If you don't use Linux or MacOS yet, why?
Each is good at its own thing. I don't understand the game of picking exactly one hill to die on.
I spend about 60% of my time on Apple operating systems, and 40% elsewhere. Windows really does suck from a UX perspective, but if you are trying to make money doing things professionally with a computer, it's hard to beat. Running outlook and office on Mac just doesn't hit the same way.
I switch around enough that I try not to do crazy amounts of personalisation in my desktop OS. Probably this evens out the OSs and there are aspects I like and dislike about each. I guess I prefer KDE Plasma to Windows or MacOS. I choose that for my own computer, but I spend far more time in Windows. I'm not sure I agree it it much worse from a UX perspective. It allows keyboard only usage very easily, which is something I struggled with in MacOS.
1) I'm only focusing on the UI - there are some things I struggle to forgive, like not being able to set add my own ringtone or alarm tone, or not being able to have the volume of a ringtone increase as the phone rings like on every ancient feature phone.
I really should have included the recent escalation in hostility towards users in my thoughts - built in ads, pushing unwanted products, trash news in new tab pages etc.
Still use it on my server though.
I might try a MacBook air at some point, but they are quite expensive when you need 1TB disk for your music files. But for now my ThinkPad T14 Gen1 still runs fine. I don't need more battery or power. No fan could be cool.
The real crime, by a lot, it middle click. I did not realize how often I use middle click scroll until I switched to Linux and it didn't work anymore.
You can fault Linux as the primary desktop environment for a few things, but that it’s different to MS is not one of those.
Do you also rant about having no windows key on a MacBook?
And it scans every executable and command run and sends a hash to motherbase. I don't know how people put up with this. There's probably some dangerous way to disable that like, let me guess, disabling SIP...
And it sucks at gaming.
Linux on the other hand is great for power users!
So you're right, it's great for power users, it's also great for other users.
Gaming: that's a fact but again doesn't matter to most people. Most people play video games on phones/tablets/consoles if they play games at all. PC gaming is a relative minority, and (regular) Windows laptops can only do lightweight gaming anyway. The amount of people who decides what "everyday computer" they should buy based on whether they are going to play games on it is very small. Plus, you get much better ROI by buying a PS5+Macbook Air than spending the same amount of money on a gaming laptop.
I'm perfectly happy with my "vanilla" macbook. Runs Baldurs Gate 3 and my final fantasy ps2 emulator just fine, and even trackmania was quite easy to get installed and runs well.
Can't comment on that hash thing, but I don't see why that would be a problem? It's not linked to your name or something. Windows does a ton of things too that I find inexcusable, such as changing settings or permissions after updates, those have an actual impact on my daily experience with these things
100% this.
I'm a dev, I don't game. No issues.
Why people find this hard to believe is kind of puzzling to be honest. As if everyone's experience simply HAS to match your own.
My windows machine is also “fine” for the most part because i turned off whatever I could and tried to mod whatever I could not. Even so, every once in a while, typing “code” and being taken to an edge bing search makes me want to rip it to shreds.
And I delay every update as far as possible and am filled with dread when it finally wont let me postpone it.
It isn’t that fine now that I think about it.
- All core services and apps experience significant performance degradation (to thenpoint that Spotlight regularly fails to find installed apps) which are currently only offset by the insane performance of the M* series chips
- Services become more and more pervasive, with ads throughout the system
For debugging I installed Bazzite (Linux gaming distro) assuming compatibility would be shit but I can at least test native linux builds of some games to see if there is a hardware issue. The thing runs perfectly. I've been playing propert windows games on Proton with higher / more consistent FPS. It is kind of funny at this point. Granted I do not play any competitive / multiplayer games.
I guess Valve did a great job on the Steam Deck sw.
I switched from Windows 10 to Fedora recently. Most of the games I play work without issue but I know there are some which categorically refuse to work (mainly some specific anti-cheating software reasons).
As for MacOS, I just hate it.
"It sucks"
Ha!
There, fixed it for you.
It's not like Linux is the blocker here.
I dont know any private person in my circle that actually sold their laptop until it wasnt broken or so painfully old that the used value was mostly for spare parts. That may change a bit with the skyrocketing pc part prices but still.
When I hear these arguments I just think these people are simply chained.
Also Linux isn't flawless either, Fedora broke sleep on my full AMD PC since like a month now and no agent could successfully debug it.
This hasn't been true for at least a decade. And it's especially not true for the M* series Macs.
Even Macbook Neo can handle editing several layers of 4k video files in several apps while running everything else https://youtu.be/Mo6o8RKn7jE?is=opeCYMDbt7bUAdvS Try that on "the same performance/ram" Windows Machine
Noticed you didn't push back on any actual facts, just emotional 'outrage'.
Can you cite that?
Or is it just all about how you feel?
Saying something like that is far grosser and more inappropriate than a using a metaphor.
How many of the people pearl-clutching in this thread actually use Windows?
I'd say the problem these days is not Ads, its Content. Firefox and Chrome (desktop and android) and Edge start with a tab of content - celebrity tat and sensationalistic world news. Windows taskbar was the same, weather and news gave me a load of tatty Content. You go and find the setting to turn it off and it goes away. But I hate Content much more than I hate Ads. Content is the problem and on that front Windows is about the same as everything else.
