I'd like to add my +1 for Linux support please.
As I've fequently observed in this kind of debate, we're seeing a lot of very polarised opinions. Some of these are from people, on both sides of the Windows/Linux fence, who have either never used the other platform or who haven't seen it in some time and are holding opinions that were true once but aren't any more.
A little about me: I use both Linux and Windows at home and in my business. My favourite version of Windows ever is Windows 7. I think it's the best version of Windows there's been. I've been exposed to Windows 8, 8.1 and Windows Server 2012 and I didn't find the user experience pleasing. I find the user interface much less productive that Windows 7. I spend the vast majority ( >90%) of my business and personal computing time on Ubuntu. I have Second Life, Steam and a significant catalogue of Humble Bundle games for both Linux and Windows. I was a keen Vendetta Online player which is supported on Linux and has a sizeable Linux user-base and I've just been part of rolling out over 800 Linux machines for one of my customers. They have been reliable and well received by the users. My customer has also found the support overhead to be much lower than the Windows boxes they replaced as they tend to break less in normal use than has been their experience with Windows.
I'm not insulting Windows. I just like that the "it just works" way of doing things in Linux, like not having to worry about hardware drivers (I can't remember the last time I plugged in a piece of hardware and the OS didn't just know how to drive it, no driver install needed) or some DLL not being installed (The Ubuntu Software Centre works out if there's some support package missing when you install something and automatically goes and gets it for you.)
At one time, you could have said that the ability to support decent games was missing form Linux but that's simply not true any more. Valve's own tests have shown that OpenGL (which started on Linux) consistently produces better performance on both Windows an Linux than Direct3D does on Windows on the same hardware (
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/08/02/valve_games_faster_on_linux/). I get at least as good performance with the Firestorm Second Life viewer on Ubuntu as I do with the same version on Windows, for example. If a developer writes in OpenGL for Windows, moving the code to Linux is a much smaller hurdle to jump and the port makes much better commercial sense. It was also true 5 years ago that you couldn't use Linux unless you were comfortable using the command line. I've seen Windows-advocates decry this most vocally while conveniently ignoring the number of times they have to reach for the command prompt or Registry Editor in Windows, two activities that would put fear and dread into most non-technical Windows users just as much as anything that they might see in the engine room of the USS Ubuntu. The graphical management tools now available on Ubuntu allow my mother to get pretty much everything she wants done now.
I get a sense at many anti-Linux comments come from the point of view of "Most people use Windows. It works just fine. You chose something else now please stop whining as I'm sick of hearing about what won't work on the OS *
YOU* chose." I would be the first to agree that some of the most-vocal Linux evangelists do the Linux community no favours when they don't know when to put a sock in it and alienate people rather than making things better. I'm a supporter and I've defintiely met a few that I wish would shut up (My opinion of the people I've met over the years, not th eposters to this thread). I think a lot of this overzealous passion comes from how important the underlying issues are to the community: The ability to use the software as we like; to fix it ourselves (or pay someone else to) if something is broken or doesn't meet our needs and the developer won't fix it. To be able to look inside any piece of software and check it doesn't have any back doors or malicious functionality hidden inside. Not having activation tied to the hardware (I recently had a laptop fail, put the drive into another and Linux just booted and worked, no reinstallation, and I could get straight back to work. Windows activation prevented me from accessing Windows and all the software on it until I got my original machine returned from repair.
I hope that the number of game and media titles on Linux contunies to improve. I'm not trying to fight a holy OS war; I just know which OS I find gets things done with the least hassle. I also find that Ubuntu tends to leave me with more usable computing power than Windows does on the same piece of hardware. That being said, I do keep a Windows dual-boot on one machine for a handful of pieces of software where a decent Linux equivalent doesn't yet exist. I believe what has been said here about the chicken and egg situation is true. To bring new users to Linux, it has to have the things they want. If developers make design decisions, like OpenGL over DirectX, making ports becomes much easier and more economic while the user base is smaller. If you build it, I believe, they will come.
Best regards and compliments of the season to you, whichever OS you choose,
Pap.
The Steam sales stats would suggest that's not a typical experience, unless 95% of gamers are using Bootcamp.... 
