I don't know if it was necessarily any better when computers were "new", most kids in the 90s knew how to plug in a SNES cartridge and maybe launch a few games

I don't know if it was necessarily any better when computers were "new", most kids in the 90s knew how to plug in a SNES cartridge and maybe launch a few games from DOS but the oft required "boot disks" were still a mystery to most. Computers were much simpler then in terms of there being fewer moving parts in the software. Modern computers might be "friendlier" in some sense, but that's only because we have had to build grand abstractions out of necessity. Once these abstractions break down it can be often difficult for even relatively tech savvy people to understand what is wrong.