IMO, bad trackpads are the biggest pitfall of cheap (and not-so-cheap) laptops, by far. At least with a bad screen you can still generally read the interface without too much trouble, but a bad trackpad can make a computer really frustrating to use!
I'm guessing if I spent time figuring out the proper drivers I could probably get it working nice on Linux too but it just hasn't been worth the effort for me.
I really like the keyboard too, but I think that is probably more individual taste.
Have you used the really cheap ones though? I have had very bad experiences with the touchpads on ChromeOS devices used by schools.
Newer models are better. I'm sure software updates have fixed a lot of the palm detection issues. But similar situation with Windows laptops, PC notebook manufacturers are 20 years behind Apple on trackpads.
With the exception of one particular school, these computers are all perfectly adequate performance-wise, but the awful touchpads just ruin everything.