FWIW, it's also not too difficult to get rid of that junk. It's certainly less work than loading a fresh copy of Windows, installing updates, loading drivers (and doing that in the correct sequence), updating those, installing recovery software, building recovery disks, running a...well...you get the picture.
-40hz
Actually I don't. Surely the easiest way to get rid of crapware is not to install it in the first place, is it not? On
my own systems, I haven't had an issue with drivers having to be installed in the correct sequence since Windows 98 at the latest. What recovery software are you referring to? I do have a curated list of software that gets installed on a new system, but if I had an off the shelf system, I would additionally have to have a curated list of software that gets uninstalled.
I'm glad there's less crapware on a standard install than there used to be. Guess how much crapware I would like. Also I don't have a lot of experience with choosing a vendor that bundles the fewest unwanted apps, but I do have a lot of experience installing and tweaking Windows from a bare install. A lot of it is about leveraging existing skill sets.
But I agree with a lot of what you say, nowadays it is not so much saving money or time as having control. And my thinking evolved in the formative years of the PC industry, where you had to think like a hobbyist, for me personally it is hard to give up that control. Kind of the same reason I don't want a Mac. (I guess Linux advocates would say the same about Windows.)