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More people are moving to Linux and are never using Windows in future.
Too late, already on Mint.
My desktop has been running Linux for a while now, but I finally got tired enough with the repeated flops from Microslop™ that I switched my 6 year old Surface I use for surfing from the couch over to Mint.
Not looking back at this point.
Too late. I've already switched to Linux Mint and am never going back.
Same, almost a year and couldn’t be happier.
They gatekeep windows 11 from older devices, what did they think would happen? I tried Linux on my thinkpad yoga, and the drivers are so shit i had to switch back to windows on it, and no, I'm not throwing away a perfectly good laptop!
Out of curiosity, what Linux did you try on it? Relatively new and you tried Mint maybe?
I ran mint on an hm110 with an old as balls nvidia and the only bug i had was tracking down the 330 drivers so i could shut the godddamn fan up. (And then had to compile a Kodi build from source yay thanks muppets)
Linux isn't as transparent as windows when it comes to legacy drivers, it's always been an issue
My Yoga 370 runs great with Fedora KDE
I've had this happen on a thinkpad yoga before. Honestly just keep windows on it and run an antivirus because you'll definitely not be receiving updates for windows defender anytime soon as that is tied to windows update.
You could also be like me though eventually and hack the bios to not be absolute trash and get Linux working on it anyway.
Just spent the weekend moving to Kubuntu. It only took about 5 hours and my computer is snappier than it's ever been. I have been on Windows for 30 years. Microsoft, you should be scared. You can't compete with free competition.
The only way to meaningfully compete with freeware is a feature advantage: if your revenue can sponsor developers to focus on polishing and improving your system beyond the free alternatives, there will be a market of people willing to pay for (immediately*) better products.
It's what keeps Excel a step ahead of Calc: between a rather clunky UX and frankly awful documentation for some features and functions, Libre just doesn't quite have the same maturity. It's good enough for the majority of use cases, okay for some more and I'm really only aware of one feature I miss (Power Query or equivalent) or haven't found. But it's not as polished, and for some, that alone is reason enough to stick with paid products.
Conversely, it's why more people are starting to move off of Windows: between user experience improvements, smoother installation, the spreading realisation that most stuff happens in browsers anyways and Proton making a lot of gaming a lot more accessible, Windows is losing that edge in features. If the list of anti-features and drawbacks grows large enough, the familiarity alone just doesn't hold people any more.
You can compete with free competition, but that requires an eye on the market. And performance-impeding spyware just isn't must-have for everyone.
*as opposed to supporting open source devs to the point where they could focus on their software, hopefully leading to better products some time later, which is less gratifying and less reliable than paying for a project you get right now
Yeah, the real "Year of the Linux Desktop" only occurs when devs actually get input from UX designers and stop designing clunky as fuck UIs.
I strongly feel the only reasons Linux is actually gaining traction right now are
A) proton/wine getting good enough interfaces for regular people to start using them (steam, heroic, hopefully bottles someday gets easier to use)
B) KDE making strides with their desktop envoronment.
C) flatpaks being easy to use and fairly reliable once someone learns to prioritize them
All still have a LOT of work to do with UX, but they are close enough to good that its less of a hurdle for new people to pick them up.
After switching to Linux (CachyOS) over a year ago now, I think I've booted my still existing windows installation twice. Both times was at the very start to get some settings from installed software to migrate and to sync some data or something, I barely even remember. That has also been over a year ago.
Ever since I've switched, I stopped noticing I even have an operating system. I just use my PC. Unbothered by popups, updates and bloat are (re)appearing pinned in my start menu (no I didn't want to have candy crush installed). Literally everything just works, and I'm mostly using my PC for gaming.
I regret not switching much sooner.
Win 10 LTSC IoT edition already has security updates until 2032, and if you activate Win 10 with MAS you'll almost certainly be activated with this version automagically.
Signing in with a Microsoft account is what they really want you to do. This is why they never fixed the glaring vulnerability that allows you to hack the password from local accounts. It's also a general symptom of the fact that Microsoft doesn't really care if you pirate their software anymore, they care about you disabling telemetry because they make more money harvesting personal data than they do charging for software - even subscription software like Office365.
Yep, that's why every Microsoft game (even on Steam) now relies on "gaming services" to authentic.
It's not about piracy, Foza gets pirated a lot and always has. If you're pirating it, you can get around it. But if you have a legit copy, Microsoft uses that as an excuse to ID your computer and tie a name to it.
I really think it's gonna be a big thing, they just kind of slipped it in without telling anyone. They're gonna fuck around trying to constantly increase profit margins and lose their monopoly.
Jokes on them, if you have a shitty enough computer that's doesn't meet the minimum requirements, you get to stay on Windows 10 forever!
I literally called this when they announced that they would only do it for a year. Of course it was going to fucking backfire.
We're in an economic crisis, the AI shit is pumping tech prices through the roof (literally Microsoft is responsible), and they want people to get new computers? Fuck off, dipshits
Maybe if they had done that to begin with I wouldn't have nuked the SSD and dropped Linux on it?
After the 3rd or so warning about EoL and not being "allowed" to install windows 11, I went back to Debian. I'm not going through the trouble of switching again any time soon.
Yeah, once I was gone it's over, I did Linux before when the whole Windows ME mess. I went back with 7, when it actually worked again, but them doing worse with 11 than they did with ME and then 8 is a "Three Strikes" rule on them.
I don't think there is any way to convince me to every use their crap again, especially not as it's all flippin' cloud subscription SAS scamware slopified surveillence tech now.
If hardware were cheap it might have gone a little better. Like I would love to build a new beast gaming rig (dual boot Linux and W11) but component prices are stupid and my W10 rig is perfectly fine.
Windows 11 can be wrangled into something decent, but it requires an immense amount of wrangling on initial install to do so.
As an example, XP needed 8-12hrs worth of work before I was happy with the way I had it configured. Win11 needs about 32-48hrs of work and testing. Some bits - like violently bludgeoning File Explorer back into a halfway XP-like folder tree - takes deep, repeated dives into the registry to properly and permanently eviscerate things like the Library and Home (quick access).
I already switched my devices to Kubuntu.
