still using Windows ...

Mine did! Thanks for the memory refresh!

The first PC I ever used at work had one of those but I never used it because nobody ever told me what it was for.

I started out using command line on mainframes: ICL first, then VAX. This was office/library work, not computer studies. When we gradually went over to PC's using Windows 3 (yes, that's how far back I go), I found it very difficult because I couldn't get my head around the UI. I couldn't control the cursor properly or remember the meaning of all those icons. It was like moving from an alphabetic script to an ideographic one like Chinese.

Starting Linux was like coming home.

My path went in a different direction, lol. I too started with dos, soon with an Arachne gui, followed by Win 3.11 for Workgroups and of course most iterations of Windows after that. I ran both stand-alone and dual boot flavors of linux starting about the time I joined here in 2003.
With the caveat that I'm not a 'gamer' so I can't directly relate to the OP, in 25+ years I've had virtually no trouble with Windows, et al., as an operating system. Sure I've had the occasional glitch but never anything that I couldn't fix or find a work-around.
Over the years I realized that virtually everything for which I utilized linux I did from the cli and that several good linux apps had been ported to Windows. With the emergence of WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux) I've been happily running a small 5 year old <$275 Win 10 laptop with WSL that does everything I need in a computer.
I will have to upgrade equipment to run Win 11 but this little lappy is getting 'long in the tooth' anyways.