Personally, I’m not brand loyal to any particular OS. There are good things about a lot of different operating systems, and I even have good things to say about ChromeOS. It just depends on what a user needs from an operating system.
Most Windows-only users I am acquainted with seem to want a device that mostly “just works” out of the box, whereas Linux requires a nonzero amount of tinkering for most distributions. I’ve never encountered a machine for sale with Linux pre-installed outside of niche small businesses selling pre-built PCs.
Windows users seem to want to just buy, have, and use a computer, whereas Linux users seem to enjoy problem solving and tinkering for fun. These two groups of people seem as if they’re very fundamentally different in what they want from a machine, so a user who solely uses Windows moving over to Linux never made much sense to me.
Why did you switch, and what was your process like? What made you choose Linux for your primary computing device, rather than macOS for example?
I’m 70% there. Game is 100% since i use just the Deck. Browsing and casual also 100%. As a graphic designer i still have to keep Adobe around for now, but i’m also testing out alternative as Gimp, Krita, Kdenlive, Da Vinci and more. I’ll soon upgrade my ssd and use the extra room for a dual boot on my desk. On my portable i already use Mint.
Originally I switched just because I didn’t have a Windows install available and Linux was convenient enough to just download and stick on there. But then once I got used to using it I massively preferred it. I’m the opposite of what you’re describing, I don’t want “problem solving and tinkering”, I like Linux because it basically just does what I want it to do. Windows does what Microsoft wants it to do lol.
I had an overwhelming feeling of corporations telling me what they are selling and that I just have to deal with it. Apple, microsoft, adobe, all subscriptions that lock you in and hold you hostage.
Maybe I am just being over the top, but I miss feeling like I OWNED something. With linux? I own my laptop again.
The last Windows OS I used was XP, around 2004-ish. Even back then, it was obvious to me that, because it was closed source, that they could one day start acting against my interests, and there was nothing I could do to stop it. I saw open source as an insurance policy - it prevents vendors from acting maliciously against their users. In that very quaint, old time, nobody believed that MS would ever do something like that, but it didn’t matter - the fact was that they could, so inevitably, they would.
I’m quite proud of how prescient I was when I look at what they’re doing today. No evil is too great to stop a greedy businessman.
Anyway, I decided to just be brave and create a partition on my main drive and install Ubuntu on it. All I needed to get my work done was OpenOffice, LaTeX, a browser, a compiler, Python… Everything worked better in Linux than Windows so even though I was dual-booting, I practically never used Windows again after a couple weeks. Later on, I switched to Debian, and the next laptop that I bought, I just wiped the hard disk and used Linux for the whole thing. I kept the recovery partition because I was paranoid but obviously never needed it.
Today, there’s no doubt in my mind that Linux is the best OS. Sure, Macs have better batteries, but if I’m doing productive work, then I don’t really need more than an hour away from my charger. I could maybe agree that the BSDs are better, but I’ve never tried them.
I got tired of having an OS that is working against me. That is not a healthy relationship. With Linux you can really see there is a shift in the mindset. User experience is prioritized and you are allowed to do what you want wherever you want to. This means for example things like running a live iso, installing the OS and surfing the web at the same time is possible. I can remap the super key, and other keys. Oh, tiling Window manager exist like hyperland. Omarchy. And how about tabs in the file explorer. Why did not Microsoft implement it 20 years ago like when it came to Linux.
I didn’t appreciate MS’s anti-consumer practices (subscription fee for an OS, invasive telemetry and tracking, fucking ads in the goddamn Start menu), etc.). I installed Mint a couple years back and have almost zero regrets.
I just felt increasingly like I didn’t have control over my system. And Gnome 2 was looking sick to me at the time, I loved the look. 👌
Started with Ubuntu for a few years and now I’ve been on Arch for over a decade I believe.
Self-respect. I’m not going to tolerate my property being sabotaged against me in service of some other entity, and I don’t understand why anybody else would either.
As soon as Windows 10 “telemetry” (read: spyware) started getting backported into Windows 7 almost a decade ago, I was gone.
Windows users in 2025 are nothing but cucks and simps for corporate abuse. They don’t “just buy, have, and use a computer;” they are part of the problem.
