From OS X to Ubuntu • Hacker News Board

Re: From OS X to Ubuntu

#181

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Jan 10, 2017, 5:33 AM UTC

developer2 wrote: post #104

timtadh wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Linux laptops: buy pre-installed. If you want linux and you want to be sure everything is functional, AND you don't want to devote lots of time to a "project" buy a pre-install. Dell Developer Edition laptops (XPS 13, 15) make great laptops. I hear good things about system 76 and purism as well. Save time. Support having good laptops and good drivers. Buy pre-installed. Paying the "windows tax" and installing a Linux…

>> Linux laptops: buy pre-installed. The fact that hardware - though much improved in the past 15 years - is still a crapshoot on Linux, particularly when it comes to laptop hardware, is so frustrating. Windows will work on practically any combination of hardware. OS X will work on any hardware it is permitted to operate on. Linux is the only consortium of operating systems that still suffer from the inability to "ju…

[deleted]

Re: From OS X to Ubuntu

#182

Post by viraptor » Tue, Jan 10, 2017, 5:34 AM UTC

phongngtuan wrote: post #154

viraptor wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Previous generation X1. Easily getting 6h of scripting. (As in, no heavy compiler or processing needed) Slightly warm, but no issues with heat.

Tbh that does not sound very good for a flagship model...

I've never seen a laptop actually survive longer than 7h practically. The advertised battery life may say >10, synthetic benchmarks may say a bit lower. But once you use it with wifi on, with proper brightness, actually doing some work - no - it always takes a big hit.

Re: From OS X to Ubuntu

#183

Post by qplex » Tue, Jan 10, 2017, 5:36 AM UTC

developer2 wrote: post #104

timtadh wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Linux laptops: buy pre-installed. If you want linux and you want to be sure everything is functional, AND you don't want to devote lots of time to a "project" buy a pre-install. Dell Developer Edition laptops (XPS 13, 15) make great laptops. I hear good things about system 76 and purism as well. Save time. Support having good laptops and good drivers. Buy pre-installed. Paying the "windows tax" and installing a Linux…

>> Linux laptops: buy pre-installed. The fact that hardware - though much improved in the past 15 years - is still a crapshoot on Linux, particularly when it comes to laptop hardware, is so frustrating. Windows will work on practically any combination of hardware. OS X will work on any hardware it is permitted to operate on. Linux is the only consortium of operating systems that still suffer from the inability to "ju…

>Linux is the only consortium of operating systems that still suffer from the inability to "just work out of the box".

Google the laptop model + Linux before you buy it. That increases the odds of getting a "it works out of the box" experience.

You'll also usually find pretty straightforward instructions how to get things going quickly if they do not work out of the box, or the simple fact that the machine is not well supported.

Also, if you had done enough Windows installs you'd know that things very seldom "work out of the box" if you do a clean install, especially with laptops. Instead, you'll have a fun time hunting bloated driver packages from some slow obscure chinese FTP server.

In addition hardware support on Windows gets worse over time. For example: Have an older Samsung laptop, wanna run Windows 10? Tough luck. [1]

On Linux you'll have this problem _very_ rarely, if ever, as hardware support (among other things) keep improving over time.

[1] http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/05/31/windows_10_samsung_f...

Re: From OS X to Ubuntu

#184

Post by hobarrera » Tue, Jan 10, 2017, 5:39 AM UTC

anuragsoni wrote: post #166

ePierre wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Save time. Support having good laptops and good drivers. Buy pre-installed. Paying the "windows tax" and installing a Linux on a windows laptop isn't just more work, it is bad for the ecosystem. I wish I could. Unfortunately, I live in a country (Taiwan) where no one knows about Linux. It's impossible to buy a pre-installed Linux laptop here. You know the most ironic part? My job here is to certify hardware (includ…

There was another post on hackernews today about some new Dell ubuntu-based workstations[1]. The webpage that the post refers to mentions worldwide availability, so maybe dell might be an option for you at some point? [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13360339 Also, it looks like that their ubuntu edition and the windows edition of XPS-13 come with the same wireless cards this year (It used to be broadcom on w…

Not sure about GP, but here in Argentina a packages can take lots of months (or just a few days if you're lucky!) to get through customs. Not to mention 50% import tax, amongst other things.

It ends up being so complicated and expensive, that just buying a winbook is cheaper. (fun fact: a plane ticket to NYC plus the price for my MBA is less than what it sells for here!).

Re: From OS X to Ubuntu

#185

Post by chubuntu » Tue, Jan 10, 2017, 5:40 AM UTC

developer2 wrote: post #104

timtadh wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Linux laptops: buy pre-installed. If you want linux and you want to be sure everything is functional, AND you don't want to devote lots of time to a "project" buy a pre-install. Dell Developer Edition laptops (XPS 13, 15) make great laptops. I hear good things about system 76 and purism as well. Save time. Support having good laptops and good drivers. Buy pre-installed. Paying the "windows tax" and installing a Linux…

>> Linux laptops: buy pre-installed. The fact that hardware - though much improved in the past 15 years - is still a crapshoot on Linux, particularly when it comes to laptop hardware, is so frustrating. Windows will work on practically any combination of hardware. OS X will work on any hardware it is permitted to operate on. Linux is the only consortium of operating systems that still suffer from the inability to "ju…

Asterisk show up fine if followed by white space * ... The question is how to show (asterisk)nix?

Apparently three asterisks + nix = *nix

Re: From OS X to Ubuntu

#186

Post by 0max » Tue, Jan 10, 2017, 5:52 AM UTC

On the flip side, I just went from OS X to Windows 10, which has Ubuntu available under developer settings...And now I can play all my old Windows Steam games.

Last time I used Windows for my workhorse was Vista.

Re: From OS X to Ubuntu

#187

Post by techolic » Tue, Jan 10, 2017, 5:53 AM UTC

It should be included some internet law that every article contains a tl;dr section.

Re: From OS X to Ubuntu

#188

Post by flukus » Tue, Jan 10, 2017, 5:57 AM UTC

StavrosK wrote: post #138

rhodysurf wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For personal use its the most up to date and because its rolling release i never have to actually upgrade or wait for releases. Also newer kernels for newer hardware.

Doesn't that break things too often? I always run across at least one breaking change on each new Ubuntu version, and I'd imagine this happens much more often with a rollling release OS, is that not the case? Also, how is packaging? With Ubuntu, someone always has a PPA for everything.

Not based on arch, but in places where I've worked that have adopted continuous deployment models, there are a lot less breaking changes and those breaks are usually smaller and more manageable.

What I'd like is a stable base system with cutting edge apps, but I don't know if any distro offers this.

Re: From OS X to Ubuntu

#189

Post by flukus » Tue, Jan 10, 2017, 6:00 AM UTC

mtw wrote: post #24

SloppyStone wrote: post #18

If only Linux had decent image editors... I would have made the jump years ago, but Gimp and Inkscape ain't just cutting it.

Same for me - last I checked, Gimp's UI is too damn awful. But I only need 5% of PHotoshop's features (smart selection, fill with color, resize, crop, optimize for web) to optimize images for web work

Does this apply to the single window mode as well?

Re: From OS X to Ubuntu

#190

Post by willismichael » Tue, Jan 10, 2017, 6:01 AM UTC

renownedmedia wrote: post #172

I've been switching back and forth between OS X and Linux for the past several years. I'm currently at a year and a half into a Linux streak and really enjoying recent advancements. My Dell XPS 13 typically gets 10 hours of battery life. Linux itself is quite stable. Simply install a recent distro and off you go. If you're using a heavy Window Manager you'll get all the convenient configuration applets you need. The…

Oh come on, I've been a Linux enthusiast for over a decade now and it's been years since I've even touched xorg.conf, installed a kernel that didn't come from a standard repo, or had trouble rebooting due to a change I made to the system.

Linux has gotten significantly less painful over the years, and it's not just that I'm more familiar with it now. Installing a mainstream distro these days is easier than the last time I installed Windows (granted, that was XP).

I finally caved and started using a Mac for work. I was afraid that I would like it so much that I would just have to buy one for home, but I actually find Linux is still pleasant to use, I still think I prefer it over Mac OS.