Topic: I've moved to Linux

[scottws]

I forgot to tell everyone: I switched to using Linux as my daily driver! I've been using Ubuntu 24.04 on my Lenovo ThinkPad for about three months now and it's been great!

I made the move because my CPU was the last one not supported by Microsoft for Windows 11, so I was stuck on Windows 10 and EOL for that is looming later this year. The laptop itself was still perfectly serviceable, so I decided to try using Linux instead of buying a new laptop. Hilariously, Microsoft ended up backtracking on the Windows 11 support requirements about a week after I blew Windows away. Whatever.

Pros:

• All of the hardware, except my fingerprint reader, worked out of the box on first boot. There were no special drivers I needed to install. The fingerprint reader itself is sadly vestigial now, though.
• It's extremely stable. No more killing explorer.exe and relaunching it periodically or anything like that. Everything just works, always, period.
• The volume and quality of tools for managing digital music libraries, mass tagging, and organizing the file system are simply unmatched.
• Lots of applications are deployed as "snaps" or "flatpaks" now, which are basically like pre-built containers but for desktop software. So they are extremely simple to install and update. They even have a bit of sandboxing, increasing security.
• Gaming on Linux has come a long way. There are tools like Steam, Heroic Launcher, and Lutris that make running games on Linux extremely easy. Basically just download and launch and it works. Gamepads, like my 8bitdo SN30 Pro just work too without issue. Not all games run though, especially any games that use kernel-based anti-cheat methods. I'm using integrated graphics on this thing anyway, so my options are already extremely limited.

Cons:

• LibreOffice (still) sucks compared to Microsoft Office. It just does. It's like an Office 2003 competitor.
• A lot of things are still terminal based.
• The competing UI toolkits (e.g., Qt and GTK+) can be annoying because an application you like might be designed for KDE & Qt rather than GNOME & GTK+. You can still install it, but it will also install a ton of dependencies from the other UI framework and will look out of place next to the rest of the apps.
• I do miss right-click and drag to another folder to show options from Windows. Linux doesn't have that. At least GNOME on Ubuntu 24.04 doesn't, not without a GNOME extension that may or may not exist.

[idolminds]

I've been thinking of making the switch at some point. My desktop cant upgrade to Win11 and it will probably be a few years until I can upgrade, so dropping Linux on here is probably the way to go. Maybe keep a Win10 dual boot as a backup for games that absolutely will not work otherwise and just lock that shit down as best I can. But good to hear that its working out and is relatively seamless.