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Windows 10 refugees flock to Linux in what devs call their "biggest launch ever" (www.neowin.net)
submitted 1 year ago by to c/linux@lemmy.ml
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[–] 120 points 1 year ago (85 children)

I'm old enough to have seen this "flocking" several times. Some people stay and are pleasantly surprised. Most people go back a few weeks/months later, and leave a "Linux suxx" post behind them. I don't expect this time will be any different, and that's totally fine.

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  • [–] 26 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    I’ve looked at Linux for years but it was always so intimidating to me. I finally installed it when my pc was being aged out of windows 10 and honestly it’s really fun to play around with even though I’m not super tech savvy. It’s easy enough to find a solution online if I run into any problems and everything is free!

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  • [–] 62 points 1 year ago (33 children)

    Linux is a lot better than the last few times.

    It might just be 'good enough' at this point.

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  • [–] 58 points 1 year ago* (24 children)

    I agree. This time, it's actually different. Big name streamers and YouTubers are showing their support. Not just people in the tech industry, but random channels like EmKay and PewDiePie.

    Linux is better than ever. Steam is a breeze. Wine support has never been better.

    Meanwhile, Windows has more nasty surprises, underhanded backstabs, and security nightmares than ever before.

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  • [–] 40 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Ads. Steering me to store all my data in Microsoft’s cloud where they do (or inevitably will) scan it for profiling, AI training, government surveillance, etc. (which also annoyingly locks file handles when documents are open). Shoving AI into every product, even when it’s completely useless. Sunsetting useful products. Changing license terms for paid products, forcing subscriptions. Requiring online accounts only and eliminating workarounds. Removing features and replacing them with incomplete UI offering less control. Massive security holes. Annoying patch/upgrade system that interrupts me while I’m working. Flaky, bug ridden tools (Teams, etc) And updates that break hardware.

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  • [–] 19 points 1 year ago* (9 children)
    • Ads all over the place (and a start menu full of crapware)
    • Telemetry you can't completely turn off anymore (the only thing I'd respect is a license check)
    • Constantly putting edge back
    • Forced MS account and removing ways to bypass it
    • Cloud upsells
    • Forced updates "do this within the next 2 days or else..."
    • "Copilot copilot copilot"
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  • [–] 11 points 1 year ago* (7 children)

    -we heard you like search bars so we added a search bar next to the menu containing a search bar.

    -open wide because here comes the unwanted update train.

    -you want to do thing with file?

    No, bad user. Play candycrush instead.

    -that’s an impressive machine you have there. Would be too bad if someone were to slow it down with tons of bloat.

    -Telemetry? At good ol MS? Never.

    -oh but all the W10 menus you love are still there, it just takes a rainforest expedition to get there.

    -Just buy a one drive subscription and walk away.

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  • [–] 10 points 1 year ago (4 children)

    Please make sure all your drivers are up to date and your screen is set to the correct resolution because it seems to be that you’re missing the bigger picture.

    “Underhanded backstab” being the correct expression or not aside=> W11 sucks ass imo, get mad if you want to. (Something tells me this isn’t about proper word choice for you though, but feel free to correct me on that if that is a thing you care about)

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  • [–] 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    Well, you’ll have to ask the person making that claim to begin with. I just added my take on the list of annoyances about W11.

    I find your interest in the expression itself rather uninteresting. I do hope it goes without saying people say these things without meaning them literally.

    All in all the step from W10 to W11 is such a letdown one might compare it to a backstab, underhanded or otherwise.

    And with that I’m done defending an expression I didn’t use to begin with. Good day.

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  • [–] 6 points 1 year ago (8 children)

    Have you used Windows past the 8.1 days?

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  • [–] 6 points 1 year ago (6 children)

    Signal has a Linux client though? I literally use it myself

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  • [–] 7 points 1 year ago

    I think a lot of people expect Linux to work like Windows, and that's why they go back to Windows, even if some stuff is easier on Linux.

    Many of us probably remember times when we tried to download random applications through a web browser, because that's what Windows expects you to do. People will try that, and be confused, why stuff breaks or not work at all.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    I mean I love linux but the biggest hurdle is that certain software/games just aren't compatible. I use my pc for sim racing in vr a lot. With no ability to use iracing or my vr in linux I'm stuck. While I hate Windows and would prefer to use linux, I'm not going to abandon my hobby and all the equipment I have for it just to use an os I prefer. Throughout many different domains of use for a computer their are many different variations of stories like mine. Until the software and games people use can be supported in the linux ecosystem 'good enough' never happens. Like for basic computer use linux is already better than good enough its fantastic, it just works has intuitive user interfaces the bones of the OS are there. The problem is that many companies and software providers just aren't filling the gap that is the needs beyond basic web browsing, media playback and, playing older/indie games without anticheat. Without the substance people expect it doesnt matter how good the bones of the system are they are gonna be trapped in windows and linux will be stuck as the outcast programmers and enthusiasts use while knowing they have to still use windows for the niche use cases they have. And time and time again, eventually running 2 systems gets tiring and linix use/adoption slows back down again.

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  • [–] 21 points 1 year ago (5 children)

    I was one of those nomadic users, every year, since 1998 with Mandrake Linux.

    I have always been in love with the idea of an open source OS, but if I couldn't game and work on it, it wasn't ready. Every year, until Valve made it easy to game on Linux.

    I made the switch when Proton was released and never looked back.

    My point is, every time users go back to Windows, they have their own personal reasons, but those will some day not be the truth anymore.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (3 children)

    Because I mainly game in VR and that's still so far behind on LInux :(

    This is a major sticking point for me too. I've got a dusty Win10 partition I haven't booted in ages, and I was keeping it around mainly for VR, but then Microsoft had to go and just extinguish that too.

    Monado is making impressive progress but it's a huge pain because they have to reverse engineer stuff with zero help from the manufacturers, instead of simply interfacing with the hardware.

    I refuse to let Meta have any of my money though. I hope a good affordable VR kit comes out that isn't another hyper-proprietary blackbox.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    I think it will. I agree about Meta, though I'm too much of a VR fan to not have one 😳 And Pico isn't any better (owned by bytedance). Vive is very focused on business (like large events with multiple people running around with headsets) these days.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago

    Yeah I agree, Meta specifically bought meta because it is Zuckerberg's obsession to own a mainstream computing platform. Microsoft own Windows. Google owns Android. Apple has their own platforms. All of them are deeply entrenched. But meta never did. So the emergence of metaverse was Zuckerberg's chance to jump into that, this is why he went all-in on it. But this is also why there's so much lockin on the Quest :( Even though it's based on Android technically.

    I totally agree it should be standardised and some movements have been made to that effect with OpenXR and the like. But nobody big from the industry really stands behind it. OpenXR is more a developer-side thing than a client-side anyway.

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  • [–] 33 points 1 year ago (7 children)

    many people will go back, but of these, i’m sure many will also come back eventually

    i’ve tried a bunch of distros in my last 2 years with windows. many didn’t satisfy my needs at the time, so i stayed on windows.

    but now, it’s been over a year since I definitely switched to linux, and over 6 months since i nuked (accidentally, but shhh) my windows partition. and i don’t plan on going back anytime soon.

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  • [–] 9 points 1 year ago

    Yeah it's been a long road for me to be fully Linux on my personal systems. I think I started messing with Linux circa 1997 and didn't switch over fully until I think Windows 7 went EoL.

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  • [–] 5 points 1 year ago (4 children)

    Just out of curiosity, which distro did you end up using?

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  • [–] 10 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 child)

    right now im on Fedora KDE! it works well enough for me, it’s modern, it looks good, and most importantly (for me) it supports fractional scaling well (my laptop needs fractional scaling and that’s been the thorn in my foot for a while)

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  • [–] 6 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Linux Mint works great, but I've heard good things about Bazzite, too.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago

    I love and hate bazzite. It's still what I use daily, but man is it weird. Just small little bugs, an it is an immutable os so that threw me off, couldn't do my wild an whacky project but atleast most everything worked right out of the box!

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  • [–] 24 points 1 year ago (6 children)

    But this time Linux actually plays video games right out of the box. No trickery. Just install steam and the rest of the experience is smooth as butter

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  • [–] 6 points 1 year ago (5 children)

    And sometimes with better performance than windows because of less of a system overhead.

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  • [–] 11 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Many people will definitely go back, but the percentage staying might be better this time around. Linux has gotten a lot more usable and stable for those tech inclinced enough to be able to install it thanks in part to proton, immutable distros, flatpacks, Wayland, and improved defaults. Mint and bazzite are pretty darn good for daily use. I've never stayed on Linux as long as I have with this run, and I really don't feel much of a push to leave it. Most everything I want to do just works.

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  • [+] 15 points 1 year ago (3 children)
    [deleted]
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  • [–] 5 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Let me guess, you might have tried Linux on n the past but only really started using Linux full time around 2021/2022, because every time I see someone saying "Linux only became user friendly around year X" is always around a 1 year mark after they started using it daily, because it's a lot more a matter of being used to than actual usability. I have been using KDE since 2004, and while things have changed it wasn't all that much, I don't remember any big usability refactor or anything of the sort happening, I'm fairly confident that if I were to put you to use a KDE 3.5 UI you would feel right at home.

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  • [–] 6 points 1 year ago

    Each person knows what it feels more comfortable with.

    Linux is not inherently hostile, it just has a very different way of doing things that what you're accustomed, so you perceive it as hostile. It is sometimes easier for someone who never touched a computer to learn Linux that someone who grew with Windows to unlearn the habits.

    There's nothing wrong with feeling comfortable in Windows, it's the system you grew up with and know how to work with and maintain.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

    Windows, starting with 8, is inherently hostile to its users in ways that are very difficult or impossible to mitigate. It's a black box of complicated machinery, a lot of which is trying to spy on you, steal your data, show you ads, upsell you on their stupid cloud services so that they can steal more of your data, etc. At this point, disabling all of this is really difficult and unreliable.

    Linux on the other hand is like a box of spare parts that you can build whatever you want from. You really do need to read the manual, or else whatever you build will look and work like shit. However, if you do build something good, it's yours now in a way that a proprietary OS never will be.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago (3 children)

    I understand downloading a file to install something.

    That's a terrible start.
    Software installation sources by priority:

    1. Package Manager
    2. Flatpak
      (Graphical utilities like Discover unite these two)
    3. AppImages downloaded from the browser
    4. Rpm/Deb packages downloaded from the browser, but really should be avoided
    5. ONLY IF YOU REALLY KNOW YOUR SHIT YOU CAN RUN SCRIPTS TO INSTALL STUFF

    You can add other stuff like toolbox after n.2 once you've got more experience.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago

    Your reply seems to insinuate that all the software I could ever need will be included in the package manager.

    Why would I make it a list if that was true? It would be just "1. Package Manager"

    That's just stupid.

    If you smell shit everywhere you go....

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  • [–] 6 points 1 year ago (3 children)

    my buddy wanted to switch from w10 to mint and i tried to recommend kubuntu because of wayland, i told him mint will be laggy because he has many screens with different refresh rates and mint can't handle that. he wouldn't listen, installed mint, and a few weeks later went back to w10 raging how linux suxx it's so laggy. could've just installed kubuntu but no, it had to be w10.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago

    Well that is a weird experience. I can imagine having issues with one device or one or more applications, especially when trying to use windows software in Linux, but having to fight everything seems... Extreme.

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