There was a period in the middle 90s to somewhere around 2005 when I could configure and run FreeBSD and GNU apps that spared me the expense of near constant hardware/software upgrades. I had no need to use spread sheets.
Two things happened to kill that system. The chief architect quit and moved to Apple to help develop their new OSX which is based on much of the BSD design that runs under the Mac GUI.
The other thing that changed was hardware prices dropped drastically, So I bought the components for a new box and built it. However, by then FreeBSD had developed numerous problems, enough so that I couldn't figure out how to install it and get the GUI configured.
I said fuck this and bought a copy of XP pro. I still didn't like Office because I don't need anything but the word processor. So I looked around for pre-compiled version of Emacs. It works fine, except it doesn't have a spell checker. And you can't use its main feature which is writing code and compiling it. The TeX compiler was not part of the binary.
The other thing I found was some version of LaTeX that sort of works. But again it's pre-compiled binary, so I can't tweak it. It's called TeXnic or something. This has it's own compiler to build TeX embedded code. It's other feature is a PDF converter.
This brings up another point to open code. Stallman's original TeX was a great learning tool to teach the design/art of text layout. Once GNU stopped supporting TeX, that was gone. After a certain point FreeBSD didn't port the older code.
There are some key components like the graphics cards, monitors, printers, hardware ports, etc. that require drivers. So there was a constant battle to keep the open source drivers current because they changed with every hardware cycle.
So with each new wave in hardware related development the open source groups were forced to keep up and they couldn't really.
The reason that Macs work better is because Apple controls every single spec and device through a custom network of subcontractors. They convinced MicroSoft and other software suppliers like Adobe to produce versions that work on Macs
FreeBSD+GNU was fun while it lasted and I learned a lot. I saved thousands of dollars I often didn't have. Then it became very unfun. I was working in bad job conditions and had no patience at all with tweaking the computer, once I got off work.
CG