I'm glad you like the game - and I would agree that the galaxy generation in ED is quite impressive (It's my favorite part of the game tbh).
I also think it's fair to point out (as you do) that NMS and ED do have some key differences and each game does things that the other doesn't. They are always going to get compared at some level though - since both deal with exploring procedurally generated galaxy(ies) and are both somewhat complex games (although each game has complexity in quite different places)
I think it's fair to compare the dev teams though. Hello Games puts out significantly higher quality software releases than Frontier - I don't think that's debatable. Their software is far less buggy, more performant and they definitely have less broken features in their game. Now, this doesn't mean their game is better, just that it's more polished. Obviously "sub par and half broken" is a subjective judgement from me.... but I really don't think it's that hyperbolic. There are numerous features in ED (even in EDH) that are barely 1.0 quality, half broken, etc.... and I definitely would consider their typical release quality (based on polish, bugs, etc) to be below average (or sub par) compared to the average game I play.
Now, it's still of course totally fine to prefer ED - and whether a game is FUN is definitely subjective to each person and it's certainly possible for a less polished game to be more fun to someone than a polished game (Kerbal space program being a famous example for me - I consider it one of the best games ever made despite the unity performance issues, need for mods to fix some jankiness, etc - granted KSP is fairly polished now... but I think it's been out for almost 10 years or something!)
Its a value judgment but one that doesn't seem to be backed by data and doesn't match my experience.
I will admit there are the occasional bugs, but nothing has been broken. Save a couple nights, weeks ago, where the transaction server ate it.
Simple fact is that no PC game is free of bugs, not if it's also complex.
Maybe me, and everyone I know who plays, are all fantastically lucky but that seems unlikely.
I have a mid range box and I can play and I'm constantly finding new, nuanced details to the game.
That stuff has to be coded in and I don't see Fdev devs getting credit for it. As an example I stopped my SRV on a rock last night.
The front right tire was up, on the surface of the rock, off the plane from the other 5 tires.
Thats not easy and its an attention to detail, from interaction wirh a procedural element, that is replicated all over the place.