I’m currently on some pirated LTSC Windows 10 but I’ll probably move back to Linux next. It just bothers me how much more effort simple tasks take on Linux, and how a lot of the options emulate the inferior Mac look. Whenever I see the red yellow green buttons on a window it makes me gag thinking about all the money that terrible company has scammed people for.
Why worry about the fact that there’s lots of options that emulate the Mac look, when there are many options that don’t? My favourite Desktop Environment currently is KDE Plasma, which I use on Manjaro. It’s more like the Windows design but in my opinion way better, and of course ridiculously customisable (which is what KDE Plasma is known for, especially compared to Windows 10/11). Also the exit, minimize, and maximize buttons I for some reason absolutely love so much better than anything else I’ve seen (no, they look nothing like Mac). My other favourites are Budgie, Cinnamon, and Mate which are all great options. Budgie’s great for the minimalistic design while still looking very modern and clean. And besides, which DE’s are you talking about when you say they are emulating Mac? Most, if not all of them allow you change the “Red, Yellow, Green” buttons to the more traditional Windows look, and move them to the right side of the Window from the left.
Well that’s nice but I was just voicing my personal gripes with the Mac interfaces which are on some of the mainstream Linux versions. I didn’t say they were all bad, it just takes me personally more time to pick the correct ones. I’d hate to select an ultra specific customized version that gets abandoned by the maintainers in a year or two, I generally run machines for about 8 years.
I’d hate to select an ultra specific customized version that gets abandoned by the maintainers in a year or two, I generally run machines for about 8 years.
TLDR (Apologies for the crazy long comment): Basically, I say that if you want peace of mind the project isn’t going to be abandoned; choose one of the most popular distro’s and one of the most popular DE’s. And I reccomend a bunch of options for Distro’s and DE’s you might like to use.
That makes sense. If you want the peace of mind that the distro or Desktop Environment isn’t going to be abandoned in a couple of years; that’s why you go with one of the popular ones; they aren’t going away any time soon or the foreseeable future. The distro developers usually customise the included Desktop Environment a bit to cater to their specific audience. Choose a popular distro, and choose one of the officially maintained flavours they make available, rather then a community maintained one, which is much more likely to be abandoned after a couple years. Here’s an example of the popular desktop environments:
KDE Plasma has been around since 1998 & developed since 1996, and is regularly developed, improved, and updated.
Cinnamon has been around since 2011 and is developed by the Linux Mint distro developers; Linux Mint being one of the top 3 most popular Linux distributions; not going away anytime soon. It’s also regularly updated too. And since Linux Mint are the devs; It’s the main, most supported flavour available for Linux Mint.
GNOME I’m not a fan of it personally. It’s been around since 1999, developed since 1997; GNOME is associated with Ubuntu and is one of, if not the most popular desktop environments available; of course this is also regularly updated too, and not going away anytime soon.
Mate (pronounced mah-tay) has been around since 2011; it was forked from an old version of GNOME due to the backlash GNOME was getting at the time for drastic changes they were making to their own DE; and made for people who preferred the GNOME 2 design. Again: regularly worked on and updated
Budgie released in 2014 and is developed by Solus distro developers. In my opinion, it’s absolutely beautiful with it’s minimalistic yet modern visual design, but I can see why it wouldn’t be for everyone; still worth it to check out.
Why don’t you setup a Linux virtual machine on your Windows PC, install a bunch of different flavours of different distro’s, and try the different Desktop Environment’s out for yourself? You might surprise yourself and find one that you adore the look of. I know from experience that using the environments themselves is way different to simply looking at screenshots or watching video’s.
The best options for distro’s to try out imo are:
Linux Mint (Debian based; probably the best beginner friendly distro out there, just about everything is doable without the terminal)
Manjaro (Arch based; made to be an arch-like distro that’s a beginner-to-linux but familiar-with-computers, and average-user friendly distro. A common misconception is that it’s very unstable and prone to breakage: this is not true anymore and was more an issue in it’s early days)
Pop!_OS (Debian based; brilliant for gamers and average computer users; they use GNOME, but System76 (the devs) are working on their own Desktop Environment written from scratch to replace GNOME; last I checked, there haven’t been any screenshots revealed of it.
Those are my top picks but I know my small list is missing many others of the great and popular distro’s. Making sure you can have a system that’s supported for years to come is easy if you pick one of the popular distro’s. If you don’t want to update the system for years at a time; don’t choose a distro with a rolling-release update system (like Arch, Manjaro, Garuda, EndeavourOS etc. which is basically anything Arch-based) If that’s how you use your system; Linux Mint with the Cinnamon, Mate, or XFCE flavour is a perfect choice. And if you want to, you ARE able to install any other DE on Linux Mint even if it’s not officially supported, and you can have as many DE’s installed at once as you want; though that will all require the terminal.
Lololol their UI is 100% absolutely better, and they are much much much less restrictive than Apple. Still a shit company, but if I had an extra 400 or 500 USD I’d pay them for the LTSC.
It depends of what distribution and overall understanding the mentality being the how to install thing stuff. Most people don’t know what’s a package manager for example, how to manage multiple disks on the computer etc… While some linux distros are streamlined and made simple, they can feel quite different to windows.
You don’t just download an installer, go to the folder, click an icon with some associated details, and have warnings about the sort of modifications the program might make when installed. No, you have to learn the command line for this task and sometimes you need to know what parameters to set, and in the case of dependencies you should probably keep track of what all it comes with and what they do because when it comes time to remove a program it’ll be even more tedious. If it takes time then it is work, and Linux is more work.
I think most distros have a command to remove orphaned packages. If you just don’t want to use the command line but want a more App store like experience, then there are some distros that do have a GUI based app store. I think you should try dual booting with something like Pop_!OS when you want to try it. Absolutely do not install it in place of windows the first time, because you might not like it, and dual boot gives you an option to remove it and go back to windows like nothing happened. Then ofc if you don’t want to try it then don’t.
Oh god no, App stores are cancer. I just want files in folders. Easily identified formats like executables or media. I’m sure theres one right for me, but it’s not like it cost me anything to use the Windows LTSC.
Well, linux executables and 3rd party installers exist, but they are not the recommended way to install software, and linux uses the same formats as windows for almost everything(mp4, txt, rtf, etc…). But you should probably stick with windows if you want that UX.
I knew about Linux when I was 10, and Linux was only like 2 years old at the time. How does someone be online in any capacity these days and not know about Linux? Linux users are everywhere and they never stop talking about Linux!
I heard the name Linux from Minecraft being available on “Windows, Mac, & Linux” when I was maybe 12-13 (2014-15), but I never looked into it, and all I thought of it was it was some kind of really obscure operating system. I wondered why I’d never seen a Linux computer in tech stores. And Windows seemed perfectly fine, so why would I need to use it? “It probably has some crazy UI that nobody can understand”(except I didn’t know what ‘UI’ was at that age)
That’s back than… I’ve been using Linux as my daily driver now since mid 2021, and I’ve been on Manjaro for nearly 1 & a half years.
However, I’ve met barely anyone who even knows what “a Linux” is. I’ve met a guy who was only using Kali Linux because he wanted to hack or something; and a friend at my church who manages a lot of the technology and computers: him and his father tried using Ubuntu about 10 years ago when he was a late teen. Than there’s another guy at my church who, despite never having used Linux in his life; surprisingly new a lot about it and was able to help me solve a display issue I was having earlier this year. I’ve nearly gotten my Mum onto Linux Mint for her laptop 😂, because she really only makes documents, browses websites, and checks emails, and really doesn’t need to be paying for Windows & having updates forced on her regularly. As a matter of fact, I’m downloading it for her as I type.
That’s really surprising to hear! I live in Australia and that may not have been available in stores here even back than… but maybe. Target is actually still around in Australia and a popular store.
It is normal your friend doesn’t understand what you are talking about since what you’re refering to as Linux, is in fact, GNU/Linux, or as I’ve recently taken to calling it, GNU plus Linux. Linux is not an operating system unto itself, but rather another free component of a fully functioning GNU system made useful by the GNU corelibs, shell utilities and vital system components comprising a full OS as defined by POSIX.
Many computer users run a modified version of the GNU system every day, without realizing it. Through a peculiar turn of events, the version of GNU which is widely used today is often called Linux, and many of its users are not aware that it is basically the GNU system, developed by the GNU Project.
There really is a Linux, and these people are using it, but it is just a part of the system they use. Linux is the kernel: the program in the system that allocates the machine’s resources to the other programs that you run. The kernel is an essential part of an operating system, but useless by itself; it can only function in the context of a complete operating system. Linux is normally used in combination with the GNU operating system: the whole system is basically GNU with Linux added, or GNU/Linux. All the so-called Linux distributions are really distributions of GNU/Linux!
Thank you for making this distinction. I've never heard this before. Especially not thousands of times by the most socially well-adjusted people on the planet.
I don’t know, given what they let Microsoft do to them I don’t know if Windows users actually understand that consent is something they don’t have to do.
Terminal-based scriptable text editor, continuation of one of the first interactive programs in the world (vi), so it has a lot of legacy User Experience, which seems unintuitive for modern users. For instance, it does not automatically write when you launch a program. Instead, you are set in so-called “Normal mode”, which maps all the keyboard keys to text-editing macros and acts as a bridge between “Insert mode” (for typing text) and “Command mode” (for application control and . If you’re on “Insert mode” and want to save your edits and quit, you need to press ESC, to switch back to the Normal mode, and type in :wq and press Enter.
Do you know how many grey beards have waited their entire lives to have a girl ask them what Linux is. You’ve made a lot of irc mods jealous tonight. Stack overflow responses are going to get super spicy for a couple days
I’d love to have a girl, or anyone for that matter ask me that. Though preferably not with the phrase “what the fuck” in front of it. I’d rather them ask me about it out of pure curiosity rather then out of distain and annoyance.
Unfortunately gaming is about the least Linux friendly hobby there is. For most tasks you can find software that will make it relatively painless to wean people off Windows but many games, especially new ones, dont work out of the box on Linux. Most of the time, theyre going to have to fiddle with things to get games to work, if they can work and youre going to have to justify to them why they should do that.
Wrong. Also master a bunch of Proton configuration and extra parameters and then deal with abysmal performance compared to Windows.
Out of the box, Proton+Wine works on surprisingly little.
Spend the next week sporadically troubleshooting when I get a free few minutes here and there.
After week 2, I finally decide for shits and giggles to download and install the "official" AMD driver from AMD's website instead of using the built in kernel one like every goddamn reply on every forum post has been telling me to use, because the PC's GPU is about ten years old at this point and the driver that came with the distro doesn't work with it.
The new amdgpu kernel driver only launched in 2015 and it was buggy and unstable for a while. GPUs from around that era default to using the older radeon kernel driver which lacks Vulkan support.
Polaris (Radeon RX 400 series from 2016) and newer just work, older cards can take some prodding.
Linux gaming works (most of the time without any issues)
What you should know before you switch to Linux:
Not every Hardware is supported as well as on Windows. Old Hardware may work better or worse than on Windows. New hardware may not work at all. Don’t buy sth. that isn’t at least half a year on the market.
Check protondb if your games do run on linux. For some people even silver there isn’t an enjoyable status. Gold should be working as on windows with minor issues and platin is works just fine.
Be ready to learn a new operating System! Linux isn’t Windows and the terminal is key to fix issues.
Or Nvidia either according to all the people telling me my problems aren’t valid.
So if you want a good time with Linux you need and AMD GPU or integrated graphics, and it can’t be too new, and it can’t be too old.
I think linux’s image is pretty accurate
Also “Be ready to learn a new operating System! Linux isn’t Windows and the terminal is key to fix issues.” I agree. I think that’s not a good idea for a lot of people though. So I think posts like OP’s are kinda stupid. People shouldn’t try to push Linux on people who shouldn’t use it.
I’m a long-term Linux user living mostly on the terminal, knowing quite a lot about the operating system. And sometimes I enjoy tinkering to get a game running even more than playing it. But in the end for some games it just doesn’t work. Of course it depends on the game and hardware and what not, but in the end if I can’t play all my games on Linux I have to bite the bullet and check for alternatives. And for me this statement is hard as hell.
uhh brickrigs works perfectly for me?
on the built-in amdgpu kernel module (since my laptop is like 8 years old i had to force amdgpu instead of radeon drivers)
radeon is hilariously broken, even firefox breaks (won’t start sometimes) while it’s in use
To be fair, a friend of mine had blue screen playing LOL on windows for a month until he found the solution: rename a random .dll of the NVIDIA driver and than reinstall the driver.
Weird stuff happens with PC, with Win, Linux, Mac or anything but people always point to Linux. Yeah on Linux we see more of these things but PC gaming in general is not so user friendly like people think it is.
Sure, but still multiplayer games that are not on steam and have some sort of anticheat or other stuff like that are unlikely to show up on deck. Unless company steps in and release version for steam deck/Linux (which they don’t cause it’s probably a lot of work for minimal returns), you have to play it on windows. At least I can dual boot on my deck to play those games.
3: try every proton version
4: try proton GE
5: (proccessing Vulcan shaders)
6: change launch arguments
7: use protontricks to install some weird dependancy
8: sacrifice your pets firstborn at an alter to achieve a running state
Not that hard lol, get good bitches. Also fuck you for wanting to play rainbow 6 siege. All my homies hate rainbow 6 siege.
Tbf you have to fiddle about with the game’s graphics settings anyways. I think lots of pc gamers are fine with having to fiddle with things. Heck seems like everyone wo ever bought a steam deck does nothing but fiddle with it. For some that is actually the most fun thing about it all.
There are also a number of compatibility issues on Windows itself thanks to the mess of DirectX workarounds they need to add to the drivers with each new game.
I’ve been using Steam in FlatPak on NixOS for a couple years now.
The only games I’ve found that didn’t work were due to anti-cheat rootkit stuff, which would probably be a bigger deal if I cared about online gaming. And I’ve had to change the Proton version a couple times, because the beta (default) seems to break a game occasionally. Overall: it’s astoundingly good compared to where it was 5+ years ago.
I agree with you, but it’s just not ready for the average person.
Case in point: regardless of which version of Steam I install it goes into a crash-restart cycle if I open it from gnome. The only way to run it is to type “steam” in the console.
The issue persists regardless of whether I use the .deb or flatpak.
right and wrong, games play nowadays, but good luck getting the same accessibility and flexibility as windows, you wanna download a cool new mod? No problem! Oops but the mod loader is only windows based and gives wine a seizure, you can probably do it, but not without an hour or more of work, not exactly casual user friendly quite yet. And god forbid the game uses a special pheriphal
It’s really a bit like what we used to do when we poked at autoexec.bat and whatnot when running DOS games back when dinosaurs roamed the land.
It’s not really complicated, you just have to prod here and there until it works (unless it just doesn’t because some kind of anti-consumer software lock just won’t play nice with Wine, although that’s becoming less common nowadays).
OTOH, things that aren’t Linux friendly… corporate accounting, an awful lot of dedicated software for niche industries… There’s no lack of things that are still complicated in Linux.
The problem though is that we are in 2023, a good 32 years after Linux came out. It shouldnt feel like you are in the DOS era. One of the problems that dawns on me is the real issue is a lack of consistency. Sometimes things work great, sometimes they dont. A lot of people arent having the same issues I and many others do which is frustrating because of how the community reacts when someone brings up those inconsistencies. There are a lot of people that dont run into them for one reason or another and all they see is people bitching about from their POV, seemingly nonexistent problems.
You also have to remember that you’re running software designed for an entirely different operating system. It’s not at all like moving from xp to Windows 10. We’re not comparing apples to oranges, but apples to hedgehogs.
That it works most of the time is a fucking miracle in itself.
Yes it is a miracle that it ever works. HOWEVER it doesnt really matter to most people why it doesn’t work sometimes. It isn’t fair but the reality is that as far as most people are concerned, their PC is basically a microwave in that they have little interest in how the internals work as long as they work and if they can’t do x or y, they dont really care that it isn’t Linux’s fault. All they see is that they installed this new OS that looks really cool but cant run certain games or run certain software. Now if Linux were popular, it wouldnt be an issue because almost everything would have been written for one distro or another (like android is dominant on phones) but it isn’t. Steam is doing a lot to change things and hopefully Linux is better supported by other companies as well in the future but right now there are still enough gaps that I would be very hesitant about recommending Linux to a heavy gamer unless I knew that they basically waded in the steam ecosystem and the vast majority of their games could be run via proton.
Back when I used windows regularly instead of sparingly, I cant remember a time when I ever had to go into the registry files or command prompt to fix anything. You might have to install newer drivers or something but effectively do surgery on the dll files etc? Nope. And you have to remember that the average windows user is… not very skilled with computers. Theyre going to need hand holding a lot more than the average Linux user. Which is why windows is more or less designed for the lowest common denominator. And itd be weird if all the effort spent writing stuff primarily for windows didn’t result in an easier experience.
It used to be that the community acknowledged the harm Windows’ dominance caused Linux. Microsoft didnt change. They still leverage their monopoly to harm Linux.
I used to also think gaming and Linux are not really that compatible, but Proton being built into steam makes it easy to run pretty much any game out of the box now.
I use both Linux and Windows (Linux professionally, windows personally)
Got a buddy of mine that will wax on for hours about how windows is pointless and should have been replaced by Linux years ago. I’ll then go “Cool, so uh, did that game download yet? Lets play!” Then start up the game. Four hours later and he’s still trying to get the sound to work or make the graphics display while continuing his rant on how user friendly Linux is.
Like, Linux is great and all, but fuck me, it’s not user friendly.
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