Ask me if you need help switching to Linux or why Linux beats Windows

[Ex-User (9086)]

So recently I played around with Linux on a virtual machine and found that it offers better user experience than Windows. I was surprised, last time when I did anything on Linux during my uni years I was using a clunky version (distro) that didn't have a decent UI, didn't have good enough code editors or any other stuff that I might need. Now, as it turns out, not only does Linux usually ship with a gorgeous UI with tons of customization, it has better performance than windows, takes 5 times less (or close to 0 depending on config) SSD space, is more secure and supports most if not all of the daily software and internet browsing that you might need.

You don't have to use the terminal for most things (for some things google is enough and if you're not familiar with technical stuff then you're going to have to google a few things like terminal commands), but if you do use it, then it's just bonus because you get to feel like a god updating your programs or downloading a new one.


So before you switch to Linux you have to know that it doesn't support all software that exists for Mac or Windows and it's mostly a problem with gaming. I think 75% of Windows games work without issue through Wine (you can google the details) For some games you will want to keep Windows as a second installed system, or emulate Windows through a virtual machine or stuff like that.

Other than that if your use case is mainly browsing and you don't use Windows exclusive software then I don't see why you wouldn't make the switch, like really explain yourself to me I want to know why you reject Linux with it's superior security, performance and freedom, it even has its own "office" software called Libre office ( windows asks you to pay for this shit). If you're worried about learning new stuff you shouldn't because it's going to take less than 2 weeks to feel at home. I've been using Linux for over a month and I don't feel that I'm held back in any way.

Now for the details. I know that some of you are not as experienced with virtual machines or installing operating systems so I'll link a few guides. If you want a familiar experience I'd recommend MX Linux and that's because, out of the box, the UI has the familiar start menu and taskbar that you know from windows. You can check "best linux distros" to see a variety of possible versions of Linux that you can get.

If you just want to try Linux out then do it on a virtual machine. Virtual machine is a program that can basically run operating systems within your operating system, so you can have your windows and open Linux on it (wooow, mind blown).
For that you can use VirtualBox.

Spoiler: Linux on VirtualBox guide

Step 1: download MX Linux 64bit from here (click the first link):

Download Links – MX Linux

mxlinux.org

Step 2: follow this guide and use MX linux iso as your OS that you want to run on VirtualBox
Step 3: Follow the "Installing Linux guide" in the spoiler below

Here's the complete guide to installing Linux directly on your PC if you want to make full use of it:

Spoiler: Installing linux guide

Now if you are not experienced in this you're probably going to run into a few issues like getting to your boot options so I'm here to offer help and advice.

Just @ at me if you need more details or help with getting it to work and I'll help with your painless conversion to the Linux church. I can help you migrate your bookmarks, passwords or whatever else you need to.

And now here's the actual reason why you want to switch to Linux and it's so you can do this:
If anyone familiar with Linux wants to recommend a better distribution or a better transition guide then jump right in and expand on what I'm talking about.

 

[dr froyd]

just install Ubuntu and you basically have everything windows has, without needing any technical knowledge

I would mention that you seem to be confusing 3 concepts: 1) Linux, 2) Linux distributions, and 3) desktop environments for Linux.

- Linux is an operating system kernel – that deals with hardware of your machine
- Linux distributions (like Ubuntu) are actual operating systems built on the Linux kernel, and come with different features and pre-installed stuff like wifi drivers and whatnot
- The "UI" is just a desktop environment, its the stuff you see on the screen. You can install any desktop environment you like (like Gnome or KDE) regardless of which distribution you have. They come with different appearances and features

one of the problems with Windows is that it is all those 3 things in one, so you can't even change your desktop environment except fucking around with colors and stuff.

when you look up people installing Linux Mint etc on youtube and showing you how cool it looks, they're just showing you the desktop environment – which actually has nothing to do with the underlying distribution.

I use Ubuntu as distribution because it comes with everything you need as a regular computer user + a bunch of useful stuff for programming etc. If you install less "commercial" distributions you might risk having to manually install drivers to get wifi working on you machine etc.

and yes, Windows is absolute cancer. Virus- and malware-infested shit that makes the computer live a life of its own, deciding on its own if it wants to install updates and restart the machine, and in general giving you zero control over you own machine.

 

[ZenRaiden]

Well I had Linux and Ubuntu.
I like it, but don't know much how to use the intricate more advance stuff.
I can obviously do the obvious stuff.
I now have a gamer laptop.
I don't exactly know why I bought a gamer laptop, other then that at the time I was looking for a laptop, and this one had the best performance vs price as far as I could tell.
I am not good at the decision making process of buying PC or laptop so my PC was bought by my brother who has more advanced knowledge of computers and bought more units in his life so he knows what is what.
My PC obviously has Windows and office.

My current laptop with Ubuntu, that I installed deliberately to learn about Linux systems, and Ubuntu was hailed as the simplest one and most useful to start with if I remember correctly.

I did not get far though.

Between battling my habits and whatever my OCD thinking and other stuff does it kind of is hard to get around to it.
Though I am still not so much undecided whether to learn about it, but what useful activity I can do on my laptop.

Obviously its a gaming laptop and I though part interesting thing would be to install a game that is made for Linux.

Libre office seems rather similar to what google has and what windows has.
Minus the actual details what to press and how to enter some things.
However I suppose part of the design is all simple copy of what people are already familiar with, and alternative idiosyncracies of those who developed this in order to I guess offer something that has alternative quality to it rather than simply copy pasting the same thing with the same errors.

 

[BurnedOut]

I dual boot Windows and GNU/Linux on all my PCs. This is because of the following reasons:
1. My PCs are old and WiFi support without a dongle is absolute shit in Linux.
2. Playing games is a huge pain in the arse because they either fail to run or have choppy framerate.
3. Coding in Windows using Neovim or Emacs is suicidal because of either: extremely shitty performance or plugins getting all riled up in their configuration. I abandoned my doom-evim framework for Windows for this reason.
4. Powershell is a blessing. It is an orgasmic shell scripting language that blows bash, zsh, fish, etc out of the water. The fact that it is possible to crossover with C# and the super comprehensive Windows API is breathtaking. However, this is a nonissue because I am not a sysadmin but a hobby coder on most part although making system scripts is a part and parcel of my quotidian coding.
5. Everybody who wounds up at my PC gets super intimidated with 'dark terminals used for nefarious purposes' or 'coding addiction' or 'incomprehensible GUI' so having Windows is super good.

Misconceptions about Windows:
1. Windows is slower than Linux. To some extent? Yes but that is only because of kernel architecture of Windows which is extremely modular. However, the performance drop is usually unnoticeable.
2. Windows is better than Linux. Sadly, no but not because it has questionable source code but because of the amount of proprietary bullshit that goes on with software distribution - not to mention - the shittone of viruses you can simply get from mangled poppycock YouTube videos or naive downloads promising some functionality.
3. Windows has better GUI. Till Win7? Sure but not better in any manner. Win8 and Win10's UIs are nice looking but there is simply too much redundancy - the two bloody control panels with the same settings
4. Windows in unsafe in comparison to GNU-L. FYI, GNU-L dominates the server market so expect to get nasty viruses in enterprise settings.

Why I like GNU-L?
1. The package manager is very good and provides all the basic things you need - from UIs to music players to various langs and sets it up automatically. Doing the same in Windows manually will sprain all your fingers and elbows. Chocolatey is comparable to apt or pacman however to some degree.
2. Coding is easier (for me). Coding in Windows is also good when you are using VSCode but I don't like using VSCode. Plus, there is a vacancy between shell and the editor for Emacs and Neovim who continuously fuck up when it comes to running a simple command and returning its output. I had to finally resort to making a lua function to save strings as temporary powershell scripts and then running them.
3. The sheer amount of updating and space required by the fat arse of Windows is pitiable and exacerbating. I own a cheap SSD and Windows struggle to survive in the 15 GB I have given it. I don't like bullshit updating when it contains explanations akin to 'Some bug fixes' in comparison to apt which yields more information regarding packages. It is also not necessary to keep updating the kernel. But, brother, I have zilch idea what the fuck is Windows fixing all the time. A leaked article from a windows employee from many years ago exposed the Bill Gates insatiable greed which led to shitty source code, lack of bug fixing in existing features and rapid-firing of new features. He also had the gall to sodomize Linux by jeopardizing the open-source hardware driver trend and furthermore the politics behind OpenGL and DirectX. If has not been for Gates, people would have been happily typing in their GNU-L machines but this motherfucker just ruined everything for GNU-L in the early 2000s. The irony is unmistakable now though - it has partnered up with Canonical (Ubuntu's maintainer and my favourite distro) and is making WSL.

I use GNU-L not because I am a masochist like those retards on Reddit shitting on Windows because they managed to get Arch Linux installed (sad for them, there is a CUI for Arch Linux now) but because I appreciate the open-source nature of the software I use. It is time invariant to a good extent and I have been happy with my system for a long time.

My opinion? Your pick. I have engaged in this cat and mouse game for a long time.

 

[BurnedOut]

 

[Rook]

linux way better than windows. i'm lazy rn so i'm keeping my old wreck of laptop on windows, with mostly ui tweaks. easy to play and 'buy' games, and that's about it for windows. i know wine exists but as im say im lazy rn. if i get a second machine might linux it and use for work. ran a few linux distros back in the day, still have a flash on an usb somewhere but dont think i'll remember passwords lel.

 

[Daddy]

I could never get behind Linux. It seems to have many issues supporting hardware. Most of the drivers and software are made by hobbyists or is not for profit and they have to reverse engineer hardware because manufacturers don't want to support Linux by releasing the proper documentation and open source drivers. Often times, "wrapper" drivers that use the Windows binary driver code are used to get functionality from the hardware. And it's not perfect; you can have bugs and weird behavior happening on Ubuntu, just as in Windows.

Ideally, something like Linux could work if hardware manufacturers would support it by releasing source code and documentation on their hardware or even making the proper drivers and software. Windows is full of spaghetti code, while Linux is much more structured and sound, so it has so much more potential. My favorite distribution is Slackware because they seem to want to live up to this ideal. If you have compatible hardware with Slackware, you can almost guarantee a true Linux experience where things just work very well and you don't have to worry about much.

But alas, proprietary corporate entities always win over what's best for society - things like insurance, healthcare, communications, education, housing (all things that are pretty much necessities) are leveraged against you to drain your wallet as much as possible with that nice pretense of "helping you". The baseline greed of humanity is incredibly embarrassing. And anything can be rationalized and supported by greed. It might as well be considered part of our DNA at this point.

 

[BurnedOut]

It seems to have many issues supporting hardware. Most of the drivers and software are made by hobbyists

In 2022, your statement may be incorrect. Currently GNUL provides generic drivers that actually work with any kinds of hardware. Newer kernels have even less of such problems but they are not keen on maintaining obsolete, buggy and vulnerable Broadcom drivers and other such drivers that have been painstakingly made from reverse engineering. I remember copying a hex file from Windows to U to make Bluetooth work. Windows themselves stopped updating legacy hardware but it is not legacy hardware for you and I because we can grind our PCs for a decade at the most. My system is over 7 years old and it is still running nicely with the exception of me being a little skeptical of kernel upgrades

The problems about hardware is more noticeable while using laptops where battery drain is an issue.

 

[Daddy]

Broadcom, hah. I remember messing around with that a really long time ago on a laptop before smart phones and having trouble getting internet and being able to figure out what was wrong. Bad experience man.

 

[Ex-User (9086)]

just install Ubuntu and you basically have everything windows has, without needing any technical knowledge

I would mention that you seem to be confusing 3 concepts: 1) Linux, 2) Linux distributions, and 3) desktop environments for Linux.

- Linux is an operating system kernel – that deals with hardware of your machine
- Linux distributions (like Ubuntu) are actual operating systems built on the Linux kernel, and come with different features and pre-installed stuff like wifi drivers and whatnot
- The "UI" is just a desktop environment, its the stuff you see on the screen. You can install any desktop environment you like (like Gnome or KDE) regardless of which distribution you have. They come with different appearances and features

I know the difference between DE's and various distros. MX Linux (a linux distro) has good DE (desktop environment) out of the box - Xfce that is going to be quite familiar to windows users. Because MX Linux comes with a graphical configuration tool (MX Tools), moving the taskbar to the bottom is very easy as is changing single click to double click. It has a great and easy to understand installer too.

One can customize everything, change DE's, write their own UI elements if they choose to. People who can change DE's or use Terminal in Linux don't need extra help setting it up.

I think out of the box experience is very important to attract users to Linux. Most people are never going to customize their PC beyond changing the wallpaper. It's possible to customize Linux to look and work almost exactly like Windows, though this can't be distributed in a neat package due to copyright.

I'm not changing the UI to look like WIndows, but most people, at least those who entertain the idea of leaving windows, would jump ships just seeing that they effortlessly get the same thing in Linux.

3. The sheer amount of updating and space required by the fat arse of Windows is pitiable and exacerbating. I own a cheap SSD and Windows struggle to survive in the 15 GB I have given it. I don't like bullshit updating when it contains explanations akin to 'Some bug fixes' in comparison to apt which yields more information regarding packages. It is also not necessary to keep updating the kernel. But, brother, I have zilch idea what the fuck is Windows fixing all the time. A leaked article from a windows employee from many years ago exposed the Bill Gates insatiable greed which led to shitty source code, lack of bug fixing in existing features and rapid-firing of new features. He also had the gall to sodomize Linux by jeopardizing the open-source hardware driver trend and furthermore the politics behind OpenGL and DirectX. If has not been for Gates, people would have been happily typing in their GNU-L machines but this motherfucker just ruined everything for GNU-L in the early 2000s. The irony is unmistakable now though - it has partnered up with Canonical (Ubuntu's maintainer and my favourite distro) and is making WSL.

My opinion? Your pick. I have engaged in this cat and mouse game for a long time.

Spoiler

View attachment 6330

No dark theme? Are you one of those rare light theme people? Vscode runs on Linux, I use it most of the time.

I think a fresh install of Win 10/11 eats 2 gb of ram, 25 gb of disk space and wastes a few % of CPU load on a bunch of useless diagnostic and spying services in the background.

Fresh Linux, depending on the distribution, takes less than 100 megabytes of ram (if it's a lean version), up to a gigabyte with bigger feature lists. Less than 6 gb of disk space and almost no CPU overhead, there aren't dozens of useless background processes that do nothing for the user like what you get in windows.

 

[dr froyd]

I guess the desktop environment is indeed important when switching from Windows.. considering that a computer is a desktop environment to most people. I would say KDE is very similar to the windows-style desktop, with a toolbar at the bottom and a start menu etc. I've used xfce too but it's a bit clunky and limited in functionality since it focuses on being lightweight.

in terms of MX linux, it looks like it comes with xfce and KDE? I would note it takes about 1 minute to install xfce or KDE on ubuntu.

admittedly I've never heard about MX linux but keep in mind that Ubuntu is a very well-known distro and as such supports a lot of popular software easily - like googl chrome, firefox, spotify, etc. You might need to do some hacking to make these work on other distributions. And also for more advanced stuff like programming tools, Ubuntu being Debian supports a vast array of software, and comes with pre-installed tools like compilers etc