“Okay, I switched to Linux, now I’m getting this error message: _______.”
“Install ______.”
“It gives me this error now: ______.”
“You have to update the _____ library first.”
“It won’t let me.”
“You have to use sudo.”
“It tells me to clone the git via the command line, but git says verifying login from command line isn’t supported any more.”
“You’re following seven year old instructions.”
“They’re the only instructions I can find.”
“You should switch to this other flavor of Linux.”
TIHI
I do not prefer apt-based systems, but I’ve installed variations of Ubuntu (e.g. Mint) on systems for geriatric (grand)parents in the past 5 years and have not yet needed to drop into shell to fix something.
If the needs are basic (browsing, email, printing, documents), Linux hasn’t needed wizardry for years. This is mostly thanks to Gnome and KDE’s hard work on GUI admin tools, but if someone is going directly from Windows to i3, they’ve chosen a steep hill to climb.
Switch to Linux and spend way more time making sure everything is updated and having to jump through hoops installing things.
No idea what you mean. I just quickly wanted to update before calling it a night, got a grub update and now it neither boots the default nor the fallback image. I use Arch BTW.
so everything breaks daily i assume?
More seriously: it really doesn’t. This was the first time for me. Fit perfectly here though. Now where did I put that that live USB drive…?
Only the pacman-keys.
That is not a problem on any of the major distros, so I’m not sure what you’ve been using. Most distros have a GUI package manager that is awesome and you can update with just a few clicks. So what hoops are you jumping through, and how is this such a problem that it’s costing you time?
KDE Neon for me. Previously Linux Mint. Both of their app stores are not great (on KDE Neon it only does flatpaks, and takes a full minute to launch), and my apt has had some kind of broken package/dependency for ages now. Also tried to install some app the other day through apt, cant remember what, but it wanted a different version of a package, but it wouldn’t let me install it cause other things depended on a different version. In the end I just gave up and installed the flatpak instead.
Also multiple times, on both Mint and Neon, an update has randomly broken my Nvidia driver, so I had to restore a Timeshift backup.
And Ubuntu/Ubuntu-based distros are supposed to be the easiest.
Know what I love about Linux? It allows you to do whatever you want, that includes breaking things. I like having that power… now if you can’t wield it, or are going to complain about it, then you should be under a more limited account and not be adventuring outside of it. My wife and grandparents have no problems on Linux, but I have them on limited accounts so that they can’t break things.
Also multiple times, on both Mint and Neon, an update has randomly broken my Nvidia driver, so I had to restore a Timeshift backup.
Yeah, bad updates happen, that’s to be expected when you support so many different hardware configurations. Windows is no different, they literally deleted user directories with an update in October of 2018, which in my opinion is the most egregious thing you can do to a user. And they have botched so many other things through updates over the years. With Linux, you can boot into a live environment, chroot in, and fix the problem. Easy compared to the alternative of Windows where you are likely re-installing all over. Or worse, and they deleted your family photos like in 2018, and they are gone forever if you didn’t have backups.
What do you mean “limited account”? Do you mean no sudo access? Because I literally wouldn’t be able to install anything except for flatpaks. Are you implying that the breakages are my fault? Cause if so, what did I do to cause them? I don’t personally think I’ve done anything crazy.
Also yes, windows breaks things sometimes as well. But my Linux install has broken over 5 times in the year and a half I’ve been using it. My windows install has broken… not once in the past 5 years. I have definitely had problems, but none so bad that I had to restore a backup or fix it with a live usb like I’ve had to with Linux.
I still like the freedom it gives me, that’s why I still use it. But I feel like recommending it to people who don’t know what they’re doing is a horrible idea.
Also yes, windows breaks things sometimes as well. But my Linux install has broken over 5 times in the year and a half I’ve been using it.
I have 1 desktop and 2 laptops running Arch… in the last year, none of them have broken. In the last 5 years a few have broken a total of 4 times, and were back up and running in < 15 minutes. I have 3 servers running Debian, none of them have ever broken in the 5+ years I’ve ran them. The wife’s laptop runs Mint, it has never broken in the last 5+ years she has ran it. So if your install has broken 5 times in one year, then to answer your question:
“Are you implying that the breakages are my fault?”
Yeah, most fucking definitely.
But I feel like recommending it to people who don’t know what they’re doing is a horrible idea.
That’s because you don’t know what you’re doing, and still do things on it without fully understanding what you’re doing, and break it. Like I said, my wife and grandparents, who have no technical ability whatsoever, don’t have problems. Why do you think that is? They don’t break it, not ever, not even one single time in the last 5+ years. And aside from Arch, which is a cutting edge, rolling release distro, I’ve never had a stable release distro break through updates, ever.
Lol, this was almost 15 years ago and i was just a dumb impatient kid messing around with CentOS. I mainly stopped using it because I couldn’t game on it and I didn’t have as much spare time at school.
And now you’re grown, right? No longer a dumb impatient kid? But still spouting off an opinion of a dumb impatient kid that is out of date by 15 years?
What on earth? Maintaining my Fedora machine has been a breeze, and most games work out the box whenever you install them on Steam!
Gaming has become the main task I expect my Linux device to do expertly!
My grandma runs Ubuntu and has gotten by fine without the command line
I accept this fate.
Lol, I’m not hating. I’ve had Linux before but it took more time then I had at that point learning and I mainly use my personal computers for gaming. Which is less of a headache on windows. That’s just me though.
I’m on windows 10, use my PC for work and gaming. The thing with windows is that it works right out of the box, all major softwares are developed for windows in mind. When shit stops working is when you start messing with stuff that isn’t your typical “start the PC -> download program -> install -> run the program -> shut off” which is what most users do. Updating the os, softwares and GPU drivers are easy tasks.
It’s when you start messing with python or softwares that aren’t too mainstream and require a bit more effort that things have the potential to break. Even then, the os itself won’t break on you unless you really try. I broke windows a few times in 15 years but it’s worth mentioning that I was manually and willingly changing registry keys and messing with a lot of other stuff. Even then most of the time I was able to fix it.
With Linux is different. If you just use the OS for basic stuff like browsing the internet and editing documents you should be fine for the most part (if you choose a user friendly and stable distro like Ubuntu or Mint). The moment you try getting to run niche softwares or something that requires you to manually open the command prompt to change things in order to accomodate what you’re trying to achieve, that’s where it gets tough for most people. That’s how Linux works, it’s the user’s fault though not the machine’s.
I never claimed it wasn’t user error. This was almost 15 years ago and I was just a dumb impatient kid messing around with CentOS.
Might want to try again if you haven’t updated your opinion for 15 years. Updating is so much easier and faster on Linux than windows nowadays. You don’t really need the terminal unless you want to on the easier distros. Everytime I see that Windows update screen at work I remember one of the main reasons I abandoned it at home. The software centers make life so much easier than windows. The software updates on its own so you don’t click on a program and then have to update it. Life, imo, is just better with Linux.
Fair enough. I would never recommend anyone to switch to Linux unless they absolutely need it for certain applications that are not possible on Windows. Linux requires some level of expertise to operate, that’s the truth because the moment something small breaks (could be something as silly as the package manager) and you don’t know how to trace it back or you don’t know basic terminal commands, you essentially stepped on your own foot.
I was running Majaro on my old laptop that I only used for basic tasks (mostly studying and taking notes), until I needed the laptop for a music project I was working on. I couldn’t even find the drivers for my audio interface or get any DAW to properly work on Linux, let alone all the plugins I needed. I had to reinstall Windows.
Now if I ever needed Linux (which I haven’t in a long time) I have a VM set up for it.
For me, it’s the right OS for the job. I use Linux for servers, Windows for gaming/work, and MacOS for gaming/personal. However, Linux Gaming is definitely coming along partly thanks to Proton (Valve).
Ah that’s right I had heard something about that. Hopefully it continues improving so people don’t feel like they have to choose either Linux or gaming and can base it purely on which OS they like better.
You can play the vast majority of games easily on Linux right now.
I’ve been a gamer my whole life, and I currently have a Linux system and I play every game I want to play on there just fine, either through Steam and/or Bottles/Steam.
I haven’t had this kind of problems with Fedora or Nobara, for me they just work. I’ve had more problems and used more time troubleshooting Windows than Linux
Mostly just when you initially install like most OSes ; browsers, office suits, game launchers, etc… My mother doesn’t even notice fedora automatically installing updates when she turns her PC off. (I enabled automatic updates for her)
Even with my arch Linux install with Hyprland, most of the time I just update before I turn it off. With a terminal command but even that is just
paruand my password orflatpak update. If I had kde or gnome desktop, I could set it up to auto update too.Sometimes I don’t even bother and use the computer without updating it for a couple of months or it automatically updates when I install new software.
Yeah I’m not sure the last time you used Linux but it’s nothing like that these days. As long as you stick with a well established distribution you’ll be fine. I haven’t had to go in a “fix” an update in a while, even in some of the beta updates they’re fairly stable.
Gaming on Linux is easier now but these Linux communities love gaslighting people. Go to any SteamDeck/Linux sub and you’ll find tons of people having issues they wouldn’t have in Windows.
FUD
Fucked Up the Distro?
Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt. A standard approach to suppressing wide adoption of FOSS.
As someone who has had been around Linux-based people and whenever I have had a single gripe about Windows - it’s this.
I don’t have a hate boner with Linux, I just feel like Linux is a little too much for the average casual user. Everything is fine until they run into a single issue with Linux, if the bewilderment of not having their familiar easy to run programs that they had on Windows wasn’t a turn off for them from the get-go.
I remember I had a date with a girl back in the’10s. We hit it off and got back to her place. Wanted to show her a funny Internet video.
She brought out an ancient laptop that refused to boot and said her Ex had tried to fix it with Linux.
I got it pointed at the right dependencies, she fellated me as it updated.
I think this is my only sexy story that includes Linux.
Well, I guess there was this one time I loaned a lonely neighbor DOS 6 disks.
But, that does not include Linux.
My suspicion is it’s not just your sexy Linux story but the only sexy Linux story.
I mean we all know that recompiling the kernel is practically a replacement for sex
Never been to PenguiCon, I guess.
Is that the furry Linux con?
This is the best blowjob story I’ve read yet lol
Switch to Linux! Then you can have problems with Linux.
The problems are different, and you can fix them in Linux. However, if you like dogshit workflows, a lack of customization, no control or the feeling like your OS is in control instead of you, ads in your OS, and telemetry data being sent, then Windows is the far better option.
I made the switch to linux that time they had three bad patches in a row and nothing was working. Every issue I have had in an issue in linux I am able to fix myself since nothing is obfuscated. I was using x11 rewritten by some Croatian dude as a proof of concept because it was the only thing that allowed torch to address the video card properly. Run into an issue in windows and find out that neither the manufacturer nor microsoft are supporting your product. Nothing i can do about it. Utterly rage inducing.
i’m sorry, i’ve been out of the loop, and i haven’t used windows on my own machines since XP quit being supported, but, fucking ads in the OS. i don’t know if you’re having me on or not.
It’s ads for other Microsoft products, and some things that will very obviously get ads in the future, like news, but actually don’t and nobody can explain how.
So yes, there are ads, but not the way you probably imagined. (Yet?)
And candy crush, don’t forget the OG!
Imagine playing solitaire and everytime you flip the draw pile a 30 second unskippable online casino ad plays.
I have seen mobile games that are like this.
Some even happen to be popular, so I have no idea what people consider fun.
If you run an office and need your computers to be relatively idiotproof, use Windowss
And lock that damn Windows DOWN. Windows isn’t idiotproof if you can install just about any software you want.
My wife is not tech savvy at all… no problem on Linux.
Or just specific software that is not available on Linux.
Okay, I’ll bite. I’ve been trying Linux every few years for the last few decades and it’s never been anywhere close to replacing Windows for me. I’m not a luddite; I was in tech for many years (MCSE certified) but there just… ALWAYS something that doesn’t work right. And there’s NEVER a simple fix. Linux for me ends up being more of a hobby than a tool and I haven’t had the time or patience to deal with it in the past.
But I’m willing to try again,
Anyone have any resources to get me pointed in the right direction? Which distro to try, how to install as a dual-boot on an exiting Windows machine without breaking it, how to get Steam/Nvidia drivers/games going, etc?
EDIT - Apparently trying to dual boot with Windows on a machine with two physical drives is too much to ask (unless you have a CS degree). Maybe next time, Linux.
Replace some troubles, with different troubles. Brilliant, as usual…
About the same when you ask for a good GUI replacement for X and someone replies “just use the command line”, like cheers for that men, not what I’m asking for.
AMEN! I asked recently if there was a good Linux alternative to this program I used in Windows called “Bulk Rename Utility” and i was flooded by people telling me how easy it was to set up a script to do what I want.
Turns out the best alternative is running BRU in Wine.
Krename is pretty nice
This makes me wonder how powerful a repo platform like gitlab would be if it allowed people to suggest software ideas and have people make them. In this instance a simple GUI wrapper for bulk rename command line would be sufficient but I would bet there’s millions of things like that, not world changing software just nice qol stuff
I’d have recommended KRename personally. It uses some programming-esque stuff (format specifiers for stuff), but it’s not exactly difficult to do advanced stuff with it.
There almost always powerful existing utilities that can do what you want in linux.
But you have to find them and they have a learning curve. Sometimes that “curve” is a cliff.
Tbh though, as a person going through this learning right now, the single most essential thing I did was youtube “basic bash tutorial” and watch a few videos/follow along with them. Gave me the first foothold to start climbing the cliff, made it much less foreboding.
Now I’m struggling with for loops, but that is not exactly basic and I’m blaming that on my ADHD, I haven’t tried to learn in months, I’ll get around to it!
No need for a script, just use
rename.
“Why even use a DE? Try a WM like openbox”
Well, because a lot of things are simplified with DE functionality, and not everyone has the same preferences…
The WM folks can be obnoxious lol. But it comes from a place of passion and love for the ecosystem so it’s not bad.
Based 😁
I do have to vouch for sometimes the command line is easier, not with everything but sometimes. Like my VPN sometimes it’s a little slow on the uptake and finding a server all that nonsense but I can also just have a few taps away at the command line and bing bang boom it’s done.
I still don’t understand why there isn’t a terminal-gui (you know, those text but graphical utilities) for basic stuff like mounting a network share. Why do I still need to manually edit fstab?!?
Sometimes what you want to hear and what you need to hear, are not the same thing.
Like wanting to hear “this is the Year of the Linux Desktop” and needing to hear “this is the 27th consecutive Year of the Linux Desktop that failed”?
The Linux desktop is superior, it doesn’t matter what year it is.
And yet people stay away from it in droves.
Fancy that.
Sounds like someone is hearing what he wants to hear, not what he needs to.
And yet people stay away from it in droves.
Ad Populum. I don’t consider the opinions of morons.
Sounds like someone is hearing what he wants to hear, not what he needs to.
Reaching now, huh? Swing and a miss.
A non-technical end-user once had a problem with Windows. A technical friend said “SWITCH TO LINUX”. Now they have thousands of problems.
I’ve been a non-stop user of Linux as my primary OS since before Ubuntu was a thing. I do not recommend Linux systems to my non-technical friends.
As long as the distro is stable anyone can use it to use a browser and browse the internet. I had put Ubuntu Linux for my mom on a laptop, back in 2010, she was using just the browser. She had it for 2 years, no problems. She did nothing else with that laptop though, because that was the first time she was using a computer. She was mostly facebooking.
My Aunt bought a new laptop to run her eBay/Facebook selling business on. She’s not particularly techy but has used Windows machines for admin work for prob 20 years or so. Laptop had no office apps installed and she tracks everything in a spreadsheet. Original plan was to install Libreoffice but it was running some budget version of Windows 10 you can’t install anything on, can’t remember what it’s called. So I installed Fedora. Chromium and Libreoffice Calc open on login, her ancient HP printer works, she’s able to access her camera as USB mass storage when she lists items and unattended upgrades are enabled. That was 2 years ago, no problems since.
Cool story, bro. And for every such cool story you can bring up I can bring you a hundred, probably, of people who got set up on Linux and returned to Windows because it was a horror show from their perspective.
Let me give you the clue: “The Year of the Linux Desktop” has been declared with monotonous regularity since the 1990s. It still hasn’t arrived. There’s a reason for this, and the quicker Linux (and other F/OSS) advocates grasp why this is, the quicker will the year actually arrive.
Until then, Linux is a fringe OS for techies. (And there it excels. As I said, I’ve been a non-stop user of it for ages.)
I totally agree that can happen. My first experience with Linux was installing Slackware from a CD I got with a magazine at 16. Install worked but I couldn’t really do much with it with no internet connection so abandoned it. Also I hosed the Windows partition when trying to set up dual boot so got banned from the family PC for a while.
Mind clarifying?
Windows S can be turned off, but it does require an internet connection.
All you have to do is turn that off and you can install anything you want. You took a simple problem and made it hard.
I don’t know how this solution should be hard. I always have a live boot usb(O.K. not Fedora) with me and installing these apps is about 1-2 commands and I really don’t like scrolling through legacy Gui apps.
It sounds like they’re talking about the N versions of Windows, which can only install apps through the Microsoft Store. That can be disabled, but my understanding is it’s a pain to get it done. It’s meant to be locked down kind of like Apple products.
I don’t because I don’t wanna be that guy.
But in general these days, I’d absolutely recommend it. Anything in the debian family is just as easy to use as windows. As long as you hook them up with some good cron jobs for auto updates and rollbacks on failures and stuff, they’ll be right as rain.
To be clear, I wouldn’t have in like 2015.
i gave ubuntu to my 67 yo grandmother and she used it until she died.
i call UBERBullshit on this
You gave Ubuntu to your grandmother and she fucking died?
OMG, Linux kills grandmothers!(I know, I quit Windows around 95, it’s just that I couldn’t resist)
Have you tried turning it off and back on?
I installed Linux to my tech illiterate parents. They are doing fine. No issues in years.
They probably stopped asking you for help and just used their phones.
I tried to install I think Ubuntu for my parents. I failed to find a way to properly allow short/simple passwords after like 2 hours of fiddling with configs. Gave up on it after that.
You shouldn’t be allowing that to be honest. You also shouldn’t be using Ubuntu especially for new users.
Well, its between allowing that and not using Linux at all so that is that. If I could get them to remeber a strong password, it would not be for PC login.
What distro would you recommend? I was under the impression Ubuntu was furthest with UIs.
Ubuntu has turned to garbage in recent years because of canonical. It also looks more like mac than Windows.
Try Linux Mint.
Hmmm, I had mint for a little bit once. I don’t remember having any issues with it which probably means it is good. Paradoxically it also made me forget about it somewhat.
But I really have an urge to try NixOS for myself… And I don’t really want to mess with my parents setup now.
Yeah I can understand not wanting to mess with something that works
I would recomment Mint to users who use their Computer for more than just Webbrowsing. If its just webbrowsing and you know Linux, try setting up Fedora silverblue. In my vm’s two digit passwords work.
I’ve found that OpenSuse Tumbleweed is better than both Ubuntu and Linux Mint.
They set out to make a distro that is kept up to date perpetually instead of managing different versions.
There is fine line with being tech illiterate and being able to use linux when it all just works. The problems arise only when you are just slightly more advanced and want to do something weird without actually being able do it in linux with some things being a bit too much for the average Joe.
The only thing people like my parents need is a functioning browser. I bet %95 of all Windows/Mac users are similar.
Yeah that is not true. Microsoft Office is one super commonly used thing, and that doesn’t work on Linux.
And before you say, yes there are alternatives to Office. The point is most people definitely need more than a web browser.
Yeah correction, people think Chromium is enough until it’s not
Microsoft Office works in the browser.
It’s shit, I’ve tried it, so many features missing.
Removed by mod
Tbh I would probably only bother to use a Linux machine for a media server really, Windows isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, computer games, widespread office and engineering support, general purpose software support and the fact that everyone uses it is the big three reasons why it’s still around, just look at how well Android has managed to stick around.
I think the only way for Linux to get ahead would be to offer easy potential alternatives to all these things, even then they’re only just competing
Thing is, linux is not suitable for general crowd.
How do you play Diablo 4 on Linux again? 4K while we’re at it?
My parents have a hard time clicking a download button and double clicking to install.
There’s no way I can get them to apt-get anything from a command shell.
How messed up is it that the touchscreen generation is having the same problem.
There’s also GUI package managers. If you chose a normal distro, there should already be one.
Given that you need to install non-native hi rez textures to play Diablo 4 in 4k on Windows, that is not a good test for the “general crowd”.
The moment you get into any kind of high end gaming PCs, you’ve already left “general crowd” territory for most computer users.
Then lets scale down to suit the new narrative.
How do normal users play diablo 4 linux in HD like install and play on Windows?
Install Lutris.
Use the battle net install helper for Lutris.
Launch battle net.
Profit.
It’s like one extra step (install Lutris) compared to Windows. Using Linux doesn’t have to be some archaic mystery and the proliferation of the steam deck is doing wonders at improving the ease of use of all this stuff.
Personally, I don’t really mess with battlenet games at all, but my understanding is that you can open Lutris and install battlenet pretty easily. Then just like on Windows, you install Diablo via their installer, and for most people, it works out of the box.
You can also download battlenet directly and add it as a non steam game to steam and then run it using their Proton compatibility option. This also works on the steam deck.
Look, I’ll be the first one to say that gaming on Linux is not as easy as it can be on Windows. But it is definitely not a bad experience, and hard core gaming is not the majority use case for computers. We have billions of PC users in the world. Under 3 million play Diablo 4. That is a fraction of a fraction of a percent.
Honestly, Heroic and Lutris arguably give a superior experience to inumerable windows installers…when they work. Which is pretty often.
I feel like that is the common trend for me. Linux is the superior experience to Windows in every situation that it works at all.
That includes when an issue arises. I would much prefer to troubleshoot a Linux install than Windows.
No, you don’t say “switch to Linux”. This is an opportunity to be free from the shackles of being the go-to IT support person! If they say they are having computer problems, ask “Is it Linux? No? Sorry, can’t help you”
From my experience you wind up just hitting up YouTube or stack exchange or something similar for a tutorial on how to do something that could work out the box on a Windows machine
The ones that make me laugh uncontrollably are those Windows disk encryption issues for which the solution is…wait for it… run Linux from a LiveISO, fix the disk with Linux, then reinstall Windows. Because Windows is incapable of fixing its own issues that it itself caused.
As a former computer service technician, we used Ubuntu Live USB and DVDs (yes it was a long ago) a lot.
Windows lacking tooling to fix issues caused by its own malfeasance was what made my switch to Linux permanent. I used a LiveCD to fix file system issues that Windows had no tools for unless I wanted to pay thousands for janky third-party tools. Once I did that and recovered most of my lost data, I thought long and hard and just said “fuck it, I’ll use Linux”.
None of my family will run Linux, however, on my recommendation. I can cope with Linux’s … selective set of user friends. They can’t, and I’ll be damned if I turn into free tech support.
I remember something happened to my family’s Windows computer once. A system file had gotten corrupted somehow so it could only boot into the repair utility, which, naturally, couldn’t repair the file.
The solution I found on Google was to put in the installation disc (I think it was Windows 7?), run the disc at startup (by switching the boot order in the BIOS), and fix it using Command Prompt on the disc.
Windows’ own diagnostic tool included with the OS couldn’t fix the problem. Only the disc could. It was pretty fortunate we still had that thing. Until then, it had just been sitting there collecting dust.
That used to be me. Now whenever someone ask me to fix their computer I’m like “no hablo windowes”
Why? So I can have more trouble? :P
Windows sucks but no one seems to realize this because they’re too comfortable with how they fix, or work around, the broken stuff repetitively. The repetitiveness of the bad experience becomes “normal” so nothing is amiss. It being broken is “normal” so in their eyes it "just works"TM. It’s almost like a form of brain washing.
It really is akin to people in domestic abuse situations who are just so numb to it they aren’t motivated to get out.
Maybe we should be taking a book from domestic abuse counseling or something?
I’ve been using distros since Kubuntu 6.06. While I have dual boot, Ubuntu MATE is what I use everyday.
A little over a month ago I built a new PC on the AM5 socket platform (modern hardware). The ASUS motherboard has a built-in Wi-Fi adapter. Windows 10? It just works, it simply required installing a driver at most. Ubuntu 22.04? Even lspci doesn’t properly identify the adapter name. Now I have to hope that I can find a driver that I will have to compile and hope it to work.
Unfortunately, GNU/Linux distros still aren’t as convenient as Windows. Blame the hardware manufacturers in this case or whatever but, in any case, the final experience is not smooth.
I honestly can’t tell if you are making an ironic joke
No joke at all. It’s literally impossible to talk sense to anyone about how bad Windows is.
I’ve done tech support for 20+ years with the first half being Windows support exclusively and the second half being largely, but not entirely, Linux support. Windows support is much much harder than Linux. Most linux errors are verbose and can be searched to find a wealth of sources of possible fixes. MS errors are nonsensical and usually land you on only one or two other posts that if they don’t work you’re entirely screwed.
I can install Linux in about 15 minutes start to finish including all my commonly installed apps. Windows takes 45min minimum on a good day and if you already know which things are in the drivers DB and which things require third party downloads and installs (and where to get them). That’s just OS and drivers. Software takes much much much longer from all the diverse third party sources. You could maybe cobble together some powershell or something that gets you like 90% of the way to the speed of installing Linux and software. But you’re still going to have some stuff without the API access or CLI inputs that just can’t be scripted.
Battery life and heat production running Linux is much better because it doesn’t spend all your free cycles exfiltrating your data to MS so machines just run faster, smoother, cooler and with better battery life.
At no time do you have to pay for or worry about licenses just trying to install the damn OS. If I had a dime for every person I’ve known in my life running windows unlicensed with that sad black background and that persistent watermark I’d have enough money to afford a single windows home license ($139 Retail).
I could go on. But why when, as noted, no one is going to give it the time of day.
I couldn’t have said it better than this.
I hate Windows for all my soul, and I must use Microsoft stuff at work, lucky me
In the last decade the only serious troubleshooting I’ve had to do is on non-Windows OSes. Including an install of Ubuntu that I blew away because it froze in the middle of an upgrade and couldn’t load into the OS anymore.
So, speaking from personal experience, Windows is what I use when I just want stuff to work. Other OSes are fun when I have time to kill trying to figure out how to do things.
If a had a nickel for every windows system that I’ve had to reformat due to a botched upgrade I’d have a small jar of nickels.
The thing is, many of us know Windows better than our back yard, because it hasn’t changed much in the past 14 years (Win7). What we might call “basic troubleshooting” might be on the same level as a similar issue on Linux if you knew nothing
Half a year ago I started using Ubuntu for work. I hate it. Everything I want to do I can do with windows as well, just easier. Much easier. What I’m left with is a lot of theoretical benefits I’m never going to use and a whole lot of Googleing how to do basic things.
On top of that the system isn’t nearly as stable as Windows. Tons of display issues and even crashes. On a fresh install on a new developer laptop nonetheless. Speak for yourself, but for me the experience on Ubuntu is worse in almost every way.
