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Windows-as-a-nuisance: How I clean up a "clean install" of Windows 11 and Edge

arstechnica.com

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Re: Windows-as-a-nuisance: How I clean up a "clean install" of Windows 11 and Edge

#11

Post by [deleted] »

gipp wrote: post #5
Night_Thastus wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. Frankly, there's still a lot of software that is either only available on Windows or only works well on Windows. Plus, for all its criticisms, Windows is very good at "just working" out of the box without having to fiddle with it. For 99% of of people out there, that's preferable to all the headaches you can get under Linux. And for gaming, yes, it's still essentially the only real option. Out of the library of…

IME just enabling experimental proton support in Steam is enough to run 75-85% of games I'm interested in.

[deleted]

Re: Windows-as-a-nuisance: How I clean up a "clean install" of Windows 11 and Edge

#12

Post by vsgherzi »

gipp wrote: post #5
Night_Thastus wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. Frankly, there's still a lot of software that is either only available on Windows or only works well on Windows. Plus, for all its criticisms, Windows is very good at "just working" out of the box without having to fiddle with it. For 99% of of people out there, that's preferable to all the headaches you can get under Linux. And for gaming, yes, it's still essentially the only real option. Out of the library of…

IME just enabling experimental proton support in Steam is enough to run 75-85% of games I'm interested in.

anything with kernel level anti cheat is a non starter unfortunately...that being said games shouldn't be doing that anyway

Re: Windows-as-a-nuisance: How I clean up a "clean install" of Windows 11 and Edge

#13

Post by itishappy »

gipp wrote: post #2

Is there any good reason for anyone to be installing windows anymore other than locked-in enterprise IT setups? Gaming was the big holdout and even that doesn't feel too relevant these days

Installing Windows involves filling in about 6 inputs then waiting an hour. This results in a device that will happily chug along without user involvement for a decade. (Yes, it will have ads and automatically restart for updates, but frankly most users don't care. I do, and disabling ads and automatic updates took me 30m of digging, and it's been 6 years since I've seen a Windows dialog. I suppose I turned off the "featured articles on lock screen" flag when it was added a few years ago too.) My mother still uses her 10+ year old Surface without issue. She's a non-technical user who's daily drivers are Apple devices.

What value would Linux provide my mother?

Re: Windows-as-a-nuisance: How I clean up a "clean install" of Windows 11 and Edge

#14

Post by hedora »

Night_Thastus wrote: post #3
gipp wrote: post #2

Is there any good reason for anyone to be installing windows anymore other than locked-in enterprise IT setups? Gaming was the big holdout and even that doesn't feel too relevant these days

Yes. Frankly, there's still a lot of software that is either only available on Windows or only works well on Windows. Plus, for all its criticisms, Windows is very good at "just working" out of the box without having to fiddle with it. For 99% of of people out there, that's preferable to all the headaches you can get under Linux. And for gaming, yes, it's still essentially the only real option. Out of the library of…

Strange. About 90% of my windows game library (99% of my windows + dos library) run on Linux.

Only about 50% of my windows game library still runs on windows.

MacOS is even worse: ~33% of my mac games still run on macos; ~90% of them have windows/linux ports that run on Linux.

Re: Windows-as-a-nuisance: How I clean up a "clean install" of Windows 11 and Edge

#15

Post by hedora »

ametrau wrote: post #4
gipp wrote: post #2

Is there any good reason for anyone to be installing windows anymore other than locked-in enterprise IT setups? Gaming was the big holdout and even that doesn't feel too relevant these days

There is not a single good Linux DE. So the other option is macOS. Good hardware but the os is annoying in some parts.

It depends on what you want out of a DE, I guess. I prefer minimalist window managers (evilwm!), though the wayland team seems hell-bent on breaking them.

XFCE, LXDE, etc, are OK compromises, since they let you configure wifi graphically out of the box (they are similar to windows before the whole windows 8 thing). Current KDE is surprisingly good too. I get the impression all of those will continue to work for a long time.

Anyway, the worst thing about MacOS is the window management. It's ridiculously buggy. Just the other day, I couldn't find one of my VS Code windows with the mouse or keyboard. I had to go to the "Window" menu and click on it to get it to open.

Re: Windows-as-a-nuisance: How I clean up a "clean install" of Windows 11 and Edge

#16

Post by hedora »

vsgherzi wrote: post #12
gipp wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IME just enabling experimental proton support in Steam is enough to run 75-85% of games I'm interested in.

anything with kernel level anti cheat is a non starter unfortunately...that being said games shouldn't be doing that anyway

I've never encountered that (though something similar happened with a ubisoft game on my unmodified Nintendo Switch...), but can't you just grab a pirate copy if this happens?

Re: Windows-as-a-nuisance: How I clean up a "clean install" of Windows 11 and Edge

#17

Post by soupbowl »

itishappy wrote: post #13
gipp wrote: post #2

Is there any good reason for anyone to be installing windows anymore other than locked-in enterprise IT setups? Gaming was the big holdout and even that doesn't feel too relevant these days

Installing Windows involves filling in about 6 inputs then waiting an hour. This results in a device that will happily chug along without user involvement for a decade. (Yes, it will have ads and automatically restart for updates, but frankly most users don't care. I do, and disabling ads and automatic updates took me 30m of digging, and it's been 6 years since I've seen a Windows dialog. I suppose I turned off the "…

Windows major updates reset things alot and enable thigs that were disabled. How can you have gone 6 years without seeing a popup when they have added things in the last 6 years during major updates that are enabled by default and show dialogue and notifications. Also you are obviously on windoes 10 and not seen the new nonsense in 11.

My parents prefer Linux because it doesn't pressure them with pop ups and enabling new features, it just leaves them alone. If your mom uses a Microsoft account and is happy with windows then Linux would be a nuisance to her as windows popups were for my parents.

Re: Windows-as-a-nuisance: How I clean up a "clean install" of Windows 11 and Edge

#19

Post by SuperNinKenDo »

gipp wrote: post #2

Is there any good reason for anyone to be installing windows anymore other than locked-in enterprise IT setups? Gaming was the big holdout and even that doesn't feel too relevant these days

Personally I have to keep a Windows VM around for the odd bit of software. Oftentimes it's software made by someone for a very specific workflow in a niche interest, and so it's less compatible either because they hardcode things, or they're just interested in getting the very specific workflow they need working, and not in any "best practices".

Re: Windows-as-a-nuisance: How I clean up a "clean install" of Windows 11 and Edge

#20

Post by SuperNinKenDo »

vsgherzi wrote: post #12
gipp wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IME just enabling experimental proton support in Steam is enough to run 75-85% of games I'm interested in.

anything with kernel level anti cheat is a non starter unfortunately...that being said games shouldn't be doing that anyway

I believe that's less of an issue in Proton now, although for a lot of those cases, the develop has to recompile some stuff. Seems more or less painless, but they do need to make the effort to go and do it.
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