First, since I will never convince you of my expertise, ( as well I shouldn't, since I have none in the math of encryption), read the following for yourself and decide Google articles on linux encryption .

Second, there is no security on MSWindows..... it is designed to help the NSA develope backdoors.... every month some new backdoor into MSWindows is discovered, ranging from hidden keystroke recorders to hidden copies of all deleted files.

Third, use your common sense. If you had something you want to keep secret, you would think "obviously encrypt it". Thinking you could keep it as plaintext, hidden by obscurity in a mess of files, is a poor solution compared to encryption. As a matter of fact, one of the first thing law enforcement does when trying to crack an encrypted filesystem, is to filter your harddrive for every text string, then use those strings as a dictionary in a password attack on your encrypted filesystem. I guess most people are stupid enough to use phrases that are familiar to them, or they hide a reminder somewhere, and the success rate of cracking is pretty high.

So just use your common sense, an encrypted filesystem is more secure than a plain text filesystem, the question becomes the strength of the encryption algorithm, and consequently "who are you defending against".

So if you don't believe what the "experts" in the above Google results say, what are YOUR alternatives?