Worth noting a lot of people had to upgrade their computer for Win10 (2 of my relatives were told they had to buy new computers by Windows but I managed to upgrade them with out after lots of fiddling), a lot will have to upgrade for Win11 (to get TPM2 modules).

I think the answer to the last one is if you need Microsoft software then use it. Not much you can do if your chosen vendor doesn't support other OS (WINE, VMs, and such aside).