&lt;em&gt;Everything has drivers for Windows!&lt;/em&gt;

This is far from being true. Actually, it's partly true. There might be a driver from a certain version which doesn't mean it will work with the next one. My father, for instance, had a very Epson multi-function printer and the scanner drivers were only for Windows 98. When he upgraded to XP there were no more drivers supporting this printer.

As for installing software, doing it Linux flied from one of the most painful tasks to one of the easiest ways. You can't beat apt-get/yum install apache php mysql gimp. Period.

As for out of the box experience, you don't get. Format a Mac computer and install OS X. _Everything_ will be installed. Drivers and a couple of good applications. Install Windows and there's nothing. Some laptop providers give you an image but then you're buying the OS and you can only use it on that computer. That's non sense. With OS X, as long as you have the installer DVDs, you can have a true out of the box experience with any Apple hardware. Same applies to Linux, except with laptops, which is still far from being a out of the box experience (but it's getting there).

Finally, regarding the virus, spyware, malware, etc.. you can't make a point using your example. Pick your parents or non tech-savvy friends and you'll see if they'll a virus or not. Moreover, I'll bet if they were using Linux or OS X they would _not_ get a virus :-)