
Reasons to Abandon Windows for Linux - praveenscience
https://www.slashgear.com/reasons-to-abandon-windows-for-linux-06572307/
======
kerng
Use what works for you. Switching sometimes to learn new stuff is great, but
don't lose your productivity.

I have been a long term Windows user (as main machine). I always liked it -
even with the _obvious_ annoyances. I'm pretty savvy at it, so can always fix
issues that arise.

Now at my new job I use a Mac and also a lot more Linux. Its good and I like
the command line but I am still happier when I'm working on a Windows machine
it seems. Mac has its own annoyances and issues, like with display adapters
and memory resets, as well as updates.

So privately I just bought a new Surface Laptop 2 and I'm happy and like the
entire experience. Finally having more native Linux tools makes it much better
experience also (and there is now a native ssh client! Yay!). It's also
powerful enough to run a Linux VM seamlessly at all times- because I also
really like Linux. So why not have both. :)

My advice, just use the one you are most comfortable with and where you know
how to fix things.

~~~
kyriakos
This is a very mature approach. Skipping the fanboyism. Especially now unless
you are doing something very platform specific (e.g. iOS development or need
Visual Studio) all platforms can have a decent workflow for development.

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paulcarroty
The main reason why I use and love Linux: hackability. MS and Apple just can't
produce something comparable 'cause it will hit their closed ecosystem.

~~~
jniedrauer
Windows is pretty hackable. Unfortunately, the documentation is pretty spotty
and often outdated. And you can't go read the source code when you get stuck.

~~~
paulcarroty
> Windows is pretty hackable.

OK, give me sources of Windows bootloader 'cause I need, for example, draw a
green animated dragon instead MS logo. And put this dragon inside Cortana
logo.

~~~
rhn_mk1
It used to be possible to change the boot screen on Windows 9x :)

~~~
ai_ia
Yeah, I remember changing the bootloader windows image to something fancy back
then.

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shawnb576
I tried this last year and eventually gave up.

I definitely prefer the Ubuntu shell experience, command line, etc. They’ve
done a great job.

But the last mile is still too rough. Battery life, sleep/wake, font
rendering, Bluetooth, all still have problems even on a Dell XPS 13 9370.

After a few months I just didn’t want to mess with it and went back.

Windows has gotten a lot better but still does a lot of befuddling and
annoying things. WSL saves it.

~~~
jchw
I think it's unlikely to have a great Linux experience on any random new-ish
laptop. Even some Lenovo laptops are imperfect experiences with Linux,
especially within the first year or two of launch. If you really want to try
Linux seriously, I'd recommend trying it on a desktop instead. Most tower PCs
with stock parts tend to work great, with only minor exceptions (some weird
audio codec setups can be fidgety.)

I don't buy specifically for Linux because I'm willing to deal with the
incompatibilities, but in my experience battery life can be at least
comparable, and sleep/wake/Bluetooth are fine out of the box on all of my
machines. Worst problem I had was my Lenovo P51 and its Nvidia Optimus setup +
docking, but that actually was also kind of tricky in Windows, so I can't
complain too much (and it improved over time.)

Font rendering is the only thing there that you probably want to tweak
regardless. For me, I just prefer disabling hinting and subpixel rendering,
for blurry-but-accurate rendering.

And if you did ever want to switch to Linux as a primary OS, you can base your
hardware purchases around it, which while isn't strictly necessary (I know I
don't) but certainly helps a lot if you just want stuff to work out of the
box.

~~~
MayeulC
I would tend to agree with this. I just do not see myself going back to
Windows any time soon. In my experience, battery use is comparable, and might
be even better on Linux with a few tweaks (powertop/tlp).

Fonts are likely a matter of taste. I personally can't stand how they look on
Windows, to the point where I had difficulties reading off one of my monitor
(and none of the cleartype settings helped). Having quite different font
rendering on multiple screens is something that highly annoys me.

As for hardware, I was probably lucky, and use a nice DELL laptop from my lab.
Sleep doesn't work on my Ryzen desktop, which I don't know how to debug,
though it's only a minor annoyance.

The general reason I use Linux (aside from philosophical/ethical
considerations) is to get my system as lean or as bloated as I want, but
always exactly know what happens on it, how parts fit together and be able to
diagnose and fix a problem is one arises.

~~~
shawnb576
This all has to exist within your tolerance and commitment. In my case I have
limited time and patience (kids, etc). It’s different for everyone.

But the battery and sleep issues aren’t close. On Windows I get probably
double the battery, maybe more. With Linux I had to hard reset out of sleep on
a regular basis, never mind if I had it connected to a monitor.

Again I really want it to work. I really enjoyed it and learned a lot. Maybe
next year I’ll try again. But in reality I’ll prob just get a new MacBook,
it’s really the best of all worlds imho.

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bluedino
>> Whereas Windows updates are often laggy and frequently require reboots,

Windows update processes regulary pegs my cpu for minutes at a time. Why does
this come out of nowhere and totally hog my system?

~~~
resonious
The Windows update situation is one of the primary reasons I've switched all
my machines to Linux. It's infuriating to open my laptop for something quick -
either to show someone something or to get some work done on the bus - and be
greeted by an inescapable update screen that lasts minutes.

~~~
kyriakos
latest news are that MS is phasing out the forced updates or at least letting
all users no matter which edition of windows they are running to postpone
updates. this will go live with the next big update 19H1 which should be out
in a month.

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sebazzz
> Highly customizable, especially the desktop interface

That entirely depends on the desktop environment. I know GNOME 3 was very hard
to tweak when it just came out. I always enjoyed GNOME 2 with Compiz though.

> A curated software catalog like mobile platforms

That has some things to iron out regarding the usability perspective. I
removed some office apps from my xfce4 desktop, and Ubuntu also decided to
remove other apps like xcfe4-session-logout, so I couldn't logout anymore.
These things shouldn't happen.

My fresh xfce4 desktop always shows a "system error". Why? I don't know.

Years after years I tried Linux (Ubuntu actually, which I expect to be the
most stable) desktop but it still is not polished. As a sysops/devops I know
what to do, but the average user doesn't. But even then, I don't want to
troubleshoot my desktop after I have just installed it.

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thunderbong
Nothing here that programmers don't know.

And there's nothing in the article that a myriad of regular users face on a
daily basis when it comes to computers that Windows solves.

------
Insanity
It depends on what you do with it in the end. For programming, I feel much
more comfortable on a linux machine rather than windows.

If you're a gamer, it's probably the opposite. :)

~~~
Zhyl
Gaming has come a thousand miles in the last 18 months. It's now possible for
a relatively layman user to be able to install and run games using steam and
lutris with no issues.

~~~
Insanity
I am doing so on Linux, and with the (relatively old) games I play I have no
problems. But drivers and performance can take quite a hit for recent games,
in my experience.

------
clircle
I thought I could jump from Windows to Ubuntu on my gaming computer after
Valve did all that great work on Photon. Not quite. Ubuntu couldn't connect to
my bluetooth xbox controller, and would never reconnect to wifi after resume
or restart.

I do prefer the speed, workflow, and several other things about the Ubuntu
desktop, but as I only need to play games on that computer, it's not worth it.

My laptop has always been Ubuntu though, as Linux is the best bootloader for
Emacs.

~~~
peatmoss
We swapped out Windows for Linux on our TV-connected video game PC, and have
had pretty good luck. Windows 10 was getting really obtrusive with its ads for
stuff like Office 365, as well as frequently making games stutter because it
decided that it needed to start an update in the background right then. I’m
sure some of the Windows issues could have been fixed by someone more familiar
with Windows, but I mostly saw Proton as a way out.

Xubuntu installed easily for me, and Proton has done a good job for all the
titles I’ve tried. But the games themselves are a bit more of a hassle than
Windows. I had to dig around in Steam to enable Proton for every game.

My wife and I recently played Divinity in split screen (Linux native) and
occasionally ran into audio issues if the game had been running for a shameful
number of hours. Divinity 2 (Windows version), doesn’t work out of the box,
though ProtonDB forums had a straight forward fix. So far, I think Divinity 2
in Proton might be at least as stable as the Linux version of the original.

But... it’s a bit of a gamble. I mean, I bought D2 on sale so it’s not a huge
loss if a game doesn’t work out, but also you want to play the game. So,
there’s always a little voice asking “will it work?” that you don’t have with
Windows.

We have two Steam controllers, which probably makes things a little easier for
us. For whatever reason, we grew to like the Steam controllers and have stuck
with them. I would guess that the Bluetooth controllers would be harder. I
haven’t gotten the hang of making bluetooth work anywhere really, and I could
imagine the interplay of bluetooth, steam, and proton all to be a bit
problematic.

On balance, I’ll probably not move our game machine back to Windows barring
some title I really want to play early in the release cycle. The hassles of
Linux feel like things I can figure out, whereas the hassles of Windows feel
like I’m fighting the established order imposed by a product manager at
Microsoft.

------
blakesterz
I rather like this list. My main everyday work machine is an Ubuntu 18 box,
it's 99% awesome. Everything works, I almost never have troubles. I've been
working like this for years now. I spend all day working on Linux and
supporting Linux servers and other open source projects. BUT I can't get USB
headphones to work. It drives me CRAZY. This is such a stupid basic thing that
"just works" on every other OS but Ubuntu just fails me totally on 2 different
boxes. I've tried EVERYTHING I don't want to even think about the amount of
time I've waster. So yeah, reason #1 I can't abandon Windows is because USB
headsets don't work on (my) Linux. This sounds like a stupid little thing, but
it's a big pain for me.

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analognoise
I just use MSYS2. Everything I want from Linux, nothing I don't.

------
karmakaze
I use macOS at work, Linux desktop at home and a Surface Go.

The HiDPI/multi-monitor support on Linux is still lacking and I haven't tried
it on batteries. It's great when your dev and prod use the same OS and web/db
stack versions.

The Surface Go is surprisingly usable which I wasn't expecting from a Windows
platform. I never use my 13 MBP anymore. So much so that if I need a more
powerful laptop, I'd opt for a Surface Pro rather than any Apple product.

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anotheryou
Can I be honest? With emacs and firefox as my daily drivers I'm relatively
platform agnostic, but I feel too old for the switch.

I was bound to windows to do work for far too long (adobe and no mac) and have
close to 300 apps installed. I don't want to bother to set up all my tools
again, rewrite my ahk scripts, search for these niche programs (if
alternatives exist at all) etc.

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tyingq
I have a Linux desktop, but disagree with this notion in the article:

 _" Highly customizable, especially the desktop interface"_

Basic stuff, like changing the font size in the main "start menu", or having
an on screen keyboard for the lock screen is either hard or impossible.
Varies, of course, with whether you're running Gnome 3, MATE, etc. But, they
all have big quirks.

~~~
swebs
>having an on screen keyboard for the lock screen is either hard or impossible

It's dead simple in Gnome. In the settings menu, under Universal Access, just
check the box that says "Screen Keyboard".

~~~
tyingq
Yes, as mentioned, problems vary with the desktop. In this case it's MATE that
can't have an on-screen keyboard on the lock screen...even though you can have
one on the login screen.

Edit: There is a workaround (switch user button, enable, go back), but there
are other desktops with no work around, like Cinnamon.

~~~
yebyen
> Highly customizable, especially the desktop interface

The freedom to choose MATE, which doesn't solve this issue for you, is
included in that statement. But this "Highly customizable" vs "uniform
experience" on the other hand, are mutually exclusive descriptors.

Freedom of software choice includes the freedom to take away complexity. In
this case, assuming that you have a keyboard and it interfaces in the usual
way, without overlapping the screen, and that it works and you can use it, all
drastically simplify quite a lot of complexity that the developer would
otherwise have to prepare consideration for on your behalf.

Don't you prefer that developers of orthogonal software packages each are
individually free to spend that time on other concerns? I'm almost certain
that you could also be starting from the gnome login screen into the MATE
desktop manager, or use MATE with LightDM, or some other login screen that
does support on-screen keyboards, if you really need it.

And sure, that's extra work for you, and it's sometimes a little bit harder
than configuring Windows, but you only have to do a customization once if
you're happy with the result.

~~~
tyingq
That might make sense if the login screen also didn't have an on-screen
keyboard. But it does have one. That makes it pretty clear it was an
oversight. They do have a fix in MATE now, it's just not yet backported to a
current Linux distro.

~~~
AnIdiotOnTheNet
And this is my biggest problem with Linux: that you generally have to either
rely on the distro and repo maintainers to get up to date software or compile
from source. That's completely ridiculous.

~~~
yebyen
In Debian unstable, many of the packages are submitted from upstreams (eg. the
folks that made the software.) The bar is simply "Debian developer" uploads
the package, as I understand it. The Debian developer may or may not be the
upstream source.

In Debian testing and stable, you're getting software that has been through a
longer and involved peer review process by Debian maintainers. That's not
ridiculous, that's why you would use a stable distro in the first place.
Because it doesn't put so much trust in upstream vendors to always put out
consistently good production-quality releases without adding any new bugs in
them.

I don't recommend using stable distros for anything but production machines,
and those you keep to approximate them (like say, staging machines).

------
Theodores
Wasn't sold by the article.

Trying to suggest to Windows users that they abandon their platform for Linux
is a bit silly really, clickbait at best. People are okay with Windows and
wouldn't be happy on Linux unless they have gone part of the way already, e.g.
struggled with development on some Virtualbox thing and need the productivity
of going native on Linux.

To me the difference between consumer operating systems and Linux is exactly
that - the paid for operating systems are a bit like consumer goods, you
aren't expected to go under the hood. Sure you can use them for software
development but they are designed for running user friendly programs where
everything is made easy.

I think that there are parallels in everything from hairdressing to the
automotive world. If you cut hair then the tools of the trade cost a fortune
and those scissors have to be sharpened monthly or replaced if dropped. You
wouldn't recommend those scissors to someone doing a craft class with their
toddler.

Or in automotive. You can race any consumer grade car but if you get into it
properly then the whole thing is different, no fancy dashboard, rose joints
that you have to replace all the time, a roll cage instead of central door
locking, the thing probably isn't even road legal. And there isn't a 'sports'
of 'M' badge on the back by the time you get into it as full on lifestyle
choice.

Most people don't want to do linux things any more than a non-track-day
motorist wants to open up the bonnet of their lease-financed car on the
motorway (on the way to the in laws).

------
jasonhansel
Also: much less overhead when testing apps intended to run on Linux servers.

------
peterwwillis
Reasons to abandon Linux for Windows:

1\. It works

2\. Lets you use professionally produced, widely supported, best-in-class
software, with support

3\. Hardware works out of the box, rather than taking a week to get it
working, if supported drivers even exist

4\. Updates less likely to brick your hardware

5\. Your company's IT department, your ISP, etc will help you fix it

6\. You don't have to tweak configuration files by hand, run a series of
commands, or call up your cousin's nephew who you heard has used this thing
before

~~~
seba_dos1
Reasons to abandon Windows for Linux:

1\. It works

2\. Lets you use a huge variety of sensibly licensed, high quality software

3\. Hardware works out of the box, unlike my perfectly fine scanner on Windows
which doesn't work on anything newer than XP (except Linux, of course)

4\. Updates less likely to brick your hardware

5\. If something breaks, you'll be able to fix it instead of looking
cluelessly at logs that don't tell you anything.

6\. You can tweak by hand whatever you want

~~~
AnIdiotOnTheNet
> Hardware works out of the box

If it works at all. Maybe.

