I think the dual boot problems are generally associated to using the same drive. If you have one drive for each you can use BIOS to control boot order instead.

of course there are alternatives, but they are all compromises, here's a couple of reasons why:

• Adobe aggressively patents every new feature they come up with, so every other software has to reinvent the wheel each time

• adobe has a huge head start with the software they already have & they make bank on the subscription model so the development (though subpar for how much money they make) is constant and steady

• to replace say photoshop you need more than one program. photoshop is a beast, it's RAM hungry but for a good reason, you can edit photography, draw traditionally, paint with oils, watercolours, do calligraphy, do pixel art, create collages, do photo manipulation, create designs, fill out digital forms, make your file into an editable pdf, sketch, hell you can even animate if you're feeling masochistic! you can bascially change any image into any other image you can possibly imagine, it's incredibly versatile and powerful. other software focuses on niches (because they can't afford to try to compete with adobe), doing one thing but doing it really well, no single program can challange photoshop, even if the main feature it offers is better than what photoshop can do. same goes for After Effects, Illustrator, and i'm sure others but those are the main ones i use (Premiere Pro recently-ish got outmatched by Davinci Resolve which is a huge win)

• if you plan on making money with your art you're basically required to at least be competent working with Adobe apps, it's the industry standard, and it's not looking like that's going to change any time soon. look up any digital drawing course, 80% are going to use photoshop, 15% procreate, 5% krita, corel, and other software (disclaimer, those numbers are vibes based and do not reflect the actual %s)

so yes, there are alternatives, but there is no photoshop-but-different-brand or after-effects-but-we-rearranged-the-ui. To replace one Adobe app you often need several programs which slows down the workflow significantly

Yeah grub with 2 drives, one windows, one linux. No problems at all.