If you're as old as me, and worked in IT in the 80s, you'll know that IBM and Microsoft originally produced PCs for technical users--engineers, mathematicians, accountants, draughtsmen, etc. They were always complicated beasts, even when they booted off a floppy disk. The manual was huge, and you were expected to read it. Hardware configuration was complicated, and expansion cards required a Physics Nobel Prize to fit. A few years later, Apple designed the Mac for non-technical people (an untapped market). They did very well, and IBM/Intel/Microsoft largely discounted this for the next few years. But eventually, Microsoft felt they were missing out, and half-heartedly copied the (optional) GUI idea in Windows 2/3. By 1995 they were getting into Plug-and-Play, but were still working with old hardware and an old underlying operating system. Things have got better, since the adoption of the NT core in Windows 2000/XP, but PCs have always had this legacy of backwards-compatibility, and a large base of options-hungry users. Using your analogy, many PC users spent their Sundays in overalls, underneath the engine--that was part of the appeal. I have always told people (as the 'computer-guy' friend), that if you don't want to get your hands dirty, get a Mac, but people I knew bought PCs because they were cheaper, and it was easier to source hardware and cheap/free software. They ring me on a Sunday. C'est la vie!
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