This is gonna be an unpopular opinion here but telling people who have used Windows their entire lives to just switch to Linux as if it's that easy is entirely unhelpful and makes the Linux community look elitist and out of touch.
this post was submitted on 18 Mar 2025
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I think I understand your broader point as saying that a switch to Linux being as simple as switching from Coors to Miller is underselling the fact that Linux is a fairly different environment/ecosystem. You’re right on that. But as someone who’s made a switch to Linux (Ubuntu) after a lifetime of other OS use, I have to say that I think it’s worth it, even with the learning curve.
I have been exclusively a Mac user and Apple cultist for at least twenty years now and only knew Windows (3.0-ME) prior to that. I have a few 2011 Intel Macs that I use for work and home exclusively (two of which were hand-me-downs) and have not been receiving updates for awhile now. I’m not in the financial position to buy a new computer and I randomly read that Ubuntu runs great on these old Macs. So I decided to give it a try. It was a bit of work that was bolstered by the fact that I do have a bit more computer know-how than the average person (but nowhere near most of the people I see on the Fediverse). But I’ve come to love it and am now working my way over to this being a permanent change.
I’m only sharing this as an example that even deeply entrenched people can learn to use this stuff. And I was a Mac guy! Apple holds your hands and does so much thinking for you! I’d think with Windows, the switch over to something like Mint would be fairly easy, given the GUI (I specifically chose Ubuntu over Mint because Mint’s GUI is described as “Windows-like” and I personally hate all things Microsoft—which is definitely a “me problem” lol—but I’m probably going to load it onto an older ThinkPad of my wife’s that we want to set up for our son).
I mean... they are out of touch. I'm sure its possible to have a pain free switch over but when I had trouble the advice was interspersed with quite a few caveats. In essence Linux is 'easy to setup but...' Still gonna try again though, also guys that laptop you all said was dying because linux made it crash is still working fine on windows with no sign of trouble.
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Switching from Windows to Linux on an older computer is like when you finally get around to clearing the bathtub drain after years of hair and crud building up. Who knew a bath could drain that fast!? And now there's no pool of water building up when I shower. Anyway, I highly recommend both Linux and clearing the drains.
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Linux mint and pop os are winner so far
Na Bazzite and Fedora
Won't say fedora is a good substitute for windows user.
I swapped from Windows 10 specifically because I didn't want to be in the Windows 11 and forward environment. (I use Arch btw)
I really don't regret it, the set up was really painful but once that was done, the KDE had so many good features that I immediately felt at home. I'm floored by how good Proton/Steam is at handling games, I don't think I've had to skip on any game due to my OS (so far).
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Having to use windows 11 for work for the last few years.
(1) Randomly a program on the taskbar just has an invisible icon. Like you can click it but if you don't know it's there it just seems like that program is gone. I keep waiting it to be fixed after every forced update 3-4x a week. Still happening.
(2) Sometimes the entire process just disappears graphically. Not even an invisible icon on the task at. Still running in the background but it's gone in the UI. Have to manually kill it or restart.
(3) I can't unzip multiple ZIP files at the same time. Like I can't select multiple ZIP files and extract them all into their own folder. Something that worked since I've used windows. Worked on windows 10, 7, and XP. It now just unzips only the file you right click even if multiple are selected.
I'm sure there are more but I avoid using windows and mostly just use it to connect to a work VPN and SSH into my redhat VM. Still, all 3 of these really common issues have existed for at least two years. The first two are constant on MS teams and Outlook. Literally no excuse, they are windows apps. Total garbage OS.
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