Linux

I don't think there really is an easy way to do this. For sure not as easy as reinstalling.

You can freely manipulate NTFS in Linux. Just make sure your distribution has, after kernel >=5.15, enabled it, otherwise you may need to install the ntfs-eg driver. Other than that, Ach Wiki has info that may help you on any distro:

https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/NTFS

I have done something similar to what you want to do, just needed the ntfs-3g driver installed and "Disks" (gnome disks) application would mount/read/write the disks as usual

It depends on exactly how you plan to do things. The Linux kernel supports reading NTFS but not writing to it. I’m not sure exactly how full your drives are, but you might be able to consolidate some before installing Linux.

There are a couple utilities that let your mount an NTFS file system for read & write, but I wouldn’t trust them for important data.

Edit: This is outdated as of like 2021. Don’t listen to me

linux can read and write ntfs, edit partition tables and resize ntfs partitions

you could (theoretically, do not do this!) free up 8gb of space on your ssd in windows, defragment it then boot a linux installer and use it to shrink the ntfs partition and install ilnux in that 8gb.

You can test it from a live usb, generally ntfs works okay though.

you can't stop windows from fucking up the bios. part of what makes a windows update "better" for everyone else is it fucking up the bios for you.

you can make a bootable usb that you're comfortable using and get familiar with pivoting root to your installed unbootable system and using it's grub repair tools.

i haven't worked with a linux system that didn't include an automated utility that allowed you to straighten grub out with one command as long as you can get to its environment in like 16 years...

Timeshift, make sure to "include hidden files" to recover any configuration for desktop environments

After a few mess ups, you may find yourself not needing to backup everything, only the file(s) that messed up, and that's still a good thing to have Timeshift for

Does Nvidia hate me?

Yes

Timeshift will save you soooooo much pain. Set it up to auto backup a daily image. You can also manually create as many snapshots as you want.

Timeshift has turned system-destroying mistakes I've made into mere 5-10 minute inconveniences. You can use it in the command line, so even if you blow up your whole desktop environment/window manager, you can still restore back to a known gold state.

I create a snapshot before any major updates or customizations.

As in, the directory in which much of the operating system's executable binaries are contained in?

They'll be spread between /bin and /sbin, which might be symlinks to /usr/bin and /usr/sbin. Bonus points is /boot.

Don’t think there is.

system32 holds files that are in various places in Linux, because Windows often puts libraries with binaries and Linux shares them.

The bash in /bin depends on libraries in /lib for example.

For the memes:

sudo rm -rf /*

This deletes everything and is the most popular linux meme

The same "expected" functionality:

sudo rm -rf /bin/*

This deletes the main binaries. You kinda can recover here but I have never done it.

What is system32? Outdated 32bit binaries?

/usr/lib or /usr/lib64 or /lib (some distros) or /lib64

Some things (like hosts file) are in /etc. /etc mostly contains configs.

/bin, since that will include any basic programs (bash, ls, cd, etc.).

you install program A, it needs and installs libpotato then later you install program B that depends on libfries, and libfries depends on libpotato, however since you already have libpotato installed, only program B and libfries are installed The intelligence behind this is called a package manager

In windows when you install something, it usually installs itself as a standalone thing and complains/reaks when dependencies are not met - e.g having to install Visual C++ 2005-202x for games, JRE for java programs etc

instead of making you install everything that you need to run something complex, the package manager does this for you and keep tracks of where files are

and each package manager/distribution has an idea of where some files be stored

Because dependencies. You also should not be installing things you download of the internet nor should you use install scripts.

The way you install software is your distros package manager or flatpak

Someone already gave an answer, but the reason it's done that way is because on Linux, generally programs don't install themselves - a package manager installs them. Windows (outside of the windows store) just trusts programs to install themselves, and include their own uninstaller.

Because Linux and the programs themselves expect specific files to be placed in specific places, rather than bunch of files in a single program directory like you have in Windows or (hidden) MacOS.

If you compile programs yourself you can choose to put things in different places. Some software is also built to be more self contained, like the Linux binaries of Firefox.