The year of OpenBSD desktop it is, then!
I’m serious, I’m getting burnout not just from Windows, but even from Linux.
And saying that every GUI is easier to use than every TUI or every config file format is wrong.
GUIs can be hard and easy to use. Config file formats can be hard and easy to use.
The fallacy is that GUIs can theoretically be navigated “intuitively” without looking for documentation for setting up stuff, but in fact I dare you try it.
OpenBSD was the easiest system to maintain on desktop I’ve had.
Unfortunately, I wanted Wine and gamez.
OK, no rtw88 for OpenBSD, so … no.
I have an old pc running windows 10, it would be cool if it stops getting updates. Makes for a nice offline pc to get some old apps and games running in the future.
every few years on Linux Discord groups across the internet
“Hi, Windows just stopped support, you guys got any suggestions?”
Mint
“You should definitely try LFS, it’s great and you’ll have exactly what you want!”
“Arch btw! Customize everything and no bloat, hurr durr!”
“NixOS is the future, go for it!”
True, i daily drived arch for 8 years and argued with one who advised arch to windows refugees, some people seriously think that arch is good for people who haven’t used true Linux not one bit in their lives
This shit is what kept me from making the jump for a long time, the hardcores just don’t know how hardcore they are and think the average person can just pick something like that up in an afternoon.
These who don’t know how hardcore they are, don’t touch grass, in short they are basement dwellers that residing in online echo chambers, i mean, i was daily driving arch for 8 years and i know i was hardcore one because i am going to university and working on a job, i mean i am seeing people and comparing myself to them, and those who seriously thinking that everyone can pick up linux in an afternoon, these people not having enough socialisation that’s for sure
Hopefully instead of turning into a bunch of e-waste, a bunch of “useless” desktops flood refurbishers, and refurbished desktops become even cheaper. I wouldn’t mind replacing my dying media server.
I’m probably one of the last people who use Win 8.1. The only thing I use there is Smart Switch to back up my phone. For everything else, there is Mint. I’ll keep up with that setup until my hardware fails.
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Literally moved everything to Linux (Nobara) like 3 weeks ago and the only thing I can’t get to work is Bizhawk which I can easily get around. It’s insane how far Linux has come for gaming and whatnot.
I was thinking how, back in the day, the most popular web browser was IE, which wasn’t on Linux. Now the most popular browser is Chrome, which has been on Linux since 2009 or whenever it was.
And of course lots of other big software is on Linux, like VS Code, Zoom, Slack, Skype. And Linux is on the Steam Deck. So yes I agree, Linux has come a long way.
Frrr I distrohopped alot till I landed to cachyos its not that bad anymore
Windows 10 will have been around for 10 years at that point. That’s a pretty good run. You know another OS that is stopping support after 10 years? Ubuntu 14 LTS, but no one complains about that. People freaked out when Windows 7 went EOL, and XP before that.
XP was kind of a F up for MS, they gave us a really decent OS that raised our expectations. People ran that for almost 2 decades because no one wanted the new OS’s MS was putting out like ME and Vista. Win 8 was out when XP support fully ended and many people chose to go with the older Win 7 because it was less intrusive and more like a PC OS instead of trying to become like a Apple/phone/tablet interface. XP>Win 7>Win 10>Win 11 imo and all the unmentioned weren’t worth upgrading for, but I don’t use my phone for the internet and I’ve been using a PC for over 40 years. We like what’s familiar and we can use without having to think too much about the tool used to achieve what we’re doing. I have Win 11 on a laptop and I have to jump through a lot more hoops to control my desktop, who can pull my info, what can install, what can run in the background. And every update I have to do it again because they add shit back in again along with new stuff I don’t want or need. Win 10 professional at least minimized how often they’d add new stuff or change my existing settings. Win 11 Pro doesn’t seem nearly as friendly.
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I just find it fucking hilarious that people expect software to be supported in excess of 10 years, paid or not, when that’s never really been the case over the past 40 years of software. Sure someone will probably come up with an edge case somewhere, but if you developed software, and continually released versions and updates, would you want to maintain a version you released that long ago?
I just used Emacs a little while ago. A piece of software that’s been supported since fucking 1985. There is no technical reason for Windows 11 not to work on a machine that’s only a few years old and ran 10 just fine. It’s literally still the same NT kernel. In the past, you could still upgrade, and your computer might slow down and struggle a bit to run the newer OS, but it did run. This time, for the first time, they are forcibly cutting off older PCs for no good reason other than the TPM bullshit.
Spit out that corporate Kool aid.
Linux works fine on older machines and can give them new life.
I recently had to use a smart phone that is over 10 years old (Samsung Galaxy S5 mini) and believe it or not, YouTube and Facebook Messenger still worked. It was slow a hell but it still worked fine.
It’s not an expectation of 10 years of software but hardware support. I’m sure people would have upgraded to W11 if they could but unimaginable amount of hardware is going to be stranded for the dubious benefits of TPM 2.0.
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Linux booted on a machine from 1971.
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/09/hacker-boots-linux-on-intels-first-ever-cpu/
Well, MS did at one point say Windows 10 would be the last windows and they’d just keep updating it.
mine hasnt been updated for about 3.5 years now. not having online access has its moments
But you had to fax this comment in.
see? your limited understanding of the many ways to communicate are on full display
I’m curious. How are you sending these messages without Internet access? I too am ignorant to the many ways of achieving this.
a little doodad called a cell phone
…which has internet access?
This will be the best thing that ever happened to Linux. Hell, it might even make it up to 4.5% market share.
Linux is already at 4.5%
https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/desktop/worldwide/
Last I heard it was 4%.
Maybe it will make 5% next year, then.
Can’t wait! Cheap linux laptops are abound!
Prices of Windows 11 incompatible hardware have been dropping like a rock all year as companies upgrade their fleets, and it’ll get far more pronounced once consumers start getting squeezed to upgrade to continue using software XYZ
7th gen Intel laptops with GPUs are already really cheap
If I were to buy used laptop, I’d want 8th gen or newer because that’s where intel finally made more than dual core for mobile.
Unfortunately when there’s 11 will install on an 8th as long as it has a TPM.
Ah, so there won’t be overflow of big bussiness 8th gen laptops… Nevermind, I’d still avoid 7th gen myself.
11 losses support for 7th gen or earlier and non-TPM enabled equipment.
You might still be able to find something newer that lacks TPM.
Alternatively, we don’t really know why they chose 7th gen as the cutoff for sure. It is quite possible that they’re just going by Intel’s own support structure. Until dropped support for 7th gen due to an age out scenario so it’s absolutely possible that in another couple of years still drop support for 8th gen.
I literally daily drive a laptop with a 4c/8t processor (6700-HQ) so I’m not sure what you’re talking about other than perhaps the lower end i5s
Edit to add, my other laptop with a third gen i5 is 2C/4T and getting pretty long in the tooth though, so I wouldn’t go out of my way for something that old though
I mean mainstream processors of that age. Even regular i7s of 7th gen were just dual cores with HT.
I was very confused by your comment so I took a poke around Intel ark. I see what you mean now, most mobile processors for 4th and 6th gen (probably the most common generations for used PCs that are incompatible with 11) have 2c/4t on the U series processors, but looks like any HQ processor gets a full 4 cores and if it’s an i7 it gets hyper threading, putting them closer to parity with their desktop counterparts
Yep, I meant U series, which (at least where I live) were covering vast majority of the market. There was occasional HQ here and there, but not that often. AMDs offerings at the time were mediocre and nobody really used them so for me, that era basically overlaps with Intel U series hegemony when speaking about laptop cpus.
Yeah I hadn’t realized how much laptops from that era sucked compared to now. Granted, that was around the time manufacturers actually started actually trying to make laptops better, but really only current laptops feel similar to desktops and even then because they’re just designed to “race to sleep” any kind of workload that actually pushes them for more than 15 seconds at all it falls over so quickly compared to a moderate desktop.
Desktops with 4th gen and newer chips however have so much life left in them, so it’s an absolute crime that Microsoft’s sending them to the metalchipper
Summary: M$ hates their users more than ever.
I don’t think they think about the user at all.
They want that telemetry/ad money baby!
the enshitification will continue until profits improve
It’s only enshitification for us.
Frankly, I don’t care.
I’m going to keep using Windows 10, updates or not, until I absolutely have no other choice, hoping against hope that the cracks in the Recall/AI monolith with have spread wide enough that a future Win 12 or 13 won’t have them in it. I don’t run a business. I don’t keep sensitive information on any internet capable devices and my work uses the AS400 system.
I know Linux is a thing, and about a dozen years ago I spent a year using Ubuntu exclusively. While appreciating the OS, I got tired of chanting magic spells at computer every time I wanted to use software I liked on it, and so went back to Windows.
These days, despite being a reasonably tech savvy person approaching 60, I’m getting to the point where I’m just not up to learning/relearning an OS unless there is a critical need, and using Windows 10 there just isn’t. At least not for me.
I’m going to keep using Windows 10
Me too. I will be glad to get no updates and not have to worry any more that Microsoft is going to ruin my computer.
The days of “chanting magic spells at computer” being synonymous with the Linux experience are far gone. I recommend you just make a Fedora installer and take it for a spin on the live test system! You don’t need to commit to it to just try it
Some questions:
What version of Linux does Fedora install? Is it directly compatible with Windows software such as games and OBS, or does it require modifications/compatibility installations such as WINE? Does it have documented support online or is it a matter of haunting forums and such for when problems occur? And no matter how solid an OS is, I will tend to break it, generally by doing stupid shit, but I will break it. Before putting it back together. Which is generally how I tend to learn software.
If you are going to play games you might as well go and try Bazzite instead! It’s built on a Fedora base with some good additions:
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It’s atomic: this basically means that everytime yov boot your computer you’ll have the choice of booting onto the newest version of your system, or the one before. If you fuck up anything it’s as easy as reverting to the last version where things were alright!
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It comes with a bunch of preloaded drivers and compatibility layers: makes compatibility with modern games and software as good as you can get it without having to tinker heaps. It’s pretty seamless.
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The installer includes many programs by default. Just tick a few boxes and you can choose to have Spotify, OBS, Discord or Darktable automatically installed in your computer
As for the documented support you can probably go a long way with the Arch, Gentoo and Fedora wikis. Other than that I’m afraid it’s gonna be relying on forums and Reddit. I’ve never irreversably broken my Fedora system for what is worth, and I don’t consider myself that tech savvy!
Game support is also really good these days. Anything that you can play via Steam will basically run. And performance is better for some games on Linux these days! Itch.io also has good support I think. You should be able to run most things that don’t use shady anti-cheat, but forget about League of Legends, Valorant or Fortnite.
I’m not sure what you mean by Linux version! But Fedora (and Bazzite) belong to their own “branch” of Linux, apart from Debian and Arch. Their philosophy is a balance between rock-solid stability (Debian) vs bleeding-edge software (Arch) that many people, including me, think hits the sweet spot quite well!
If there’s anything I missed or you are curious feel free to ask more questions :)
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What version of Linux does Fedora install?
As of this writing, My install of Fedora Linux 40 KDE is running Linux kernel version 6.10.11.
If that’s not what you were asking, Fedora is the distro. It’s a fork of Red Hat, uses the rpm package format, they offer the GNOME desktop by default (the “Workstation” flavor) but several other popular UIs are available.
Is it directly compatible with Windows software such as games and OBS, or does it require modifications/compatibility installations such as WINE?
Linux is not directly compatible with Windows software. Either the developer/publisher of the software must ship a Linux version or a compatibility layer such as WINE muse be used. If you play games on Steam, Steam will pretty much just handle that. There is a setting in Steam’s settings called Enable Steam Play for all other titles which at this point is the “just work” button.
OBS is open source and widely available on Linux. I just now installed it from Fedora’s package manager.
Does it have documented support online or is it a matter of haunting forums and such for when problems occur?
It’s documented and supported a hell of a lot better than Windows is. I don’t know how people use that puddle of shit. I was converting a computer from an HDD + Dell Optane to a regular SSD. Apparently I didn’t quite have the BIOS set up right for this so it gave me an “Install error 0xd2c77e2939a44aa7b5” Which I guess you’re expected to write down on a piece of paper by hand because the Windows installer runs in an incomplete and useless environment. Trying to install Linux on this same machine, I got an error which said “Such and such BIOS setting is probably wrong. You can read more abut it here” and gave a hyperlink to a wiki, which was clickable because this was running in the full desktop LIVE environment, and it also included a QR code link to the same article so you could easily pull it up on a mobile device.
That said a lot of your “hey I’m having this weird issue” is going to take you to the distro’s forums or to Reddit. As if that’s not where most Windows tech support comes from anyway, Microsoft doesn’t answer any questions.
And no matter how solid an OS is, I will tend to break it, generally by doing stupid shit, but I will break it. Before putting it back together. Which is generally how I tend to learn software.
You’ll fit right in here. I once borked a Linux Mint install by uninstalling Python. A LOT of shit broke including the package manager, I couldn’t get Python reinstalled. That was a reinstall of the OS, thankfully I had /home on a separate partition so I could just install the OS around it without touching that and I didn’t even have to restore a backup. That kind of mistake tends not to be the “I just ruined my life” moment that borking Windows is because Linux is faster and easier to install. I’ve never killed a Linux install doing anything “normal” aka what you’d expect to do if you were used to Windows. All except once I was doing goofy things with the system files, and that once I was building a circuit on a Raspberry Pi while it was running, a jumper wire got away from me and touched something on the board and it froze. Had to power cycle it. Probably don’t let random wires touch your motherboard while the computer is running. That’s a Top Gear Top Tip.
What version of Linux does Fedora install?
Whatever resides in its repositories for the specific release of Fedora. What exactly do you need the specific version for? I’m sorry, but this question sounds as if you were trying to imitate some kind of savvyness.
Is it directly compatible with Windows software such as games and OBS,
Linux doesn’t present Windows NT ABI, if that is your question. It’s a different operating system, and it would be a very weird expectation of it to do that.
or does it require modifications/compatibility installations such as WINE?
Wine is a userland implementation of Windows subsystem for NT, only for Unix-likes.
So yes, if you want to run Windows applications, you are going to use Wine.
Does it have documented support online or is it a matter of haunting forums and such for when problems occur?
Good documentation is present, unlike with Windows. Haunting forums is generally not our way of doing things. However, that will yield better results than Windows, too.
And no matter how solid an OS is, I will tend to break it, generally by doing stupid shit, but I will break it. Before putting it back together. Which is generally how I tend to learn software.
I’m not sure you’re an adult. I’m also not sure you’ve written a single line of code in your life.
I’m 58, and the only “code” I’ve ever written is hexadecimal for the Apple ][+ we had back in high school. Which isn’t even remotely close to what actual code is. Thanks for the attempt at insult, but it’s my reality, so fuck you too.
It wasn’t an attempt at an insult. It was an attempt to inform you that the whole comment seemed strange.
That kind of pretense is even more stupid when
and the only “code” I’ve ever written is hexadecimal for the Apple ][+ we had back in high school
it turns out you’ve seen some parts of real computing many people haven’t.
Also sorry for making you feel whatever way, my comment was basically intended to prevent more of that in future.
So, about using it - the advice would be to try something convenient in dualboot (shrink the NTFS, shrink the partition it’s on, install Linux on the freed up space) and see for yourself.
[Children of the Omnissiah plays]
Despite what the fanboys say, linux still isn’t completely ready for primetime. I’ve been a casual linux user for twenty-odd years, and it has come a LONG way from assembling Lego bricks into a usable OS to a mostly plug-‘n-play setup.
There’s plenty of stuff that doesn’t work. Compared to Windows the software isn’t all available. Sound and video can still present difficulties. I moved my Steam library to linux and many of the games work well, but forget it if you’re into AAA online play, anti-cheat software still doesn’t play nice on linux.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s a much more polished and easy to use setup than it’s ever been. But it still doesn’t beat Windows for the amount of mainstream software available and still needs to be irritatingly fiddled with if you want to do anything off the beaten path with it.
What’s the “plenty of stuff that doesn’t work”? And what audio/video issues are you having? Pipewire is miles better than anything Windows can conjure up in latency, quality, and customization. Video is literally just rendering pixels, which works with web browsers, and local video players (mpv and vlc). The only valid complaint is [Windows] software availability.
Audio cracking and popping, sound not working at all, flickering at certain resolutions, not rendering faces properly, some software won’t load at all, some linux apps don’t work correctly, USB ports not working, wireless dongles not working, etc. I’m not going to bore anyone with the full list. I mean, I can tell you’re waiting to pin the blame on me or say something along the lines of “all you have to do is…” and that’s really disingenuous. Either Linux “just works” or it doesn’t. And even as a fan and long-time user…it doesn’t. Not like Windows, anyway.
Not trying to blame you or anything, just stating the facts. It does sound like you don’t want to hear the other side though, and are completely convinced that these issues you’re having are normal to the average Linux system.
Installing a recent version of a normal Linux distribution (Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora, Mint) will come by default with the following: Pipewire server (most likely wireplumber), Wayland, network drivers (except Debian) for most adapters, stable graphics drivers (unless you’re an NVIDIA victim), a DE of your choice (KDE, GNOME, Cosmic, etc). This setup will not have any audio cracking or popping, no flickering at certain resolutions, working USB ports. However, if you’re the type who refuses to update from the unmaintainable Xorg, old pulseaudio/alsa drivers, uses some obscure distribution, uses an NVIDIA GPU, or uses hardware from 2 decades ago, then you’ll have a horrible experience and it will only get worse with time, not better (unless you have an NVIDIA GPU, which will get not-garbage drivers eventually).
What’s there to hear? I already said I’ve been a linux user for 20 years, so it’s not like you’re going to convince me to change or tell me something I don’t already know, yet here you are trying to sell me a product I already use without acknowledging any of the issues that can happen with Linux…and there you go accusing me of some kind of user failing when I already stated I downloaded a current popular distro to get thing working. Why should I have to explain my regular upgrades and updates? I really don’t have time to listen to soft accusations after I stated real issues with the OS. If you’re happy with linux, great, but don’t shove your rose tinted glasses on everyone else’s face.
Pipewire is miles better than anything Windows can conjure up in latency, quality, and customization
For my own curiousity, is this a recent thing? When I was researching before making the jump to linux, it was implied that audio on linux wasn’t in the best state comparative to windows.
Technically it has been a thing since like 2015, but Pipewire 1.0 was only released 10 months ago , even though many distributions were already using it by default since 2021 (Fedora) and 2022 (Ubuntu, Pop! OS), given how much of an improvement it was over pulseaudio.
Ah, its very possible I was seeing some years old info then. Thanks!
I upgraded to 11 and honestly it’s about the same. Very familiar and fast. I’ve had no problems with it in the 3 years I’ve been using it. If I had the preference I’d use 10 but only by a very slim margin as they are virtually identical in day to day usage. I do think it’s faster.
My steam deck has taught me that I’ll be completely OK running linuxn(probably arch) as my daily driver with a win 11 dual boot (maybe just a vm?) for things that simply won’t work on proton.
SteamOS is not the same as its base Arch Linux. If you want something slightly easier but still Arch-based, try EndeavourOS (but please not Manjaro).
If you have the time, try switching on your own terms within the next year. It’s almost guaranteed you’ll run into issues, but trying to dual-boot now rather than later gives you all the time you need to figure it out before MS forces you on Windows 11.
Fortunately this won’t be my first dance with dual booting Linux, I’ve tried it a half dozen times since the late 90s, going as far back as multibooting booting slackware, nt4 and win98. I’m sure I’ll go through a few distros before settling on one that works for me. I’ve also got 6 drives in my pc (2 nvme, 2 sata ssd and 2 HDD) so I have lots of room to play. One major thing for me is HDR support which is pretty new in Linux so I’m not sure where we stand on that.
Updoot for Slackware in the 90s!
Genuine question, what are your criticisms of Manjaro? I’ve been on it since about 2019, and haven’t had any major complaints.
For me, it feels like the best mix of features I’ve found so far. Pacman, AUR, very up-to-date repos, and Archwiki, without a lot of the major PITA manual labor I experienced with Arch. No shade on Arch, I just don’t have time in my life to constantly be tinkering and fixing basic stuff I want to just work.
Curious why some people recommend against Manjaro now.
https://manjarno.pages.dev is a good read
Manjaro as a project is amateur hour, over and over again. Their practice of holding back packages is bad, causing many version conflict problems. Their software DDOSing repos is bad, they can try to pass the blame to pamac, but they are the ones shipping it. Their repeated inability to keep certificates updated is bad.
EndeavourOS should be recommended over Manjaro every time.
Interesting, I’ll give it a shot on my next rig. Looks like it came out after I’d already gotten comfy with Manjaro.
Can’t say with my use case I’ve run into any of those issues, though the cert stuff sounds kinda gnarly, especially to happen more than once.
It’s hard to argue against “ain’t broke why fix”, and frankly, I’m surprised your install has lasted so long without going sideways heh. If you avoid the AUR that’s probably helped. And I actually do believe manjaro has improved in the last year or two - it’s just difficult to recommend while endeavour and archinstall exist.
I’ve been daily driving Endeavour OS for a few months now and it’s great. It’s Arch based so there is a learning curve but it’s worth getting over the hump.
I’m in a similar boat. There have been some setbacks, but I’ve been planning a desktop build to replace my gaming laptop from 2015 for a long while now. SteamOS has given me the confidence to commit to an AMD build with a Linux OS. I’ve been on the fence between a few distro options though. Maybe mint, maybe Nobara, there have been a few others.
Is it going to be able to run decent games? I’m curious about support for GPUs. I guess VR won’t be a thing for a while.
VR “works”, but as someone who uses it, I can’t reccomend it for now.
Compatibility is wildly different between headsets. And no matter which route you take, you will need to tinker and troubleshoot. There is no plug and play solution right now.
If you want to plug in your VR headset, and just play some games, stick to Windows for now. If you’re fine tinkering around, there’s always SteamVR, but also check out Envision and Monado.
As for desktop games, you can find what works on ProtonDB. Most games work fine, with the exception of games with kernel level anti-cheat.
Thanks, that’s about what I was expecting (if it worked at all).
https://help.steampowered.com/en/faqs/view/18A4-1E10-8A94-3DDA
Can confirm VR works!
You may want to try Arch in a vm before daily driving it. It’s an excellent distro, but vanilla Arch is a far cry from SteamOS.
Give Bazzite a try if you like Steam OS
Do not use Arch as a daily driver if you are a beginner.
Despite what some people will try to claim, Arch is not stable.
To be fair, I may have stopped getting updates anyway? I suspect what happened is typical, that some Win10 update bugged the update process and I was supposed to either roll it back or get the next one by hand and just… didn’t.
It is my intention to start looking at linux distros and have one installed by Summer 25…assuming I haven’t immolated in a wildfire or been sent to a detention center by then.
Same thing happened to me a few years ago. My old laptop from 2013 is hardware incompatible with something in modern Windows10 and when it tried installing the late 2019 update it just died. Had to buy a new laptop to keep working.
Today, that same laptop is happily running Arch Linux. I’m still trying to decide what I’ll do with the main gaming PC.
<Rant>
Windows 11 requires a TPM chip. On some phones, a TPM exchanges a small, memorable pin for a large key with which to unlock your phone, and only allows so many guesses (20 usually) before it locks up…allegedly.
They can be unlocked with an electron microscope, but that’s expensive enough that FBI is going to be resistant to do that to any but the most important devices.
However, apparently Microsoft and Intel are releasing TPMs they can access, not to block off outsiders for the users, but to keep the highest tiered access reserved for the OS controller. That being Microsoft. So your Windows 11 computer isn’t yours, rather you’re borrowing it from Big MS… and eventually any other state or institution that figures out how to hack it open.
It’s not like Microsoft hasn’t pulled this kind of stuff since the 1990s, trying to lock down control of every computer for its own profit.
</Rant>
