New
#10
One of the main problems seen with Linux is simply put it still UNIX based while the gui and additional packages are a constantly changing open source OS not being standardized like you would expect to see with each progressive version of Windows. At this time it's become more of a beta tester's OS since every so many months one or the other distro has a totally new release effecting the main gui.
For the more MS friendly distros like ubuntu, Knoppix it can serve well live as an emergency data recovery tool booting from a live cd as well as seeing an excellent cross platform drive tool(GParted of course) while not always as friendly to the novice user. Windows on the other hand sees a far larger range of softwares as well as now seeing the largest improvement seen in 7 for the desktop OS.
I think what you are now seeing is MS maturing a bit more as a company in general taking into consideration what the average home user looks for in an OS. Support, reliability, and flexibility! Besides seeing the regular updates MS is now taking into consideration those that still have need to run older softwares with the introduction of the XP mode besides simply seeing an updated Virtual PC from the 2007 version.