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I replaced Windows with Linux and everything's going great

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Re: I replaced Windows with Linux and everything's going great

#151

For not much prior research, he sure has done a lot of prior research to even know about desktop environments or bootloaders compared to your average windows user. This article read like every other promising Linux is user friendly and easy, then proceeding with the author fixing issues the average user wouldn’t be able to even diagnose. I think anyone technically savvy enough to follow the article is already aware L…

*GASP* OH NO THEY MIGHT LEARN A SKILL!!!! Snark aside, I really really don’t understand the aversion, even within the tech community, to learning new skills especially as it pertains to Linux. Would having new knowledge be such a burden? Why is it something to avoid? Why is it not a good thing if normal people learn more about computing? Do we want a population of iPad baby Linux users? Normal people can use it now,…

It should be a choice, not a requirement. With Windows you can get your work done without knowing much about Windows itself, but with Linux you're forced to understand every level of the entire OS so you can debug it first and then maybe get your work done. For an OS built around user freedom Linux sure doesn't give its users much choice on how to use it.

Re: I replaced Windows with Linux and everything's going great

#152
post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Windows is a bizarre product at this point; it is what the company is famous for, but it is small beans next to Azure, right? Nobody would get into the Operating System business to make money I think, the going rate is $0, subsidized by something (an ad company, a hardware company, or general kindness and community spirit).

Productivity and Cloud have a revenue of about 30B each while personal computing only was 13.5B (that includes windows Xbox and search + advertising) according to ms earnings report q4 25

Yep! That’s what I was thinking of. It is a cloud hosting company that keeps some legacy software around for sentimental reasons.

Re: I replaced Windows with Linux and everything's going great

#153
post #124

Commercial OSes (both Windows and MacOS) now feel so insanely agenda driven, and the agenda no longer feels like anything close to making the user happy and productive. For Mac, it feels like Apple wants to leverage what came out of VisionOS and unify the look and feel of mobile and desktop--two things no one asked for. For Windows, it feels like ads for their partners and ensuring they don't fumble the ai/agent tran…

As if Linux was/is not agenda driven. People really forgot I guess.

Obviously, you can't build something as complex as a modern operating system without intention, and therefore an "agenda" but I have a feeling you know what OP was getting at.

I also know that the impulse to be a pedant is strong because I fight it every day, ha!

Re: I replaced Windows with Linux and everything's going great

#154
It's a catch 22.

The way to make Linux easy to use is basically just to pre-install it and ensure the hardware is compatible.

System 76 does this, and charges 3x as much as other OEMs.

At this point if I'm a consumer ohh Linux is 3x the price.

If you install Linux on a refurbished Thinkpad, most of the time you can get something very nice for 500$ or less.

I often dream, if I had money, of buying and refurbishing hundreds of laptops per year. Installing Linux and giving them out.

Would be better than cities handing out Chromebooks.

Re: I replaced Windows with Linux and everything's going great

#155
post #111

We use OneDrive/Teams/Office365 at work. I think this will be difficult with Linux. Doable with Mac. In think MacBook Air + Microsoft365 may be the cheapest startup IT setup that doesn’t require windows itself.

You use your private hardware at work?

Re: I replaced Windows with Linux and everything's going great

#156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So I should still be using an Apple //e and an 80 pound CRT TV?

Please be serious, that straw-man is clearly not my point. (I thought you said it was 90# of CRT) There’s definitely a balance between the newest of the newest bleeding edge hardware that we could only have dreamed of five years ago, and still functional hardware from five years ago. Just like engineering is a balance between technical optimization and cost. Seems like your mindset is one that chooses optimization at…

A 6 year old M1 MacBook Air that is still being sold new for $699 at Walmart is not “bleeding edge” and not expensive. Even the latest MacBook Air with 16GB RAM is $999.

And a 27 inch CRT was between 70 and 100 pounds…

Re: I replaced Windows with Linux and everything's going great

#157
post #44

For all who switched to Linux: which distro did you choose and why? Fedora: wanted to have the newest kernel and updates due to new hardware - so far i am really satisfied; the only issue i have is that the printer does not work everytime… as a workaround i print with my iphone instead.

Gentoo with KDE plasma, because I can :)

I don't really recommend this route, but I will say that the experience has been pretty great. Once setup the regular maintenance is just boring update commands. Most days, it's a less than 1 minute affair to get everything compiled and up to date.

Arch would be a pretty equivalent experience as would be using bin packages with gentoo.

Re: I replaced Windows with Linux and everything's going great

#158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So everything but good battery life is achievable on a portable device? “Besides that, how was the play Mrs. Lincoln?” This isn’t 2015… ARM Macs have been out for six years

Come on, buddy, at this point, nobody could take you seriously. You are attributing to the software and OS a difference that exists because of hardware. You can’t seriously sit here and say Linux battery life on x86 doesn’t reach your par when you’re comparing it to a completely different computing architecture. You’re comparing apples to oranges and complaining the oranges are more sour than the apples. Run Asahi Li…

I don’t care why it’s better. Whose fault is it that Linux gets worse battery life on every computer that also runs Windows or MacOS?

Re: I replaced Windows with Linux and everything's going great

#159

Commercial OSes (both Windows and MacOS) now feel so insanely agenda driven, and the agenda no longer feels like anything close to making the user happy and productive. For Mac, it feels like Apple wants to leverage what came out of VisionOS and unify the look and feel of mobile and desktop--two things no one asked for. For Windows, it feels like ads for their partners and ensuring they don't fumble the ai/agent tran…

>unify the look and feel of mobile and desktop Lol, that's what Microsoft tried 10+ years ago and everybody gave them shit for it, especially Apple fans. Now Apple is "inventing" this again.

You can't seriously compare how inappropriate Windows 8 was on desktop to the latest macOS. Bad UI aside, the OS is effectively the same OS X from 2001 with some fresh skin.

Also a lot of people hate on macOS changes, I myself did not upgrade to the latest version.

Re: I replaced Windows with Linux and everything's going great

#160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>unify the look and feel of mobile and desktop Lol, that's what Microsoft tried 10+ years ago and everybody gave them shit for it, especially Apple fans. Now Apple is "inventing" this again.

Ubuntu also tried this with Unity. They were hoping that Ubuntu would become more popular on tablets if they had a more tablet-friendly UI... They imposed this on desktop users even though nobody asked for it and basically nobody used Linux on a tablet. It was kind of a disaster. Ubuntu is a commercial entity though, so yeah, prone to the same kind of bad management decisions. as Microsoft and Apple. At least with Li…

The thing is, Unity was great as a UI even on desktop. The main issue was poor performance early on.
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