If you’re already with Linux, this is not for you. This is for people who’re indecisive or been contemplating for long about whether to make that jump.
For me, it’s a matter of a few things. I’m on a Windows 10 version that guarantees me until 2032 of support. That means I would effectively skip Windows 11, like I already mostly have and potentially skip Windows 12 if that turns out to be a shitty choice. I’d be coming in right in time for whatever Microslop shits out for Win13.
Should Windows 13 suck, I think that’s a consideration. Another consideration is when Valve keeps dropping support for certain Windows versions of Steam. Because I know for a fact they will drop Windows 10 support entirely one day and then Windows 11. I believe it is really stupid that they do this.
By the time my Windows 10 version expires, I’d be getting older, which means I’ll probably care less and less about computer-related things. Going to Linux wouldn’t be a problem since I’d be doing barebones things like browsing and checking e-mail.
And I’d also hope that by 2032, Linux would have better development like easier access to proprietary drivers and software among other things.
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If Infinity Ward’s next game includes a DMZ mode and it’s good, it will probably determine what I do. I’ll probably need a new PC to play it. I’ve got a 1080 and I’m on Windows 10. I play ARC Raiders with no problem now. But if I have the money, and DMZ2 is fun, and it requires Windows, I’ll probably get a new PC with the next Windows. If it doesn’t, I’ll probably just switch my current PC over to some flavor of Linux, and maybe put that money to a down payment of a house. It’ll probably be about the same amount by that point.
I’d need a good reason to use my PC. The one I bought a few years back has, at most, 50 hours of use since coming out the box. Based on all the Linux communities posts, I’d spend more time than that just installing distros and troubleshooting my graphics card. I suspect the main reason people haven’t switched to Linux is bc 99% of desktop computers are owned by corporations not people
get Cricut design space studio to work over USB in a bottle, without having to run a whole damn windows virtual machine
I’m not the only person using the machine, and the only other user wants to use a cricut, which requires design space studio
I tried some things on reddit but people trying to figure this specific thing out is a recent development but it just happens to apply to me
There are 2 barriers for me:
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Ease of access - I haven’t found a distro that I can just download and install. They all require some sort of third-party software that runs the installation. Which means I usually end up struggling to find a tutorial that actually works with the distro I chose.
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Driver issues - The only thing I want to do is run a browser. I stream movies. Seems simple, but I’ve yet to find a distro that will smoothly stream. I’ve tried various browsers.
In fairness, I’m using a single laptop for this purpose, so maybe it’s a hardware issue? Dunno, don’t care, just want things to work.
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Mint and Fedora both have live images that dial function as test images and install media. Move your data off your drive, install, put it back. It’s super simple to make them using Rufus.
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You can test how well they stream from the live image.
Thanks for this, I’ll check it out!
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For me it’s because I have an iPhone and Windows has at least some compatibility with it, mainly for syncing my local music collection to my phone so I can listen with Apple Music offline. While it can be a pain, at least it works. If I were to use Linux I would need a way to transfer files between Linux and iPhone so I can listen to my music on a third party iPhone music player app, which I also haven’t found a good solution for yet. If anyone has any suggestions I’m all ears!
VLC will let you do this! This is how I got all of my music off of my Linux machine over to my iPad and iPhone. I haven’t tried transferring from iPhone back to Linux, however.
The iPhone is intentionally incompatible with Linux, or at least it was. They dropped support for Linux over 10 years ago.
If I could find something like AltSnap on Linux I would move like, this week.
I know some of the features may already be part of Linux but I use this program pretty extensively and I don’t know much about Linux desktops and how they control.But anyway I’m gonna move to Linux anyway, I have a date in my calendar later this year and my friend is gonna help me switch to it.
I use the “windows” key and click to drag windows around quite a bit. It came as part of KDE.
Anticheat support for this MFer
I tried to migrate to “The finals” but … not the same
I get that there are different Distros and that having options is great, but it’s a double edged sword. It also means that things get more complicated and some get more support than others.
If I commit to Linux then my whole house will switch to that Distro because I don’t have time to figure and support >4 PCs with similar but different OSs.
Autocad - for work
Photoshop - for work
Getting more software companies to support.
Make the terminal easier to use. I don’t use it often but when I do I waste an average of 15min just trying to find a guide or wiki. A help file or built in guide would be nice
Everyone that uses Linux, expects you to be a Linux expert
Steam is great but a native GOG app would be nice. Instead of Herolauncher
Anti cheat support from games
Hardware support. Just finding drivers for peripherals is sometimes more trouble than it’s worth
Generally make it more inviting to new users
More support for WINE and Proton
Getting a new computer or getting internet that belongs in the modern age.
My laptop from MSI for some stupid reason has raid on the 2 primary drives, so if I put Linux on it I gotta get my almost 4tb of games back. That has taken me a long time to download, my home internet is rarely over 1MBPS. New computer, remove raid if the morons put it there, then Linux. Presuming all my games work, haven’t checked but I presume most do.
I’m a whole lot less computer literate than I was when I attempted it in my 20s, I also really only play some games nowadays and binge watch stupid on YouTube… the computer has become less of my life in my 40s so learning a new system sounds like… work.
Look, to be perfectly honest, I’ve had to do far less “computery” bullshit on Linux. After about six months of everything just working fast and flawless, I realised Windows is the OS that requires a pretty high level of computer literacy. Even installing Linux is a simple and quick breeze compared to Windows.
All it took was a final, “Oh, for fuck’s sake! That’s it! I’m fucking done!” moment. I just didn’t want to do it anymore. Never had one since. Using a computer is a nice thing again.
I 100% recommend Linux for grandparents!
I think this experience is possible, but it’s a bit lucky; requiring every piece of hardware to match, and no software needs to represent hurdles.
I’ve fought a few of those hurdles and they haven’t been so bad. I think your experience is great when it happens, but it’s hardly a guarantee.
It’s fast and easy and no big deal until you want to do something radical like create a shortcut and pin it to your taskbar, or share a folder on a home network. Or share your screen with a TV… there have been too many damn times where I’ve wanted to do something that should be simple and the matter of a couple clicks but it sends me down a rabbit hole chasing dependencies and searching terminal commands and spending hours doing something that takes less than a minute on mainstream operating systems. My user experience has drastically improved since I swapped to Plasma but don’t pretend everything works perfectly and intuitively immediately for everyone unless the expected use case is literally turning it on and opening a browser.
This is exactly my experience too, after 6months things just worked. Only Pop_OS’s new major update broke that a little bit, but is now for the most part back to just working like they used to or has been improved.
Windows that I have on a laptop keeps being annoying with its sudden updates that slows down everything, and not taking no for an answer when I press not fucking now or ever.
I empathize with this even as a highly computer literate person who works in tech. I turn 40 this year, and when I’m off the clock, I need to read books, touch grass, and live my life as if I don’t know how computers work.
I think this is a very valid reason. I used to reinstall Windows every 6 months or so for various reasons, switching to Linux wasn’t any more work. But if you don’t enjoy researching, installing OSs, etc then it’s only ever going to feel like a chore.
For me it’s not about whether it is more work or not. It is more along the lines of, tolerating microsoft’s bullshit for any longer. Windows 10 in more ways than one, has teetered me towards the edge of switching. Because I hate stupid mandatory updates, I hate how insultingly stupid it is to use a Windows system these days and every dumb decision Microsoft has made that has turned Windows into what it is and what it will be in the future.
I won’t mind a little work to use my machine, long as it frees me from all of that bullshit.
If the current situation hasn’t gotten you to switch then you’re not gonna switch in 2032. You’ll probably just have some other excuses.
Bazzite seems like it would fit perfectly with you then
I’ve used old computers for phasing out certain social networks - e.g. I’d block Facebook on my main computers, and only access it on my old laptop. That’s been quite effective. You could do that, and just use Linux Mint or Xubuntu on that old laptop. Very real learning necessary, and you do manage to break it somehow, it’s not a big deal.
Lazyness.
I’d try it on a new system but I really don’t want to live migrate my whole system.I still have a machine that runs Windows 10 LTSC. Used to need it to run Adobe softwares, but I get past that now.
Now I need it to run my heavily modded Bethesda games. I can’t get my GOG versions to run through MO2 or NMM even with the help of Steam. I feel really stupid. Heroic Launcher somehow can’t run some Proton supported games on my end, too. My small collection on Steam seems fine, but most of my games are on GOG, I can’t figure out why sometimes Heroic won’t work.
Having the time to dick around and get a linux distro up to my current speed with windows. Or someone else making a distro that mirrors windows 10 capabilities, and utilities (even mundane things like control panel and it’s branches to other settings) and verbose explanations of functionality in the onboard help docs or subtext of options. Or an onboard llm asshole like clippy that can be conversed with om how to accomplish something the linux way.
I think what the linux community misses or forgets is that windows became popular partly because it held people’s hands so much. If linux users want to see the year of linux come to fruition they need to make the distros walk people through a task instead of pointing at the wall and saying “up”.
Conversely I think the linux world says they want everyone to use it but I wonder if they actually want that: everyone using linux means the computing and advertising world pivots and makes linux equivalents of everything, including all the gate keeping, scummy business, malware/adware/tracking…
Some distros’ discord servers and sites have actually set up AI assistants to handle that clippy concept of being able to ask questions without judgmental users responding.
I stayed with Windows largely because their guidance to those actions was generally good, and left when it started sucking - when a Start search for some normal desktop action instead gave a website article that got an automated “Try restarting” answer from an MS volunteer.
I still don’t think Linux guides people all that well (better or worse depending on the distro). These days, I think it does get better than Windows if only because Microsoft got so lazy with their own product.
The “suckyness carryover” isn’t as natural as you think when people can fork distros so easily.
And how would the advertising world even get their shitty software onto your computer? Unlike windows, there isn’t some monolithic corporate entity making decisions about your computer for you.
Your last paragraph nails it. I’m not trying to get the whole world to switch, but I’d be happy to get the like minded peopleout who haven’t switched.
When it stops being a tool that works for me and starts working for corpos, well, then I will be in the minority again.
This topic used to come up all the time on Reddit subs, but this is the first time I can remember seeing it on Lemmy.
It needs to actually work.
No display issues with Nvidia. Working HDR out of the box. The OS and games most pick up the correct resolution both on desktop and running in proton. I need to be able to turn my monitor off and on without having to remove and insert the HDMI.
Same with audio. I need it to correctly detect my HDMI pass through and not need a script to run on boot to pull and grep a changing device id on every fucking update.
Finally I need Bluetooth to not be a total piece of shit and correctly support a controller without latency.
Now, where is the nerd to come screech at me, tell me my issues were fixed a decade ago and that Linux just works perfectly on random hardware and that Linux is so easy an idiot could do it? All the while I spend 40 hours a week on the cli and ide.
Even steam deck has a bunch of issues that nerds will hand wave away.
Hoestly same.
If linux meets your needs, cool. I’m even a little jealous, but please, linux guys, understand that not everyone has the same needs as you.
I need my personal computer to get out of the way and let me do other stuff, not be a project in itself. If you’re a developer, desktop Linux is pretty good at that. Lots of nice compilers and versioning systems and IDEs and runtime environments to play around with. If you’re literally anyone else it just doesn’t cut it.
I have been trying to use Linux since 2009. I keep trying, but it never gets any better for my needs. In fact it has gotten worse.
Sounds like most of your problem is NVIDIA. I don’t have any of that on AMD. But if that’s what you have that’s what you have. I’m not blaming you. Unfortunately NVIDIA (the company) is just not as good about making their stuff work with Linux.
Bluetooth works great for me. At least since I switched from a shitty old Broadcom wireless card to a modern Intel wireless one.
Checks clock. 40m.
So you’re just going to have wave away the other 2/3rd? I get it Nvidia made it a pain in the ass. What excuse for BT, HDMI, and Wi-Fi?
Normal people aren’t going to buy hardware just to use Linux.
Like I said I’m not blaming you. If that’s the reality for you I’m not here to prosthelytize. Maybe you can try again on your next PC if you’re still trying to get away from Windows.
BT
Commented on
HDMI
NVIDIA, along with HDMI audio.
WiFi
Not something you mentioned but honestly not something I’ve had a problem with in 5+ years across a lot of hardware. Except this one old Broadcom card that was pulled from a Mac because I wanted to try Hackintoshing (running macOS on a normal PC).
Your HDMI problems are Nvidia’s fault. WIFI I’ve never had problems unless it’s a shitty WIFI card, BT also works, even with my shitty adapter. No noticable latency on a DualSense controller.
Perfection. No notes.
I would need games to be supported, as well as engineering programs I need like solidworks, ansys, etc
I already use Linux, on and off, but the lack of support for a (proper) CAD program is the biggest issue for me.
I’ve been happy with FreeCAD for my CAD needs, but the stuff I do is pretty simple.
For me, as someone who’s not into esports-games, I just expect games to work on Linux now, and they nearly always do. The exception has been a couple of old or obscure titles that run fine in a virtual machine. I’m not running any fancy version of Linux, just Mint, and the only thing I do to get them to work, is install them on Steam. Proton is amazing.
If you are into esports-games, though, there’s a risk that they’ll require kernel-level anticheat, and Linux does not do that.
It feels like the problem with Linux gaming nowadays, is that people expect you to own your games on Steam. Yes, Steam’s support is excellent now. But my GOG games not so smoothly. Is it because of my obscure hardware? Is it my misconfiguration? Or is it me mod my games the wrong way? I’m still trying to figure out a way to mod my GOG Skyrim through MO2.
Yeah, that does suck. I usually check GOG first for a Linux version, and if it doesn’t exist I buy the game on Steam.
Most games are, but there’s a few asterisks mostly not because Linux is incapable of running it but because there’s super invasive anti-cheac that doesn’t allow it.
I need games to be supported
SteamOS and steam consoles will be really helpful for this I think
Edit: typo
every distro can run games now
I assume you mean games? If so, yeah I’d love to get into steamos stuff if that’s an option for my pc but it’d have to be like a real os not just geared for gaming. Do you have any info on that
Edit: but tbh I probably can’t because like I said I need my work programs
Steam is amazing on any Intel version of Linux. 95% of games work. It’s not true that you have to use Bazzite or SteamOS to play games, I ran a bunch of No Man’s Sky on Manjaro Linux.
I have a steam deck, which is in console mode most of the time, but seems fully capable of acting as a desktop. The only issue is the fact that it’s console shaped, but that’s no fault of the os.
What games aren’t supported that you play?
Most games have worked for years now
