I switched from Windows as my main OS almost four years ago now. At first I had your issues, but soon over came or ignored them. I was too a heavy rainmeter user, and loved theming and throwing screenshots and zips with my themes on DeviantArt. Conky, a Linux equivalent that is pretty great. As far a media players, I was a huge Foobar2000 user, but found a home with deadbeef. Obviously these programs have trade offs compared to windows software, but they also have there benefits.

I distro hopped (switch versions) for first 2 years I switched. I would find weird bugs or glitches that one distro with would perfect, but had its own bugs. I'll agree with you that drivers sometimes suck for newer hardware. My 2 year old Lenovo laptop has two Nvidia graphics cards in sli... Don't get me started on sli on mobile GPUs. For the longest time I hated the different versions and forks user make of software. I never new what was still developed or why to use one of the other, I was lost. I also hate home everything just works on windows, while something's need to be configured on Linux.

All of this considered, I love Linux. After using windows since I was a young kid, I have grown to love finding small things windows does better then Linux and vice versa. I work helpdesk for my university, so I get to work on Macs too. Interesting to compare the top three OS's (technically the kernel is the OS). I love that almost every part of a distro let's you change it, or replace it with something else. I personally love the ability have stable or testing branches of software, I love how light and quick it is compared to windows In m6 usage.

I would say if your more comfortable on Windows that's okay. At least you tried it and had fun. I still use Windows at work, and its great for what I need it too. Linux on my computer at home does everything I need it to do at home. Use what you want, don't let others tell you otherwise. Pick your poison.