Why use this os? Whats special?

I have Ubuntu on a laptop that I was using to play around with and learn command line. There is nothing of value on it so I don't care if I break anything...and in fact I did. The sound stopped working couple years ago and trouble shooting didn't resolve it, so I moved it to storage.

Last night, I dusted it off and installed updates... but sound still isn't working. 😕 I searched online and went through various troubleshooting steps, but still no sound.

What can I read to understand what's going on and figure this out? It's hurricane season so I'll be indoors a lot more.