4 ms·

No, there's no consumer-level desktop hardware you can't use on either Windows or OS X or both. That's false. Hardware support is indeed a reason not to use L

by lvs 11y ago

No, there's no consumer-level desktop hardware you can't use on either Windows or OS X or both. That's false. Hardware support is indeed a reason not to use Linux, but the question is who needs to pick up the slack. With other operating systems, manufacturers put (more or less) effort into writing device drivers that are functional. With Linux, they really do not. It's a large and moving target, and the market value of doing so is not clear to them.

xioxox 11y ago
Really? There's plenty of old hardware which no longer works in recent Windows versions. It's not in a manufacture's interest to update a driver to recent OS versions. In Linux drivers usually remain for a long time.
- ethbro 11y ago
  Example: Sony VIAO laptops http://esupport.sony.com/LA/perl/os10upgrade.pl?stage1=24&stage2=113&stage3=VGN-S450FP&month=&day=&year=&mdl=VGN-S450FP http://esupport.sony.com/LA/perl/os10upgrade.pl?stage1=24&st... "IMPORTANT: Drivers for other hardware components such as Network cards, etc..., may be available on the manufacturer's web site. Sony software applications that originally shipped with the computer may not work after installing Windows 10. Sony cannot guarantee your system capability after installing Windows 10." Had a friend with this. Sony sold division to some other corporation. Which leaves Win10 qualified drivers for such optional things as, oh, WIRELESS NETWORKING in limbo after a Win10 upgrade. Sure, you or I would pull the wifi card model, go to the manufacturer's site, and use the drivers from there. But Joe, Sally, Bob, or Jane public aren't going to get past "Wifi stopped working, and it wasn't on the update screen".
- bloaf 11y ago
  Probably, but I'd also wager that the majority of those devices use physical connections that any machine capable of running recent windows versions do not have. E.g. DB-25 ports. I will also wager that the only real "wall" that would prevent old hardware from working was the removal of 16-bit support from x64 versions of windows.
- pdabbadabba 11y ago
  Yeah. GP's point was overstated. But there's a weaker claim that is just as important and, I think, indisputably true: Windows supports virtually all hardware that is popular among desktop users. Or, even better, Windows supports far more hardware than desktop Linux, especially if you weight hardware by popularity. It's understandable, of course--Windows has a greater consumer installed base resulting in greater manufacturer interest in supporting the platform. For Linux desktop users, unfortunately, the dynamic is often the opposite: the manufacturer has no interest in supporting the platform, and users/volunteer developers have to do all the work...which the manufacturer may then break at will. But that doesn't mean that hardware support is not still a major problem for Linux desktop adoption.
- aeturnum 11y ago
  Sure, there's lots of old hardware that the manufacturer no longer supports. That, to me, seems like a very different problem, as the older hardware /was/ supported by an older version of windows. It's true that this traps you in an un-patched OS, but (as pointed out many other times in this thread) patching Linux components also risks creating hardware incompatibilities.
- lvs 11y ago
  Whether there's continuing support for a product is a very different issue. At some point, all consumer hardware was functional in a version of Windows or OS X, since it was released precisely with support for one or both of those OSs. Yes, updates break things, but that is a very different problem than the one facing Linux. The problem facing Linux is that manufacturers are not supporting (or not seeking with much vigor to support) any Linux distribution upon initial release of the hardware.
  - xorblurb 11y ago
    It is a very different issue but can be very much in favor of GNU/Linux distribution when they work on a given piece of hardware: they are far more likely to be able to get version N+1 of said distribution than Windows N+1. Now Windows 10 might bring the best of both worlds for the Windows world, but for now it does not work well that much.
vetinari 11y ago
> No, there's no consumer-level desktop hardware you can't use on either Windows or OS X or both. That's false. Oh, I can show you multitude of printers, scanners, tv tuners that do not work with Windows or OSX. Or they work with exactly one Windows version and that's it.
- gtirloni 11y ago
  Maybe old printers, old scanners and old tv tuners? The reality is that when a new laptop is released, Windows will support everything it has from day one. If that's because of Microsoft's or the manufacturer's efforts, that doesn't matter for regular users. On Linux, you buy the laptop and wait 1-2 years for bugs to be ironed out or even for things to barely work for the first time. Afterwards, Linux will continue to support that for a very long time while Windows may drop support after 2-3 versions because the manufacturer has no interest in upgrading drivers for the newest Windows releases. Specially for something that is not selling anymore. Most people I know in the open source world barely use any fancy features like tv tuners, fingerprint scanners, touchscreens, or even printers. From reading some comments here, these are usually the people saying "everything is fine". I do think everything is fine for open source developers but no so much for regular users. And if the focus can be on the latter, then I guess everybody will benefit at the same time. EDIT: typing this from Fedora 23 on a laptop with a NVIDIA card that is disabled because I got tired of bugs in nouveau and the constant hassle of updating the kernel and the GPU drivers stopping to work. I'm happy with the ingrated graphics though so my next laptop won't have a dGPU, probably.

by lvs 11y ago

xioxox 11y ago

Really? There's plenty of old hardware which no longer works in recent Windows versions. It's not in a manufacture's interest to update a driver to recent OS versions. In Linux drivers usually remain for a long time.

ethbro 11y ago
Example: Sony VIAO laptops http://esupport.sony.com/LA/perl/os10upgrade.pl?stage1=24&stage2=113&stage3=VGN-S450FP&month=&day=&year=&mdl=VGN-S450FP http://esupport.sony.com/LA/perl/os10upgrade.pl?stage1=24&st... "IMPORTANT: Drivers for other hardware components such as Network cards, etc..., may be available on the manufacturer's web site. Sony software applications that originally shipped with the computer may not work after installing Windows 10. Sony cannot guarantee your system capability after installing Windows 10." Had a friend with this. Sony sold division to some other corporation. Which leaves Win10 qualified drivers for such optional things as, oh, WIRELESS NETWORKING in limbo after a Win10 upgrade. Sure, you or I would pull the wifi card model, go to the manufacturer's site, and use the drivers from there. But Joe, Sally, Bob, or Jane public aren't going to get past "Wifi stopped working, and it wasn't on the update screen".
bloaf 11y ago
Probably, but I'd also wager that the majority of those devices use physical connections that any machine capable of running recent windows versions do not have. E.g. DB-25 ports. I will also wager that the only real "wall" that would prevent old hardware from working was the removal of 16-bit support from x64 versions of windows.
pdabbadabba 11y ago
Yeah. GP's point was overstated. But there's a weaker claim that is just as important and, I think, indisputably true: Windows supports virtually all hardware that is popular among desktop users. Or, even better, Windows supports far more hardware than desktop Linux, especially if you weight hardware by popularity. It's understandable, of course--Windows has a greater consumer installed base resulting in greater manufacturer interest in supporting the platform. For Linux desktop users, unfortunately, the dynamic is often the opposite: the manufacturer has no interest in supporting the platform, and users/volunteer developers have to do all the work...which the manufacturer may then break at will. But that doesn't mean that hardware support is not still a major problem for Linux desktop adoption.
aeturnum 11y ago
Sure, there's lots of old hardware that the manufacturer no longer supports. That, to me, seems like a very different problem, as the older hardware /was/ supported by an older version of windows. It's true that this traps you in an un-patched OS, but (as pointed out many other times in this thread) patching Linux components also risks creating hardware incompatibilities.
lvs 11y ago
Whether there's continuing support for a product is a very different issue. At some point, all consumer hardware was functional in a version of Windows or OS X, since it was released precisely with support for one or both of those OSs. Yes, updates break things, but that is a very different problem than the one facing Linux. The problem facing Linux is that manufacturers are not supporting (or not seeking with much vigor to support) any Linux distribution upon initial release of the hardware.
- xorblurb 11y ago
  It is a very different issue but can be very much in favor of GNU/Linux distribution when they work on a given piece of hardware: they are far more likely to be able to get version N+1 of said distribution than Windows N+1. Now Windows 10 might bring the best of both worlds for the Windows world, but for now it does not work well that much.

vetinari 11y ago

> No, there's no consumer-level desktop hardware you can't use on either Windows or OS X or both. That's false. Oh, I can show you multitude of printers, scanners, tv tuners that do not work with Windows or OSX. Or they work with exactly one Windows version and that's it.

gtirloni 11y ago
Maybe old printers, old scanners and old tv tuners? The reality is that when a new laptop is released, Windows will support everything it has from day one. If that's because of Microsoft's or the manufacturer's efforts, that doesn't matter for regular users. On Linux, you buy the laptop and wait 1-2 years for bugs to be ironed out or even for things to barely work for the first time. Afterwards, Linux will continue to support that for a very long time while Windows may drop support after 2-3 versions because the manufacturer has no interest in upgrading drivers for the newest Windows releases. Specially for something that is not selling anymore. Most people I know in the open source world barely use any fancy features like tv tuners, fingerprint scanners, touchscreens, or even printers. From reading some comments here, these are usually the people saying "everything is fine". I do think everything is fine for open source developers but no so much for regular users. And if the focus can be on the latter, then I guess everybody will benefit at the same time. EDIT: typing this from Fedora 23 on a laptop with a NVIDIA card that is disabled because I got tired of bugs in nouveau and the constant hassle of updating the kernel and the GPU drivers stopping to work. I'm happy with the ingrated graphics though so my next laptop won't have a dGPU, probably.