It would be less of an issue if more vendors submitted drivers to Windows Update. As much as I am "happy" with my cheap TP-Link 802.11ac NIC (I use a lot of TP-Link gear in my house, my TG1600-24TS switch is great for the price too) I literally cannot reinstall Windows without having the driver disk at hand or plugging in my powerline network adapter to download the drivers from their website. A lot of these issues could be mitigated by this alone, as the first thing that the Windows installer does (if you are upgrading from a running system) is check windows update for updates to the installer and compatible device drivers.
I agree that maybe they shouldn't be so persistent on trying to get people to upgrade this early, especially if you have a NIC that isn't supported out of the box or has a driver that isn't on Windows Update (because I know the first thing I do when unboxing new hardware is throw the damned CD away, the only thing I use the DVD drive in my PC for is ripping movies).
I agree that maybe they shouldn't be so persistent on trying to get people to upgrade this early, especially if you have a NIC that isn't supported out of the box or has a driver that isn't on Windows Update (because I know the first thing I do when unboxing new hardware is throw the damned CD away, the only thing I use the DVD drive in my PC for is ripping movies).