Even games are rarely a good reason to use Windows these days, that’s how far Linux has gone. Intel’s GPU drivers for Windows straight up package Linux gaming compatibility tools like DXVK. Unless your favourite game requires a rootkit (kernel level anti-cheat), or refuses to enable Linux compatibility in their anti-cheat, it will work just fine.
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Easy way to stop windows detecting chrome and pushing bing/edge at you:
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I haven’t had Linux since a server about 20 years ago (IT took over that stuff so I’m happily sliding into blissful ignorance) but one of my kids got a Steam Deck which is Windows games on Linux and it seems to be driving a lot of compatibility development. Fixes pop up for games every day, new updates and experimental releases of Proton and packages etc. seem to get games working pretty quickly.
And other manufacturers are bringing out handhelds so I can only assume this will speed up the work.
As @Syfer_Polski says: anti cheat measures are the real problem.
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[looks at “results” of latest search on Google]
They have a point. Not that they really offer a viable alternative, no. As if…
But they do have a point.
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They really do. Google and their “browser” chrome are worst in class right now.
MS got thoroughly enshittified too but Google has years of a head start on them.
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I only have MS Office on my current PC because my clients use Word and Excel for their projects and I couldn’t get some of the formatting in OpenOffice or LibreOffice sorted out (not deeply software savvy). Now that LibreOffice is sorted out and the formatting is solid I’ll decline MS Office on my next build. In fact I may just keep using Win 10 indefinitely and keep my AV and firewall looking out for me.
My computers at home are all Linux (have to support MS here at the library, unfortunately). I think I’ve had maybe one game in the last two years that Proton wouldn’t run and that was an easy refund. I know I have at least a few dating from early 2000’s and they run quite well. You sometimes have to check to see if a specific Proton version works better for a given game, but most of the time just leave it set to “latest version” and you’re fine.
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Just from a quick search on ProtonDB, the only game I see that might give me issue is Summoner (1999) which isn’t a problem since it was also made for PS2 so I can probably get a copy of that to run on Linux through an emulator instead (still will have to deal with the lack of player balance patches but oh well, not a deal breaker). But all the other games like HoI4 and other Paradox Games look to be okay with no tweaks and others like BG3 are runnable with tweaks. So I’ll probably test this out on my other PC to see how it’ll run. I’m thinking of going with MX Linux, Mageia, or Bodhi Linux.
Ugh. I hate Teams, but our business has bought into the Office 365 ecology bigly, so I have to suffer with it.
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Teams is the worst.
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I downloaded the Teams app to my nearly SOTA PC because some of my clients use it. My computer started doing all sorts of wierd BS, opening files that had been ostensibly deleted, hanging up programs and the machine completely shutting down on random occassions. I deleted Teams and all of a sudden my PC works the way it used to.
The only way I will use Teams is to open it in my browser. Everyone I know in government that has to use it at work despises it.
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My 86 YO father does. And he also calls/emails Garmin support, and Canon support and Civilization support and Google support and his ISP support.
Then he calls me.
He’s the nemesis of any support center, like a dog with a bone he doesn’t let go until things are to his satisfaction.
Mind you, he’s quite computer savvy, but he does not tolerate the slightest hiccup.
Only if your time is free, and you are keen to be abused by a number community members.
I say this as someone who has been running some version of Linux since Mother’s Day (plus one), and still does, works daily with Linux based products, and has contributed to a number of open source projects.
I also run Windows 11 joined to my Windows Server Essentials based domain, Hyper-v server, and FreeBSD.
I briefly had an Hackintosh, but I find macOS urticating so stopped quite soon (apart, of course, from the dubious legitimacy).
EtA: I also called MS support once, for a license problem. They were extremely kind, professional, and correctly sorted the issue - it took almost one hour (something had gone seriously wrong - 99% my fault), but they never showed any sign of being annoyed or condescending.
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I ran Ubuntu for years and loved it, except for every time something went wrong. Then it was always one of three options:
1- Pay someone $200/hr for tech support
2- Here’s a few lines of code- we’re assuming you know how to configure all the variables before you run it. Just go into the hidden directory with the settings- we assume you know where it is- and reconfigure all the permissions before rewriting the kernel, which we’re sure you know how to do.
3- Somebody already fixed that- go download this bit of code from some random guy’s website and install it as a root user.
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Good for him, he sounds like a pip! I aspire to that level of greatness in my old age.
Microsoft is the Borg, basically. Prepare to be assimilated. I have a lot of experience with them, including some experience dealing with the corporation as a professional, going back to the '90s, and they were always evil and they always abused their monopoly power.
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What’s your issue with Windows 10? Just curious.
I have a 16 year old laptop running Windows 10. It’s pretty slow but works fine otherwise. I personally like Windows 10 better than 7, but I benefit from features like a cmd window that actually supports cut-copy-paste that I know aren’t relevant for most users.
Honestly I feel like this is the only reason to own a windows pc. And it didn’t have to be this way but if you want to hobby a gaming machine and have access to the latest games with the best games (albeit buggy at release), it’s sadly the only way.
I honestly can’t tell/remember the differences between 10 and 11. It’s just Windows. It stopped nagging me to change to Edge from Chrome after a few attempts.
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Primarily the overall look and feel of the UI. I could learn to tolerate it, but why bother when Win10 will be officially obsolete & left to rot in 2025?
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Boot loops. I have a 2-in-1 laptop/tablet PC with Windows 10 that is stuck in a boot loop. Windows diagnostic & repair tools are useless for the problem; Windows spends a lot of time “fixing” the problem which never goes away. I suspect the Users registry hive is corrupt and the device is so locked down by the manufacturer that I cannot boot any other OS to get at the machine’s contents. That last part is the fault of the manufacturer, not MS, but I still count it as a Win10 failure. All I have here is Win10, which does not supply the tools I need, so the machine is effectively bricked.
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Broken updates. In recent years MS has developed a distressing tendency to release broken or buggy updates for Win10 & Win11.
This is a starter set of complaints. I could add telemetry (data collection) and forced updates (along with forced reboots) to the list. Both of these features can be disabled, but I consider them both to be obnoxiously intrusive and a red flag for Win10.
Windows 10 does have some nice features like the cmd.exe improvements you mention, and WSL, but IMO the cons outweigh the pros.
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