• jaschen@lemmynsfw.com
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    11 months ago

    Legit question. Outside of FOSS and a few more frames per second on some steam games, why would anyone go through the trouble of installing and configuring a Linux box? Last time I tried I couldn’t get my Bluetooth headphones to work and I had to buy a new webcam because I didn’t know how to compile drivers.

    I sorta just accept I’m running a bit slower and everything works on my TinyPC win10 box.

    • detalferous@lemm.ee
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      11 months ago

      I find the experience to be superior to Windows in every way, including driver support. And it gets more and more stark with every version of Windows.

      Ten, you say? Is that still supported?.

      • Ziglin@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        It is, for now…

        Nvidia drivers can be a hassle on Linux but on windows you need to use the Nvidia driver installer (as far as I know) with a gui and ads, so also a bad experience.

    • woelkchen@lemmy.world
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      11 months ago

      Last time I tried I couldn’t get my Bluetooth headphones to work and I had to buy a new webcam because I didn’t know how to compile drivers.

      When was that? 2002?

      • jaschen@lemmynsfw.com
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        10 months ago

        It wasn’t recent. I think it has to be at least 5 years ago.

        The noname webcam I had was awesome. Had a bright LED when you’re on a call. This was before covid, so before all the webcam innovations. I could get the camera to engage but couldn’t get the LED to turn on.

        I had to end up getting a Logitech webcam.

        I fix my webcam issue by reinstalling Windows.

    • BananaOnionJuice@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      11 months ago

      I would say convenience, my experience is that it just works, and then you get an OS you are fully in control of.

      On Windows you sit down to do stuff and Windows needs to reboot and update, and you have already postponed it as long as you were allowed.

      Yes there will always be some hardware that lacks Linux support, and the migration to Linux can be bumpy.

      • Ziglin@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        In my experience it usually doesn’t just work at first but after you get used to it and it’s fine. More importantly, if you have a problem you can find it and fix. If you’re not happy with how it looks, change it and if you don’t want companies spying on you, don’t install their software.

        Also as someone that sometimes has to use windows I absolutely hate being forced to do updates, like come on I just wanted to turn it off and leave and then I have to wait 5 minutes for it to go through the update and boot again just to turn it back off because it can’t remember that I pressed the off and not reboot button.

    • sgtgig@lemmy.world
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      11 months ago

      FOSS is a really big reason to run Linux. In ten years you can trust that your Linux install will be running and up to date. In ten years there’s a non-zero chance Microsoft will have moved to a forced subscription model for Windows.

      It also just runs faster, can fully update itself and all installed software with a few button clicks or one terminal command, and has tons of options for people who have more technical skill.

    • LeFantome@programming.dev
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      11 months ago

      I cannot answer your question because it proceeds from an assumption I cannot related to. In my view, Linux is much easier to setup and I have immediate access to a huge software library and am immediately productive.

      Installing Windows is much more of a hassle ( the licensing alone ) and, even once installed, you have a system that does nothing useful and needs much more time to install software on before accomplishing anything. Every time you turn around, it is throwing up arbitrary and artificial roadblocks.

      Unless it is already installed, I personally cannot fathom why people would want to spend their time installing Windows.

    • Rewolb_W@lemmy.world
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      11 months ago

      why would anyone go through the trouble of installing and configuring a Linux box?

      It doesn’t cost any money and it doesn’t spy on you. It tends to be “lighter” than Windows, so it generally runs better on older hardware. It is easier to tweak and customize.

    • ArcaneSlime@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      11 months ago

      If you get used to the terminal, to connect your bluetooth headphones you turn on your bluetooth and type bluetoothctl scan on it’ll scan and return devices by mac address, find yours, type pair [the mac address] connect [mac address] exit exit done.

      • Cosmic Cleric@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        Hey, it works for you and that’s fine ☺️ 😉.

        Be better for Humanity though if people supported corporations that made better products than those that made worse ones.

    • Howdy@lemmy.zip
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      11 months ago

      I just switch my gaming rig to linux 3 or 4 months ago. First time daily driving linux. I haven’t touched a driver or anything system config related. I don’t think there is a single peice of hardware not working on my box. Im on pop_os! With an amd gpu. Can play any game thanks to steam proton or lutris. Playing wow and cyberpunk right now.

      • jaschen@lemmynsfw.com
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        10 months ago

        That’s awesome. Thanks for sharing. I honestly haven’t thought about drivers either. Sounds like outside of No ads and bloatware, which is completely removed with the Tiny11 build, I don’t see an advantage. At least not worth the trouble learning it.

    • ѕєχυαℓ ρσℓутσρє@lemmy.sdf.org
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      11 months ago

      When was that last time? In the last 5 years, except for brand new graphics cards, I’ve never had any hardware that didn’t simply work out of the box.

      And for the first question, it works much better and breaks less often (these memes exaggerate for comedic effect, usually it’s rock solid), has much greater privacy, and it’s free.

    • KubeRoot@discuss.tchncs.de
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      11 months ago

      AFAIK games generally still run worse on Linux, there are cases that seem to beat Windows performance, but I’m not kidding myself about that - it’s just not big enough of a difference to worry.

      Aside from other reasons people are saying, I love my package manager. Having a centralized system where my stuff comes from and is installed, not having to deal with searching for websites, finding installers, and dealing with the bullshit they sometimes throw your way. And guess what, if something’s not available in the repositories, perhaps because it offers no installers in the first place, I can usually easily make my own build script and install it in the system anyways.

      And then when it comes to updating my stuff, I also don’t have to deal with every program having its own updating/auto updating system, I just run a few commands and update everything I have installed.

      • 0x4E4F@sh.itjust.worksOP
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        10 months ago

        And then when it comes to updating my stuff, I also don’t have to deal with every program having its own updating/auto updating system, I just run a few commands and update everything I have installed.

        This is the best part for me… well, one of the best parts 😁.