[megous]

Windows is just less organized, with files appearing all over the place and without user having knowledge what's really needed.

On Arch Linux, all system files are listed, along with their content hashes and expected permissions/ownership, in the installed package database. So it's possible to just list changed files in /etc or unexpected files in the system, or files with unexpected permissions, and do a manual cleanup/checkup if needed. No idea how I'd even approach that on Windows.

I guess the only time I'd need to re-install would be if I messed the system so bad that manual fixup would be too laborious over fresh setup and reconfiguration. (And I'd have to lose system backups too)