In my case I understand the sentiment of both sides. I have a Radeon 4670 (Sapphire) and that is a very reliable card, supports 2 monitors with different resolutions using the latest AMD driver that is intended for that card even in Windows 2012. I love this card. Before this card I always had ATI cards and these were great as well for their day.
However, I did upgrade to a newer Radeon HD 6450 (XFX) with the 15.6 version of the AMD driver and it doesn't properly support 2 monitors. Not in Windows 7, not in Windows 8, not in Windows 2012. I don't dare to try the new 15.8 beta driver as exchanging drivers is much more of a headache than it used to be. Compared with Nvidia's offerings on the low-end scale...the Nvidia's just work (like the old school ATI's and early AMD's did).
This last AMD card sure tempered my love and lust for the latest AMD graphic card offerings. I still think there isn't much wrong with the hardware itself, but the drivers (software) are a piece of sh.t. Now I don't know if the drivers are as problematic when they are combined with the high-end AMD cards, but I sure as hell won't spent a pile of money to find that out.
Unless AMD gets their drivers in order for their cards in every price range, my 15 year stint with ATI/AMD will end and my next video card will be a Nvidia.