@anonicus I don't get why that says PC - those are laptops.

No, it was never like that for systemd/Linux after 1999, provided you didn't have a dogshit Wi-Fi card that refused to operate without proprietary software.

Back in around 2003 or so, distro's tended to not completely shit all over the users freedom and so if the Wi-Fi card required proprietary software, you'd have to choose to download and install that, or better replace the Wi-Fi card with a decent one.

Wired NIC's has always had good support

Pretty much all common GNU/Linux distros in ~2003 had precompiled binaries, although certain software was primarily distributed in source form (some still is), so 3 "compile"'s is incorrect.

GNU bash doesn't take months to learn.