I realize this is a Linux community, but I was wondering why you still hate Windows. I mean, I love Linux, but I will not argue that it’s more convenient to the average person in most use cases to use Windows, I recently had to switch back to Windows and I realized how convenient it all was and how I was missing so many things because of my love for Linux. But at this point, Linux is a part of my personality and my self-image and I will not leave it, but I gotta be honest, it’s pretty convenient being on Windows. So, why have you guys chosen to still stay on Linux? Some reasons I can appreciate include
- The terrible privacy policies of Microsoft. It sometimes makes you feel like your computer is not owned by you but lent to you by Big Tech.
- The community and the spirit of sharing
- The joy of “figuring it out” and customizing everything you want to the minutest details
- FREEDOM!!!
sudo suKinda ties into the previous points, but still one of the best selling points, the freedom to do whatever you want is liberating. You can run a server on it or you can create a script while knowing you have control over almost every FOSS app there is or just destroy your whole system with one command. Idk, feels good man!
These are the big ones, but one must realize you are sacrificing many things while not using windows too, productivity can be much greater there if you are a normie, it’s really convenient! So yeah! Give me your reasons! Also, how many of you dual boot?
The “we know better than you” attitude Microsoft has. They’ve very slowly removed more and more power user functionality. Almost every customization has to be hacked in with a group policy or registry edit now, or by outright replacing explorer.exe
I still rank OSX higher, simply because it’s at least consistent. Windows is a fucking mess.
I genuinely don’t find Windows easier to use. And troubleshooting Windows problems is a friggin’ nightmare compared to Linux.
The Microsoft support forums are pitifully hilarious, too.
“Hi, I need help with N. I’ve tried X, Y, and, Z.”
“Hello, sorry to hear that you’re having trouble with N. Have you tried X, Y, or Z?”
“Yes.”
“I’m sorry to hear that it’s still not working. Please refer to this thread, and feel free to contact Microsoft Support with any future questions. Have a nice day.”
“But my problem still isn’t solved. Hello?”
Where one of X, Y or Z is “update your system” and “ensure you’re using the latest drivers.”
OK, but seriously, X, Y and Z are these:
-
Reboot
-
DISM.exe /Online /Cleanup-image /Restorehealth -
sfc /scannow
The only answers you’ll get.
Because I don’t sit down at my Linux destop and feel like the product. There’s no ads or suggestions or popups or apps installing themselves or shit copying my files around in ways I didn’t really want or AI bullshit or anything even remotely suggesting I buy more shit, just… whatever the fuck it is I was intending to do.
The value in not having my computer act like a damn slot machine trying to get me to insert more quarters is, frankly, immense.
I like being in control of my computer.
Windows and Android have this attitude where they decide how you want to use your device and block customisation. And the fact that they feel entitled to be able to change how your device looks and feels without warning or permission is something that’s deeply uncomfortable to me. There’s also this feeling of not knowing what my device is actually doing, and how much of my data it is actually collecting.
With Windows, there’s also a lot of small papercuts that make it annoying to use (and that my Windows friends don’t seem to understand):
- Lack of middle click paste.
- Lack of the ability to drag windows using “alt”.
- You can’t turn off the window previews in the task bar.
- You can’t disconnect from a wired network connection from the connections list.
- Sometimes the computer just restarts on its own for fun.
- Finding settings is a pain because they keep adding new settings menus.
- Whatever garbage the start menu is doing nowadays.
- Installing software and drivers is a pain.
- The attitude that you have to download (or buy!) third party software for core features that should be included in the OS.
- It doesn’t support my keyboard layout, and the editor for making new layouts is terrible.
- The bitlocker password entry doesn’t respect your keyboard layout. Or clear the entry when you get it wrong.
- Windows licenses are a pain to manage.
- Managing the bootloader just sucks.
- The registry just kinda sucks compared to dconf and/or text config files.
- Font rendering is ugly, imo.
- I don’t care about edge, fuck off with that shit.
- I can’t change the volume by using the scroll wheel.
- Launching a pinned app on the task bar causes all the other pinned apps to shift around so I misclick.
- Device letters are not stable if you add or remove devices.
- It just resets settings sometimes, because why not?
- It can’t be installed to a partition that isn’t the first partition on the disk. This is not mentioned anywhere, nor is the error useful.
- It’s just bad for developing on, due to lack of tooling.
… Whew I ranted for a while there, didn’t I? Yeah, I dual boot Windows for the games that either don’t run under protonwine or the devs want to add a rootkit to.
- Lack of middle click paste.
- Lack of the ability to drag windows using “alt”.
- I can’t change the volume by using the scroll wheel.
These feel like DE specific complaints rather than Windows complaints. I wish I could use windowkey to switch applications for example.
Changing sliders with mouse wheel does sound cool, I want that.
Just this weekend I had the pleasure of installing Win 10 on a blank disk. The install went ok, but then it bothered me logging into the MS Account. After cursing for a while and since it wasn’t my PC, I gave in. I know I can fight it, but it’s not worth it here. Then it continued trying to get me to consent to all kinds of shit. NO, I DON’T WANT FUCKING OFFICE AND I DON’T WANT MY FILES IN ONEDRIVE you assholes!
Then it forces me to choose a PIN for “secure login”. DUDE! That motherfucking PC is used for a bit of office work and gaming. Just let these poor people boot up the machine and use it! 0000? Too simple. 1234 too. Fuck you, MS. Ok, random PIN and a sticky note it is, asshats.
Anyway, after getting it to fuck off, I continue to the desktop. Oh wow, 10 updates and a ton of missing drivers? It’s a fresh install! What the fuck did it install?! Of course the installation of all these updates takes an hour and countless restarts… AFTER A FRESH INSTALL! Not even my overblown super slow Ubuntu server takes that long for updates; and that runs on a HDD not a SSD like that PC I set up.
But wait. One update failed. Why? Ah, the rescue partition is too small… THE ONE THAT DUMB SON-OF-BITCH CREATED ON ITS OWN AS PART OF THE INSTALL! How to fix? Ah, execute a bunch of commandline foo with diskpart and other tools. Wait, isn’t that exactly the kind of shit that Windows fans laugh about when looking down on us Linux nerds?!
So … ugh … just one simple anecdote of why Windows can fuck off.
But wait. One update failed. Why? Ah, the rescue partition is too small… THE ONE THAT DUMB SON-OF-BITCH CREATED ON ITS OWN AS PART OF THE INSTALL!
Shit, I forgot about this bug! Such a weird design choice to make the installer fuck up its own partitions.
Heh, yeah. I had to fix that earlier this year on another machine, but that one was ooold and went through a bunch of upgrades so I figured it was due to its age (even though I still didn’t get how they could be so lazy to not automate this process as part of the update or … well… slim down the rescue tools again). But then they apparently didn’t even care enough to release a new installer that prevents the issue. So they either don’t give a crap or even do it deliberately to break Win 10 in favor of Win 11. Either case: that’s not what I pay for.
You can move Windows Recovery to C: drive but I don’t recall the exact commands. Maybe I moved the recovery image to C: partition. https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/manufacture/desktop/reagentc-command-line-options?view=windows-11
eh…i installed windows 10 for someone last month and it went pretty smoothly. just say you don’t want to connect an account, “you wont be able to use one-drive” , ok whatever . reject all “send us optional data” prompts. update to the latest version, and done.
the shittiest part of the install was trying to download the ISO… apparently windows doesn’t want Linux users to download their system or something, had to get it from a windows laptop.
Offlive account during install works only when you are not connected to the internet from that PC. Maybe also only with Win Pro, not Home.
The crap you have to disable are all dark patterns and I hope the EU rips them a few more holes.
“Just update”… I think I went into enough details about what pissed me off in my initial comment.
Almost every Linux distro would have been: boot the installer, select disk, select meta packages, username, password, done. 10 mins later you have an up to date system with no shady online crap.
The PIN is stored locally on the machine only. It doesn’t get synced with anything anywhere. It’s actually much safer to use a PIN for authentication because it’s four digits that you (well, maybe not you) don’t have to write down, and the only time it works is on the physical machine. The user account password can be long and/or complex, but if you’re only ever authenticating at the keyboard, all you have to remember is the PIN.
I know. My point was that I don’t wanted any local auth at all. It should boot right to desktop, no PIN or password asked. The linked MS account is completely worthless and only used to satisfy the installer.
It’s also possible to have Windows log in as a specific user at boot, without user input. Regardless of operating system, your logged on session is in the context of some user account, whether you interactively log in or the system does it for you.
