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Microsoft forced me to switch to Linux

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Re: Microsoft forced me to switch to Linux

#831

Post by maccard »

ryukoposting wrote: post #259

I just started a new job where I'm subjected to Windows 11. They gave me a behemoth of a laptop. 64GB of RAM, absolute screamer of a CPU, big GPU, the whole deal. Windows 11's file browser lags when opening directories with more than 100-ish files. Windows 11's file browser takes a few seconds to open at all. Context menus take a noticeable amount of time to appear. I'm getting used to a new keyboard, so I keep hitti…

Honestly - I think it must be a laptop thing. I have a similar spec laptop [0] for work, and it's... borderline unusable. I can ignore the upsells, always online, etc but the OS is just fundamentally falling apart more and more every other release. If I unplug the power cable, it throttles itself to the point of being neutered, and if I try to put it to sleep it _very regularly_ will just stay awake and drain its own battery.

My work desktop on the other hand (i9, 64GB ram, 4080 GPU) is absolutely screaming and I have some of the same problems but they're nowhere near as bad.

I don't think I could genuinely buy another windows laptop.

[0] https://www.dell.com/en-uk/shop/laptops-2-in-1-pcs/dell-xps-...

Re: Microsoft forced me to switch to Linux

#832

Post by maccard »

Aurornis wrote: post #633
ryukoposting wrote: post #259

I just started a new job where I'm subjected to Windows 11. They gave me a behemoth of a laptop. 64GB of RAM, absolute screamer of a CPU, big GPU, the whole deal. Windows 11's file browser lags when opening directories with more than 100-ish files. Windows 11's file browser takes a few seconds to open at all. Context menus take a noticeable amount of time to appear. I'm getting used to a new keyboard, so I keep hitti…

> Windows 11's file browser lags when opening directories with more than 100-ish files. Windows 11's file browser takes a few seconds to open at all. > Context menus take a noticeable amount of time to appear. I can almost guarantee this is from some endpoint management software your company installed. I have a Windows 11 workstation that I use all the time for some CAD software and the occasional game. Everything is…

> I can almost guarantee this is from some endpoint management software your company installed.

I disagree. I've got windows defender as the only endpoint software on both my daily driver machines, and I see the same issues.

In 2019, I was working for a place that installed Carbon Black on my desktop and it went from fast to unusable overnight. I've since changed jobs, and I've seen a decay in the baseline of the OS over the last 6 years.

Re: Microsoft forced me to switch to Linux

#833

Post by fasterik »

mixmastamyk wrote: post #781
fasterik wrote: post #689

With Windows 10 EOL, I had to decide whether to upgrade my laptop to Windows 11 or Linux. I've been a Windows user for decades, but with all the user-hostile bullshit coming out of Microsoft and the degradation of performance on Windows 11, I decided to go with Ubuntu instead. I'm still on a Windows 11 desktop for the time being, but seriously considering switching there as well. The main thing stopping me is the und…

Recommend to split your music workstation from your personal files machine to get some privacy back. Then run cleanup scripts to pare Windows down to the bone. Also Mint over Ubuntu.

Why Mint over Ubuntu? I like the Ubuntu experience out of the box. It seems to handle high-DPI and per-display UI scaling well, due to Wayland. From what I've read, Mint still uses X11.

Re: Microsoft forced me to switch to Linux

#835

Post by signal11 »

Aurornis wrote: post #633
ryukoposting wrote: post #259

I just started a new job where I'm subjected to Windows 11. They gave me a behemoth of a laptop. 64GB of RAM, absolute screamer of a CPU, big GPU, the whole deal. Windows 11's file browser lags when opening directories with more than 100-ish files. Windows 11's file browser takes a few seconds to open at all. Context menus take a noticeable amount of time to appear. I'm getting used to a new keyboard, so I keep hitti…

> Windows 11's file browser lags when opening directories with more than 100-ish files. Windows 11's file browser takes a few seconds to open at all. > Context menus take a noticeable amount of time to appear. I can almost guarantee this is from some endpoint management software your company installed. I have a Windows 11 workstation that I use all the time for some CAD software and the occasional game. Everything is…

>> Windows 11's file browser lags when opening directories with more than 100-ish files. Windows 11's file browser takes a few seconds to open at all

> I can almost guarantee this is from some endpoint management software your company installed.

You can repro this on demo Surface laptops at Costco. It’s not a good look when expensive laptops render their darn File Explorer slowly.

Also re endpoint management, corporate Macs also have endpoint management and still provide better experience vs corporate Windows PCs.

Microsoft isn’t a mute participant in the corporate device market. Their recommendations and best practices carry enormous weight. Windows division can work with security vendors and customers to improve UX. But they maybe haven’t done enough. Maybe because Windows is an increasingly small fraction of Microsoft’s bottom line? Who knows.

But today you’ll see increasing numbers of Macs in even super-Windows-heavy workplaces, especially in digital/cyber/AI/leadership roles. That’s not a one-company quirk.

Re: Microsoft forced me to switch to Linux

#836

Post by MarsIronPI »

throwawaysoxjje wrote: post #678
ryandrake wrote: post #516

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple does this all the time, though, and seems to get a free pass here. I have four Macs in my home, and they are cut off at Ventura (for the 2017 iMac), Monterey (for the 2014 Mac Mini and the 2015 MacBook Air), and El Capitan (for the 2014 iMac). They are all stuck at 3, 4, and 5 major OS versions back. Nobody really seems to complain about this, though.

Because Apple been continuously doing deprecating hardware regularly since the mid 90s. And they’ll processor architecture every 10-15 years. Microsoft was the backward compatibility king.

Though it's kinda funny that Wine can run Windows applications that Windows can't.

Windows doesn't support 16bit apps anymore, but Wine (at least Wine <9.0) still does.

Re: Microsoft forced me to switch to Linux

#837

Post by notenlish »

varispeed wrote: post #541
ryukoposting wrote: post #259

I just started a new job where I'm subjected to Windows 11. They gave me a behemoth of a laptop. 64GB of RAM, absolute screamer of a CPU, big GPU, the whole deal. Windows 11's file browser lags when opening directories with more than 100-ish files. Windows 11's file browser takes a few seconds to open at all. Context menus take a noticeable amount of time to appear. I'm getting used to a new keyboard, so I keep hitti…

If it's Intel then it might not be fully down to Windows 11. The PC laptops are universally crap. I had a few latest ones, Ultra 9 and they are atrocious. Experience reminds me using a netbook in early 2010s. I would refuse to work anywhere without a Mac. If x86 then it would have to be linux, as that would be passable (apart from fan noise).

Panther Lake and Lunar Lake are pretty good I'd say. Intel has been improving.

Re: Microsoft forced me to switch to Linux

#838

Post by sunnyps »

delta_p_delta_x wrote: post #216
jsheard wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Wayland has fractional scaling as a sort-of workaround if you can tolerate the entire screen being blurry. Every other major OS can deal with this. I think Windows is the only other one which really does this properly, macOS also does the hack where they simulate fractional scales by rendering with an integer scale at a non-native resolution then scaling it down.

> I think Windows is the only other one which really does this properly Windows is the only one that does this properly. Windows handles high pixel density on a per-application , per-display basis. This is the most fine-grained. It's pretty easy to opt in on reasonably modern frameworks, too; just add in the necessary key in the resource manifest; done. [1] Linux + Xorg has a global pixel density scale factor. KDE/Qt…

ChromeOS also does fractional scaling properly because Chrome does it properly. The scaling factor is propagated through the rendering stack so that content is rastered at the correct scale from the beginning instead of using an integer scaling factor and then downscaling later. And it takes subpixel rendering into account too, which affects things like what elements can be squashed into layers backed by GPU textures.

I think Android does it properly too because they have to handle an entire zoo of screen sizes and resolutions there. Although they don't have the issue of dealing with subpixel rendering.

Re: Microsoft forced me to switch to Linux

#839

Post by maccard »

pier25 wrote: post #116

> You had unsaved work? Too bad, it's gone, get bent. This has happened to me a couple of times. I put the PC to sleep and the next morning I discover it has decided to close everything to install an update. Not using Windows ever again to do any work. Say what you will about Apple but at least they don't do crap like this.

the flip side of this is I can't count the number of times that cropping a screenshot in paint and leaving it in the background has partially stopped my PC from rebooting, and I've discovered the following morning that "you have unsaved work" on paint interrupted the shutdown and i need to do the shutdown _again_.

Re: Microsoft forced me to switch to Linux

#840

Post by BLKNSLVR »

> Basic operations are so much faster on Linux. Opening directories,

The fact that "opening directories" is something specifically mentioned as a point of difference hints to me that there is something terribly wrong in Microsoft / Windows -land.

If "opening directories" isn't a solved problem in any Operating System that's no longer in beta, never mind one that's been around for 30-odd years, there's something rotten in the foundations.

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