16 ms·

Ditching Windows: 2 Weeks with Ubuntu Linux on the Dell XPS 13

211 points by neverminder 8y ago

datalist 8y ago
Quite the opposite story of https://medium.com/@neroux/linux-why-dont-you-love-me-30cd054f485b https://medium.com/@neroux/linux-why-dont-you-love-me-30cd05...
- GiuseppaAcciaio 8y ago
  I remember when I installed Debian on my old Toshiba laptop in 2004 (all 16x CDs of it, which a friend had to download for me coz I had no broadband), I couldn't update it because the ethernet network adapter (no wifi) on my laptop was not supported... nice to see that this curse still occasionally persists! If I remember correctly I fixed it by installing a different distro (Ubuntu or Kubuntu, which surprisingly despite being based on Debian had no issues recognizing my network adapter)
  - majewsky 8y ago
    > nice to see that this curse still occasionally persists /s FTFY Seriously, though, that's a huge outlier. I haven't touched a machine in the last 10 years where Ethernet and Wifi were not supported out-of-the-box. (Including my new Thinkpad, which I was weary about since it came with an Atheros Wifi module, but it too worked out-of-the-box without any tinkering). These days, the biggest issues are with Nvidia GPUs from what I've heard.
    - Insanity 8y ago
      The drivers for gpus are a bit annoying but only if you want to game on Ubuntu. Nouveau drivers are horrible for performance and the nvidia ones are not always great, if you can find a compatible one. That being said - I can't compare with AMD as my last system of Linux with an AMD gpu for gaming was back when it was an ATI gpu. :p
      - majewsky 8y ago
        I have two systems with AMD GPUs: a desktop with a 2015 R9 Nano and a 2018 Thinkpad with a Ryzen APU. The amdgpu driver works perfectly on both of them. The Ryzen APU has one issue where you need to set `iommu=soft` in the kernel parameters to get it to boot, but that seems to be more related to the CPU than the GPU.
        chupasaurus 8y ago
        I don't have that parameter set, everything works fine. Ryzen 2400G.
        majewsky 8y ago
        Maybe it's got to do with the chipset? Not sure, I don't have any other Ryzens to compare against. But `iommu=soft` is strictly required on my system, otherwise the screen just stays black after the boot manager.
      - jandrese 8y ago
        nVidia's drivers cover a pretty wide swath of cards. I've had decent luck in Ubuntu just going to the proprietary drivers section and clicking on the binary blob. The only downside is that it locks you into one version of the driver until you do a full OS upgrade, and that driver gets pretty out of date by the time the next LTS is ready.
    - avenius 8y ago
      It still does occur though. A while ago I bought an Asus mini-pc to be used as a media server, only to be stumped by issues with the Realtek drivers. Apparently they're no longer available after kernel version 4.15. From what you're saying, I guess those devices just aren't that common anymore?
    - wil421 8y ago
      I had issue with intel gigabit Ethernet on an Asus z270e when I first bought it. Ethernet wouldn’t work on Linux or when I booted a Hackintosh just because. Looking at the Asus spreadsheet for Linux my board supports Fedora and Ubuntu. OpenSuse and RedHat were listed as N/A.
    - Shinchy 8y ago
      TP-Link still have these issues and they're one of the largest manufacturers of wireless tech. In some sense a similar case to the Nvidia Issues.
  - realusername 8y ago
    I seriously doubt you can find a machine today where Ubuntu does run but you can't use the Ethernet, even WiFi issues are getting rarer.
chopin 8y ago
The Linux Mint experience of the author is strange. I was able to install with no problems on three very different machines (Dell Inspiron, HP Laptop (forgot the model, it's my daughter's) and an assembled game PC featuring 4 Monitors). The only qualm I have with it: For fear of data loss I decided against full disk encryption (the installation procedure asks for it) in expectation that one can switch after installation (I think Windows is able to do this). Unfortunately, that is not possible and imposing this later seems to include a lot of low-level work.
- AdmiralAsshat 8y ago
  The article author was on a Linux podcast about a week ago and clarified that he couldn't reproduce the Mint issue, as it seemed to properly detect it when he retried later. But he had set strict guidelines for the article--basically, that he had to do this from a lifelong Windows user's perspective. So if the distro didn't work the first time, he moved on to the next one.
  - chopin 8y ago
    Yeah, I got that and I am absolutely fine with it. A bit strange though that this happened. Maybe he scrambled something during trying the live image... As I migrated not only me, but also (non-technical) other users I would have wanted to stick to Mint even at the cost of jumping through hoops as the migration is said to be easier for Windows users (as compared to eg. Ubuntu). We never looked back.
    - wes-t 8y ago
      Another anecode here, but I've had the exact same thing happen to me - Mint failed due to a similar issue during install, while Ubuntu installed without issue. I ended up using ubuntu for a while
kanishkdudeja 8y ago
The only issue I face with Linux on my Dell XPS 13 is the sub-par touchpad experience. If I use Ubuntu with XOrg, I don't have features like touch rejection while typing etc. If I use Ubuntu with Wayland, my cursor is all over the place.
- amarant 8y ago
  I have similar issues I've found that disabling tap-to-click is the only option. Takes some getting used to actually pressing down the touchpad instead of tapping, but at least typing is now a deterministic experience.
- davidbanham 8y ago
  It's a bit of a pain that it doesn't work well out of the box, but the situation can be fixed with a little tuning of your xorg configuration file. https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Touchpad_Synaptics#Using_the_driver.27s_automatic_palm_detection https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Touchpad_Synaptics#Usin...
  - spacenick88 8y ago
    At least with KDE/Plasma most of this can actually be done in a UI. I'm an Arch Linux user myself and I haven't hand edited an Xorg configuration file in at least 3 years.
  - majewsky 8y ago
    For reference, this is what I use on my notebook (Thinkpad E485): https://github.com/majewsky/system-configuration/blob/30dbd7c9e2ef0c66dd7eea398755706a3e05be8b/holodeck-traal.pkg.toml#L91-L106 https://github.com/majewsky/system-configuration/blob/30dbd7...
- Jedd 8y ago
  > If I use Ubuntu with XOrg, I don't have features like touch rejection while typing etc. I'm guessing that when you say "Ubuntu with XOrg" you're referring to a specific window manager? On Debian with Xorg my touchpad and touch screen are both easily toggleable with a keyboard shortcut, the touchpad automatically disables itself when I'm typing or when a mouse (bluetooth or logitech solaar) is detected.
kurtisc 8y ago
The author praises the package manager as a positive, not a negative as I usually see from people used to downloading *.exe installers. He's used other distros, plus a Mac, in the past, but I wonder if phone app stores (plus Windows' own software store) have made this become a more natural method of installing software for the average user?
- cix_pkez 8y ago
  I switched from Windows to Linux before I had a smartphone and appreciate the package manager. I got a Macbook for work and lamented the lack of package manager (homebrew is a weak substitute in several ways).
  - rbanffy 8y ago
    Macs have the App Store, which works well for GUI programs. On the CLI side I have played with Brew (and Fink a long time ago), but I prefer MacPorts because it feels more solid (at the expense of not having all of the bleeding edge stuff.
    - cix_pkez 8y ago
      Ah, yes, but my package manager covers every piece of software I use. No specialized update services. It seems like a small thing, but it's more pleasant.
      - rbanffy 8y ago
        Oh yes! We solved that problem in the early 2000's.
      - AnIdiotOnTheNet 8y ago
        And if it doesn't cover software you use, then it sucks to be you. Or if you want to install an application to a different disk. Or if you want to have two different versions of an application installed. Or if you want to use an application that relies on dependencies your package manager has decided are incompatible. The package management paradigm has its own set of limitations and flaws.
rospaya 8y ago
I'm writing this from my XPS 13 using the latest Ubuntu and once I've spent a few hours configuring everything, it works almost perfectly. There's still a few bugs, like Ubuntu not remembering the audio settings.
- SmellyGeekBoy 8y ago
  XPS 15 9560 here. The audio thing seems to be very recent. I've noticed that my (usually muted) audio is always re-enabled on boot now, but only in the past week or so. I've been running Cosmic since the early alpha days. A minor annoyance as everything else works perfectly on this machine - hopefully it'll get fixed soon in an update.
  - dboreham 8y ago
    Audio is similarly broken under Windows too on my XPS13.
- emptyfile 8y ago
  What? So XPS 13 which you can buy with Ubuntu preinstalled still has parts of the hardware not working after "a few hours configuring everything"? I can't understand how that's acceptable to anyone. Literally every laptop I've installed Linux on had a litany of driver problems.
  - rawoke083600 8y ago
    I want to downvote you and shout/hope it aint so.. but your right :(
    - yanonymous2 8y ago
      * you're
  - androidgirl 8y ago
    It's possible they don't mean hardware, but rather Ubuntu does not save the settings properly. I have had that issue with the Unity WM
funkythings 8y ago
The only thing that is stopping me to jump to a linux laptop is battery life. MacOs is just optimised to a crazy extent. Nothing really comes close to the same battery performance if you don't want to get your hands dirty with tlp.
- rawfan 8y ago
  From what I heard, this is not true for the Dell XPS 13 and other new Notebooks that supposedly run well with Linux. I get almost 5 hours out of my decade-old Thinkpad T410 (original battery). My 2018 Macbook Pro 13" with touchbar only gets me through 2/3rds of the workday (older models or 15" work way longer). Apple put in smaller batteries and optimized their own (!) apps to compensate. You're pretty much forced to use Safari if your don't want even worse battery life.
  - jammygit 8y ago
    I find its all WiFi. On an xps 13 with ubuntu, I get 10-12 hours on low brightness without wifi, but often 4-6 otherwise with wifi. Its really nice for roadtrips.
    - robocat 8y ago
      I wonder whether that is causation or correlation? AFAIK the WiFi hardware doesn't use much power itself, although I might guess that background protocol chitchat could cause CPU usage. I think that when I am usually using WiFi I am also usually using a browser that chews power.
    - chadlavi 8y ago
      Turning off wifi is probably just turning off your ability to do a lot of heavy processing as you interact with the internet, right?
      - jandrese 8y ago
        This is my thought. Turn off wifi and you're no longer running the cpu and memory monster that is a web browser. But this is something Apple does right. My wife noticed that she can get around 50% more battery life out of her Macbook using Safari instead of Firefox. (7-8 hours instead of 4-5).
apexalpha 8y ago
>once I've spent a few hours configuring everything This is what stops noobs from using it.
- izacus 8y ago
  Configuring my Mac to my liking also takes a few hours and it doesn't seem to stop noobs from using it.
  - addicted 8y ago
    The difference is that “noobs” can be useful with their Mac without any configuration. That’s harder with Linux, although as the author of this article points out, this isn’t true anymore, especially with Ubuntu.
- Multicomp 8y ago
  The article author touched on this as well. The single biggest hurdle that comes up when my sphere of influence talk about installing a linux distro is the amount of manual fussing and finicky driver work you "have to do". Whether that is the reality in today's distros compared to people trying distros out in years past (hello XUbuntu 7!) is to the side. Perception is reality, and no amount of my arguing has been able to change people's minds unless they are already a tinkerer or an anti-Microsoftie. A sibling comment talks about using xorg vs Wayland and the difference it makes in making the mouse work well or not. That is a perfect example of what holds Linux back from it's (hopefully soon) year of the Linux desktop. If a given Linux distro would target a consistent set of apps that are familiar to users/"noobs" out of the box (the list the author used is pretty representative) as well as some more visible attempts at automatic driver selection based on known hardware IDs, it would dramatically lower that friction and thus help combat the possibly unfair perception Linux currently runs into in the mind of plain users. I will say, Microsoft has been bungling things so epically with their windows update boondoggles that I'm starting to encounter users who seem more open to that Linux thing, at least if you pitched it with a distro that tried to have Windows-like look and feel, like the ZorrinOs/Lindows/KDEs of the world.
  - 8y ago
ericcholis 8y ago
I recently switched to an XPS 15 9570 from my Macbook Air. I'm giving windows a shot for my secondary dev machine (python, docker, php, etc...), while being fully aware of the persistent Windows 10 issues. So far, the hardest part was adjusting my keyboard workflow from Mac to Windows. For the time being, I'm extremely happy with the hardware and satisfied with Windows. I'll give dual boot a shot in my spare time.
- Amygaz 8y ago
  Same here, except I bought a precision 5530, after 12 years on Mac (2 MBP, then a MBA). It’s been a few months and I like it, I don’t regret it. I don’t mind Windows 10 at all, it feels a bit more customizable than MacOS actually. I do find the way it puts all the files that makes an app work all over the place. But a lot of people are experts in this. My Linux need is limited so I run the Ubuntu installed from the Microsoft App Store. Rest of my time is splitted between Firefox, Conda and Office. I am not doing any serious CAD, so I didn’t really need the Quadro or the 4K screen, but I have none of the problems that some are complaining about the XPS and it just looks so great. Onyx case also!
  - ericcholis 8y ago
    Windows Subsystem for Linux is one of the big reasons why I didn't mind switching. I tried out a few thinkpads as well, but ultimately went with the XPS
- stemc43 8y ago
  windows for docker & dev box? seems like perfect scenario for Linux here :) Fedora 29 is great tbh - u should give it a try.
  - ericcholis 8y ago
    There are a few occasions where some images don't work with file syncing between windows shares and docker. MongoDB comes to mind.
Zhyl 8y ago
There was an interesting thread on Reddit [1] the other day which did a breakdown of the state of gaming in terms of native games and games that can be run easily via Steam Play (aka 'Proton', Valve's in-built WINE+DXVK layer). The results were quite interesting and, as one of the replies pointed out in another breakdown, Linux now competes with (and in some ways beats) gaming on macOS in terms of size of catalogue. Granted there is a ways to go to beat Windows in this space, but the progress over the last 6 years generally and the last 6 months specifically is astounding. [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/linux_gaming/comments/9qopag/5000_linux_games_on_steam_and_a_few_other_numbers/ https://www.reddit.com/r/linux_gaming/comments/9qopag/5000_l...
- WorkLifeBalance 8y ago
  Beating macOS at gaming sounds like a punchline, that's just not impressive, macOS has only ever been an afterthought for gaming.
  - de_watcher 8y ago
    Yes, you've got to try very hard to be worse than MacOS that is openly sabotaging OpenGL and Vulkan efforts.
    - pjmlp 8y ago
      Lack of OpenGL and Vulkan support never mattered on game consoles. Even with Switch's adoption of Vulkan, most games are actually using middleware that makes use of NVN. If a platform is relevant to professional games developers, they will target it, regardless of which APIs and OS it requires.
      - monocasa 8y ago
        Consoles give very strict contracts that you can rely on to not change for the whole lifetime of the console. In contrary macOS changes stuff every year apparently based on what a fortune teller says for Steve Job's ghost. That means that early on, yeah it's as bad as Mac, but it gets way better over the lifetime of the console.
rawoke083600 8y ago
linux and "new" (i'd say new < 3-5 months) is always tricky in terms of support from the major distributions without having to fuzz too much. But i won't have ANYTHING else than linux on my laptop.
f4stjack 8y ago
Although I have used Linux on and off for more than 16 years, its main OS status in my household is nearing its anniversary so I think I am in a position to share my experience. The machines I've installed Manjaro are: - HP Stream 13 (Celeron 1.6 ghz, 2gb ram 25 gb hdd) - Clevo W230ST (i7 3.0 ghz, 16 gb ram, 240 gb SSD) - AMD Ryzen 1600x, Nvidia Geforce 1060, 8gb ram 100 gb SSD First of all, I hadn't experienced a "Okay that's it I am moving to Linux because of X". It was more of a gradual process. My one limiting factor was gaming and after realizing I was able to play 103 over 137 games waiting in my backlog in Steam I decided to give it a try on my Hp Stream - which I call my Potato. It needed some tweaking due to HP using rtl8723be and connecting one antennae for some reason. I needed to compile a kernel module to select the right antenna. But apart from that it was smooth sailing. My turning point to using Linux, or rather KDE, was the muscle memory I gained and the ease of use. For example when you press alt-space kde provides an easily accessible searcher which I configured to run software only - but it also searches for anything you write in your file system as well. Secondly, yakuake is a wonderful tool which provides a terminal just by pressing F12 and thirdly, last but not the least, KDE Connect is a huge game changer for me. See, if you are on the same wifi network with your pc you can: - see the notifications from your phone and reply back - share the clipboard with your pc and phone - find your phone if you lost it in your home by ringing it from your pc - and it turns off your music player in your pc if you receive a call. I felt like I was missing those features when I was using Windows in my other PCs so I converted them to Manjaro as well. They didn't need tweaking compared to HP; practically everything was working out of the box. The stuff I did was with Clevo I needed to install Bumblebee (which is VERY easy with Manjaro and for some weird reason I couldn't do it in Ubuntu derivatives and ended up with a black screen) to use switchable graphics on it and with the AMD case I installed Nvidia proprietary drivers for performance and gaming reasons. Speaking of gaming steam's proton provides a good experience for most of the games I've tried. Lutris is also good, I tried some System Shock 2 and Fallout on my potato (because my gut feeling was if a machine with limited resources run it adequately I wouldn't have any problem with the others and I was right) and they ran quite good. I experienced some sluggishness with SS2 but well... that was expected to be honest. HP's 3d performance isn't something to write home about generally. As for programming my biggest test was running Microsoft stack. I heard good stuff about .net core so I started with it and saw that even my potato was able to run ASP.Net MVC 5 successfully. For a more native experience I decided to install a server 2016 plus Visual studio in a virtual machine. I used my clevo to do that and was pleasantly surprised that it ran quite well with providing 4 cpus + 4gb of ram to run the container. As a personal note I doubt I'll use it much due to I have exited the IT industry practically and unable to enter it again, not that I want to any more. (people expect a bachelor's degree in Engineering or in Programming here and I am a Humanities graduate with a bachelor in philosophy and a master's in sociology) Other languages which can be installed on linux natively like python, ruby, java didn't cause any problems so all was fine on that front. A question might pop up about Manjaro. Why Manjaro? Well because I think it has a lesser resource overhead compared to Ubuntu derivatives. The fans on my clevo never stopped turning with Mint and Kubuntu but Manjaro KDE is a cooler (no pun intended) experience for it. In addition to that I like AUR and the concept of rolling release. Another distro which is famous for its up-to-dateness is OpenSUSE but it borked post install for some weird reason so I can't say I had a good experience with it. So I hope I helped with my personal experience with "converting to Linux". Thanks for reading!
red-tea 8y ago
I did this ten years ago and I've never looked back. When I see what Windows 10 is today I'm so glad I made the jump. Linux is easier to use than ever. It wasn't always this easy. I run Gentoo at home and everything just works and what's more is I understand why it works (well, mostly).
simion314 8y ago
For power users I would suggest Kubuntu LTS, try the live image, if your hardware works then install it and for a few years you should be good. KDE is more configurable then GNOME and it does not suffer by the GNOMEs architecture and memory issues(aggravated if you customize it with extensions)
daledavies 8y ago
I really have tried to use Ubuntu Destop as my daily driver after using the server varient for many years in work. It's not great for any "design" related task where I would normally jump into Adobe CC, no problem I'll just reboot to Windows for that. Until one day it just stops working... won't boot, logs you out immediately after logging in, random UI components become corrupted etc. At this point I always end up thinking... Well I've got reboot into Windows now anyway so why bother sifting through Stack Overflow for hours trying to fix Ubuntu.
- rbanffy 8y ago
  > Well I've got reboot into Windows now anyway so why bother sifting through Stack Overflow for hours trying to fix Ubuntu. For the rare occasions I wanted to wipe clean my Linux install without inflicting any pain on myself, I keep everything that lives under my home folder on a separate filesystem. This way, I can easily wipe the OS clean and not worry about my data. A similar setup for dual booting can be handy, provided the other OS can use the filesystem I keep my important data in. Having said that, the only times I experienced problems like the ones you describe was when I was so bored I decided Debian Sid would be a fine work OS. In other words, I was asking for it. What have you been doing to your machine?
- CaptSpify 8y ago
  As a Linux user and advocate, it's really frustrating to see these types of comments being down-voted. Linux still has a ton of issues OOTB, and disregarding negative experiences like this won't make them go away. I wish that instead of preaching Linux when it clearly isn't ready, we'd spend more time making it ready.
zhte415 8y ago
On reflecting the writer's use-case, and my own use-cases for enjoying both Linux (Ubuntu, but Gnome3 no Unity) and Windows: I've used Linux for 15 years. It truly was a pain getting things like ADSL modems (wired) connecting. But that was 15 years ago and not the point of this post. I use Linux at home - Gnome gives me no task-bar, or a highly customisable one if I want that. I'm focused in the application that I'm in. The UI supports the *NIX philosophy that one app does one app's job well, and if more need to be binded together, that's OK too. I feel peaceful in Linux. Terminal is running and that's an alt-tab away. Mouse to the top-left gives me other apps, though only ones I regularly find useful. Mint might not give the same. Linux, or my Linux setup, allows me focus. I use Windows at work - Windows has a taskbar. Everything is in the Windows menu. The taskbar can be hidden but mouse-over activates it, and the Windows menu can be customised, but it still feels there as a distraction. Office is an outstanding piece of software today; Outlook: I used to receive 400+ email per day, and know people that get 2000+ everyday too - Outlook makes that almost manageable; Excel and Powerpoint are astoundingly good at their scope; Word, I transitioned to pmwiki (need for collaboration and flexibility); Sharepoint and AD integration... obviously this is a corporate environment. Windows feels distracting. Adding a Linux sub-system doesn't change this UX (for me). What works for me - In a working environment I have Linux running on a VM and spend 60% of my time in this. At home I have a Windows VM running 20% when I want the best of Windows (which, for me, is Office). Not a gamer so no input there. Choose the most comfortable tool for the job. YMMV.
- cix_pkez 8y ago
  Exactly. I've used all 3 major OSs and when we get into these discussions, you have to look at how each has its own pain points to be fair. Overall, Linux is a clear win for me. But YMMV, indeed.
  - AnIdiotOnTheNet 8y ago
    It's a big problem though that when pain points are brought up the response is often to just point at one of the other OSs's pain points and dismiss the criticism. Unfortunately we can do very little to make Windows or MacOS better other than complain to the deaf ears of the companies that own them, but theoretically Linux Desktop could be better if complaints weren't simply dismissed in this fashion.
Wehrdo 8y ago
Glad that Ubuntu works well for the author, but I've used Ubuntu on and off for a good 5+ years, and could fill a book with small things that just don't work quite right, and cumulatively makes it feel like I'm fighting the computer instead of working with it. As a brief taste: * No trackpad swipe gestures (plus many more subtle trackpad issues) * Pre-Wayland the only way to attach a second screen at a different DPI was with xrandr that caused random flickering * Accidentally bricked it once because I restarted while updates were happening in the background (no indication they were, and no prompt to let me know before restarting) I could go on for awhile...
- jjoonathan 8y ago
  On my Dell Precision 6800: * "Supported" ubuntu was so old that neither Chrome nor Firefox would update * Latest ubuntu constantly toggled the backlight at 30fps (yes, really). * They didn't provide a driver package, instead they provided a utility to bake drivers into install media. Naturally, it didn't work, the documentation described a significantly different version. * All these problems were well-represented in forlorn solutionless forum / stack overflow threads.
  - rbanffy 8y ago
    Usually Ubuntu takes care of browser updates by itself - you don't (shouldn't) update browsers yourself.
  - PascLeRasc 8y ago
    Where did you get info on what the "supported" Ubuntu version is? I've installed 18.04 on C2D machines and it looks like your machine has a Haswell CPU. The latest version of any Linux distro you want will work. Also, did you ever try these utilities to set the backlight PWM? https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/backlight#Backlight_PWM_modulation_frequency_.28Intel_i915_only.29 https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/backlight#Backlight_PWM...
    - jandrese 8y ago
      I think he's referring to the version that Dell ships with the laptop. But that laptop has been out of support from Dell for so long I don't know why this is a problem, it's not like you were going to be able to call them up and get support on it anyway. In my experience Ubuntu on Dell laptops tends to just work. Even things you might not expect like the volume keys on the keyboard.
Theodores 8y ago
Ubuntu works great for me and has done on every machine I have installed it on over the last decade or so. I find that the support for drivers is much better than with Windows except for when it comes to wi-fi. This means I have a drawer full of external wi-fi dongles and miscellaneous folders full of drivers that don't quite work. Despite this I find Ubuntu to be a much more productive OS than the alternatives available. What I do not understand is why people are so willing to give Ubuntu a hard time. On any discussion there are people from Windows or OSX that point out their negative experiences of Linux whilst being blind to the deficiencies of their own paid-for OS. It seems as if it is easy to write 'yeah I tried Linux for a couple of weeks five years ago and I thought the start menu was naff plus I couldn't get x to work' or to moan about the command line aspect. It is much harder to write constructively so any discussion of Linux comes down to many subjective judgements.
- rbanffy 8y ago
  When was the last time `apt dist-upgrade` did delete all your files? Oh... Never ;-) It's hard to read all these opinions when my own experience with Windows is that I won't touch it with a pole. And God help me if the wireless fails (my wife's corporate issued Windows laptop could connect with the Starbucks across the road, but not with the stock D-Link at home) because there are at least 3 vendor specific control panels in addition to the Windows one, all showing conflicting information (and nothing on what actually failed). Windows users are so shenanigan-tolerant when it comes to Windows it's a bit surprising they don't like rock-solid distros like Ubuntu or Fedora.
  - AnIdiotOnTheNet 8y ago
    > When was the last time `apt dist-upgrade` did delete all your files? Oh... Never ;-) On the other hand, I have had it brick the package manager to the point that only reinstalling the OS from scratch would fix it, or break perfectly functional existing applications by replacing their libraries with incompatible versions. I think if you look around you'll find that Linux Desktop users are also remarkably tolerant of shenanigans. Editing poorly documented text-based config files by hand, having to compile some applications from source to get an updated version because it isn't in the repo, having to containerize applications because of the interdependency mess, setting kernel boot parameters because of strange driver behavior, etc. Modern OSs just kinda all suck and it's more or less subjective which ones suck more than the others.
bitwize 8y ago
I freakin' love Linux as a personal workstation OS. I got into it in 1995, back in the days when Linux was punk rawk and you had to dig around on tsx-11 and sunsite to find things to run on it. I still dual-booted Windows there for a few years. Then I noticed something: Windows would, suddenly and without warning, stop working. As in, blue screen on first boot. All the way up through Windows 2000 -- 9x, NT, didn't matter. Windows would find a way to fail and, often as not, take the whole disk partition with it. So I decided, okay, Microsoft, if that's the way you're gonna be, fuck you. Yeah, yeah, I know. Windows "Just Works" out of the box. Except when it doesn't, in which case you're up shit creek. The extra tweaking I had to do to get Linux fully going was well worth it because once Linux was configured, it would stay that way -- forever if need be. For that reason I still run the same distro today as I did back then -- Slackware. Where other distros try to win you over with newness and shininess, Slackware is shibui. Shibui is the Japanese aesthetic of crafting simple objects out of natural materials, in such a way that the natural texture of the material shows through and gives the object an understated beauty. Slackware is a simple distro put together in such a way that the "natural texture" of Unix shows through, making it easy to configure to your liking provided you're willing to learn the command line and some basic configuration files. It's very much like a BSD in that regard. I know I'm not a typical user, but I fit the profile of an ordinary Linux user from another era. I'm glad to see more and more Windows users give Linux a try, but I just hope there'll still be room for people like me in the vast and changing Linux ecosystem.
- fak3r 8y ago
  Like you, I know I'm not the typical Linux user, but I took started out with Linux (Red Hat) in 1996, then got into learning Linux with Slackware. Today I have servers at home and 'in the cloud' all running Linux (mostly Debian), and home systems (old iMac 27", Macbook Air 13") running Linux only (ElementaryOS and Budgie Ubuntu) and couldn't be happier. I use i3 on the desktop and just work so much better/faster than in any other OSs. You get closer to the real power of the hardware too, amazing how much faster everything is w/o the bit OSs of macOS and Windows. At work is a diff story, depending where I am (I'm an IT contractor), but when I have a Windows laptop, I do 95% of my 'real' work on a Linux server I ssh to. I've also gotten into FreeBSD and OpenBSD on servers and they're fantastic there too, but being in a Linux desktop is where I'm happiest. TL;DR me too ;)
linsomniac 8y ago
If you don't have specific Windows apps, I'd be tempted to try a Chromebook these days. Around 2 years ago I got a cheap Chromebook and it was terrible. I think it was $250. Fit and finish and keyboard kind of sucked. I found one of those HP Chromebook 13 g1 boxes, which Woot had refurb for half off at just under $500, and it is much closer to the hardware experience I'm used to with Thinkpads, for 1/6th the price. Now, I almost always reach for the Chromebook instead of the Thinkpad EXCEPT when I need to connect to both of my work VPNs, the Chromebook will only connect to one at a time. I can ssh into my personal and work machines, run my password manager, program via remove vi sessions (though I could stand to use VSCode, I don't have that set up on my Thinkpad either). The Chromebook has been a great experience for me.
- StavrosK 8y ago
  Chromebooks sound amazing except I don't want to be locked into Google or give them more of my data...
  - panarky 8y ago
    Personally I choose Debian, but if the alternative is getting locked into Microsoft and giving them more of my data, then I choose Google.
    - StavrosK 8y ago
      For me, I'm thinking about what I would prefer to give to my parents/family, who right now use Ubuntu laptops. Chromebooks might be a bit slicker, but yeah, there's no contest between Ubuntu and Google in the "big brother" department.
    - Razengan 8y ago
      Surely Google's privacy-invading footprint is far wider than Microsoft's, including Analytics etc.
    - acct1771 8y ago
      Do you trust the hardware?
Razengan 8y ago
To add my own anecdote to everyone else's: I haven't touched Windows or used anything by Microsoft since 2010, save for trying some games that my friends played. These days, if there's a Windows-exclusive game I like, I try to run it in CrossOver/Wine or Parallels/VMWare, or forget about it. Windows machines are synonymous with games consoles for me now, and between my Nintendo Switch, 3DS, and Mac ports, I feel I'm well-catered for with regards to games. I also don't use Google for anything except their search and YouTube, and I was already using the latter before Google gobbled it. iCloud serves my email needs just fine. I also try to block as much of Google's cross-site tracking services on my computers as I can, like Analytics. If you're horrified or disgusted by the idea of someone sticking solely with Apple for so long, consider that you and I only prove the point that it IS certainly possible to avoid one or more of the 3 major computing companies entirely. Once you're used to the alternatives to those, you may never even miss them.
ConcreteRooster 8y ago
Anyone use Linux on the desktop with a document scanner? A big component of my at-home PC use is scanning documents (I'm a self-admitted digital hoarder). I have a Fujitsu ScanSnap S1500, which is "supported" by Linux/SANE. I have tried to use this scanner under Linux, and while it does work, the problem is that the Windows-only Fujitsu software (ScanSnap Manager) does a lot of useful things to the scan data: straightens the document if it was fed in at an angle; converts to PDF; adjusts contrast, white levels, etc so the digital result magically looks like the physical document; and more I'm probably forgetting. I have Ubuntu on a little NUC PC attached to my TV. The other day, I heard the fan running loudly on this system. Ubuntu's update system, across several processes, was collectively pegging both CPUs at 100%, causing the fan to ramp up. Why does an update system (which was waiting on my input) require so much CPU? The huge number of distributions is both a blessing and a curse. Ubuntu has clearly put a lot of effort into the ease-of-use aspect. But what I found (years ago, to be fair) was that if you had any non-trivial problem, the forums weren't terribly helpful. On the other hand, a distro like Arch has fantastic documentation, and really knowledgeable forum users, but you need that because you're doing everything by hand. I haven't found the sweet spot that gives an Ubuntu-like experience out of the box, but has a very technical Arch-like community. The statements the author made early in the article really resonate with me. I consider myself a Linux "pro", as I've been using it as an enthusiast for 20 years, and have been a professional admin for about a decade (server-side, not desktop). So I have fixed or feel I can fix just about any Linux issue. But at this point in my life, after work, I don't have the time or desire to fiddle with things, I want them to "just work".
- pmercatoris 8y ago
  "I haven't found the sweet spot that gives an Ubuntu-like experience out of the box, but has a very technical Arch-like community." For me, that sweet spot is Manjaro. I have been using it daily on a laptop (T470) at work for nearly 2 years, with barely any problem at all. Moreover, it gives you many very polished DE options (official and community editions).
julienfr112 8y ago
I'm using Ubuntu since almost 10 years. I rediscovered windows 10 and i have to admit it's pretty good : more responsive than Ubuntu, more pretty. On the down side, you have to download drivers even for very common devices like for the wifi card of Intel nucs. I miss also the simplicity of installing software and library (sudo apt get...) Vs downloading an installer, the installer download something, clicking ok ok ok ok ok ...
contingencies 8y ago
My laptop (~99% work only) setup is ZFS root + Gentoo on XPS15: https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Dell_XPS_15_9560 https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Dell_XPS_15_9560 ... but switched from Mac (vs. Windows) after yet another stupid hardware error and Apple quoting more than the price of the thing to fix it. Haven't used Windows personally in over a decade. Manage to game a bit, but in general don't have time anymore. However, just specced a couple of Ryzen workstations at work, and they will run Windows. More expensive than I expected. I don't built machines that often anymore. Since when did you need 700W of power and a dedicated graphics card because CPU doesn't support built-in graphics chip? This is truly a new world. :)
- Synaesthesia 8y ago
  Try hackintosh. And people tend to recommend way overspecced power supplies.
  - contingencies 8y ago
    No time for hackintosh. It's not that people recommend, 450W wouldn't get an image. Had to chuck it out and upgrade. That's hardware today!
- Leace 8y ago
  Why ZFS instead of btrfs (asking out of curiosity as I'm pondering the issue myself)?
  - contingencies 8y ago
    More familiar personally. I think its been stable longer and has more features, but btrfs may have caught up these days.
    - Leace 8y ago
      Thanks for your explanation. If only ZFS was GPL licensed btrfs would probably never exist. I was very much interested in ZFS and invested a lot to learn the internals but the out-of-tree status of it and the fact that btrfs gets better and better with every kernel release probably means that btrfs will get ahead of ZFS some time in the future. (that's just my observation) FWIW it seems anecdotal evidence [0] shows that btrfs is stable for daily use (just don't use RAID 5/6 [1]). [0]: https://www.phoronix.com/forums/forum/software/general-linux-open-source/1055883-btrfs-to-ship-multiple-performance-improvements-in-the-next-linux-kernel?p=1055926#post1055926 https://www.phoronix.com/forums/forum/software/general-linux... [1]: https://btrfs.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Status#Overview https://btrfs.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Status#Overview
mahgnous 8y ago
I had an absolutely horrible experience with the XPS 13 and Ubuntu 18.04. Wireless drivers didn't work worth a crap in it and I was having problems controlling temperatures and it was constantly performance throttling on me. I ended up returning it. (This was not the dev edition)
Paraesthetic 8y ago
The problem here is steam has a long way to go in terms of a catalog for games, and the games that do run are often buggy ports with little support because developers see less users as less critical for patches. That said, I can't move to linux purely because the software I need for audio is far superior on Mac or PC
Leace 8y ago
I've installed Arch on XPS 13 9350 and was also surprised by the amount of things that worked out of the box: touchpad, HiDPI scaling, different scales for different monitors, no issues with the Thunderbolt dock. Actually Windows had more issues for me on this laptop. Or course one can still screw something up but with a little effort it's easy to learn how to get out of trouble. Additionally Linux is like Lego - one can create their own setup, e.g. currently I'm using Yubikey's OpenPGP card to unlock full-disk encrypted disk. Bitlocker cannot use smartcards (but can use TPM).

211 points by neverminder 8y ago

Quite the opposite story of https://medium.com/@neroux/linux-why-dont-you-love-me-30cd054f485b https://medium.com/@neroux/linux-why-dont-you-love-me-30cd05...

GiuseppaAcciaio 8y ago
I remember when I installed Debian on my old Toshiba laptop in 2004 (all 16x CDs of it, which a friend had to download for me coz I had no broadband), I couldn't update it because the ethernet network adapter (no wifi) on my laptop was not supported... nice to see that this curse still occasionally persists! If I remember correctly I fixed it by installing a different distro (Ubuntu or Kubuntu, which surprisingly despite being based on Debian had no issues recognizing my network adapter)
- majewsky 8y ago
  > nice to see that this curse still occasionally persists /s FTFY Seriously, though, that's a huge outlier. I haven't touched a machine in the last 10 years where Ethernet and Wifi were not supported out-of-the-box. (Including my new Thinkpad, which I was weary about since it came with an Atheros Wifi module, but it too worked out-of-the-box without any tinkering). These days, the biggest issues are with Nvidia GPUs from what I've heard.
  - Insanity 8y ago
    The drivers for gpus are a bit annoying but only if you want to game on Ubuntu. Nouveau drivers are horrible for performance and the nvidia ones are not always great, if you can find a compatible one. That being said - I can't compare with AMD as my last system of Linux with an AMD gpu for gaming was back when it was an ATI gpu. :p
    - majewsky 8y ago
      I have two systems with AMD GPUs: a desktop with a 2015 R9 Nano and a 2018 Thinkpad with a Ryzen APU. The amdgpu driver works perfectly on both of them. The Ryzen APU has one issue where you need to set `iommu=soft` in the kernel parameters to get it to boot, but that seems to be more related to the CPU than the GPU.
      - chupasaurus 8y ago
        I don't have that parameter set, everything works fine. Ryzen 2400G.
        majewsky 8y ago
        Maybe it's got to do with the chipset? Not sure, I don't have any other Ryzens to compare against. But `iommu=soft` is strictly required on my system, otherwise the screen just stays black after the boot manager.
    - jandrese 8y ago
      nVidia's drivers cover a pretty wide swath of cards. I've had decent luck in Ubuntu just going to the proprietary drivers section and clicking on the binary blob. The only downside is that it locks you into one version of the driver until you do a full OS upgrade, and that driver gets pretty out of date by the time the next LTS is ready.
  - avenius 8y ago
    It still does occur though. A while ago I bought an Asus mini-pc to be used as a media server, only to be stumped by issues with the Realtek drivers. Apparently they're no longer available after kernel version 4.15. From what you're saying, I guess those devices just aren't that common anymore?
  - wil421 8y ago
    I had issue with intel gigabit Ethernet on an Asus z270e when I first bought it. Ethernet wouldn’t work on Linux or when I booted a Hackintosh just because. Looking at the Asus spreadsheet for Linux my board supports Fedora and Ubuntu. OpenSuse and RedHat were listed as N/A.
  - Shinchy 8y ago
    TP-Link still have these issues and they're one of the largest manufacturers of wireless tech. In some sense a similar case to the Nvidia Issues.
- realusername 8y ago
  I seriously doubt you can find a machine today where Ubuntu does run but you can't use the Ethernet, even WiFi issues are getting rarer.

chopin 8y ago

The Linux Mint experience of the author is strange. I was able to install with no problems on three very different machines (Dell Inspiron, HP Laptop (forgot the model, it's my daughter's) and an assembled game PC featuring 4 Monitors). The only qualm I have with it: For fear of data loss I decided against full disk encryption (the installation procedure asks for it) in expectation that one can switch after installation (I think Windows is able to do this). Unfortunately, that is not possible and imposing this later seems to include a lot of low-level work.

AdmiralAsshat 8y ago
The article author was on a Linux podcast about a week ago and clarified that he couldn't reproduce the Mint issue, as it seemed to properly detect it when he retried later. But he had set strict guidelines for the article--basically, that he had to do this from a lifelong Windows user's perspective. So if the distro didn't work the first time, he moved on to the next one.
- chopin 8y ago
  Yeah, I got that and I am absolutely fine with it. A bit strange though that this happened. Maybe he scrambled something during trying the live image... As I migrated not only me, but also (non-technical) other users I would have wanted to stick to Mint even at the cost of jumping through hoops as the migration is said to be easier for Windows users (as compared to eg. Ubuntu). We never looked back.
  - wes-t 8y ago
    Another anecode here, but I've had the exact same thing happen to me - Mint failed due to a similar issue during install, while Ubuntu installed without issue. I ended up using ubuntu for a while

kanishkdudeja 8y ago

The only issue I face with Linux on my Dell XPS 13 is the sub-par touchpad experience. If I use Ubuntu with XOrg, I don't have features like touch rejection while typing etc. If I use Ubuntu with Wayland, my cursor is all over the place.

amarant 8y ago
I have similar issues I've found that disabling tap-to-click is the only option. Takes some getting used to actually pressing down the touchpad instead of tapping, but at least typing is now a deterministic experience.
davidbanham 8y ago
It's a bit of a pain that it doesn't work well out of the box, but the situation can be fixed with a little tuning of your xorg configuration file. https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Touchpad_Synaptics#Using_the_driver.27s_automatic_palm_detection https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Touchpad_Synaptics#Usin...
- spacenick88 8y ago
  At least with KDE/Plasma most of this can actually be done in a UI. I'm an Arch Linux user myself and I haven't hand edited an Xorg configuration file in at least 3 years.
- majewsky 8y ago
  For reference, this is what I use on my notebook (Thinkpad E485): https://github.com/majewsky/system-configuration/blob/30dbd7c9e2ef0c66dd7eea398755706a3e05be8b/holodeck-traal.pkg.toml#L91-L106 https://github.com/majewsky/system-configuration/blob/30dbd7...
Jedd 8y ago
> If I use Ubuntu with XOrg, I don't have features like touch rejection while typing etc. I'm guessing that when you say "Ubuntu with XOrg" you're referring to a specific window manager? On Debian with Xorg my touchpad and touch screen are both easily toggleable with a keyboard shortcut, the touchpad automatically disables itself when I'm typing or when a mouse (bluetooth or logitech solaar) is detected.

kurtisc 8y ago

The author praises the package manager as a positive, not a negative as I usually see from people used to downloading *.exe installers. He's used other distros, plus a Mac, in the past, but I wonder if phone app stores (plus Windows' own software store) have made this become a more natural method of installing software for the average user?

cix_pkez 8y ago
I switched from Windows to Linux before I had a smartphone and appreciate the package manager. I got a Macbook for work and lamented the lack of package manager (homebrew is a weak substitute in several ways).
- rbanffy 8y ago
  Macs have the App Store, which works well for GUI programs. On the CLI side I have played with Brew (and Fink a long time ago), but I prefer MacPorts because it feels more solid (at the expense of not having all of the bleeding edge stuff.
  - cix_pkez 8y ago
    Ah, yes, but my package manager covers every piece of software I use. No specialized update services. It seems like a small thing, but it's more pleasant.
    - rbanffy 8y ago
      Oh yes! We solved that problem in the early 2000's.
    - AnIdiotOnTheNet 8y ago
      And if it doesn't cover software you use, then it sucks to be you. Or if you want to install an application to a different disk. Or if you want to have two different versions of an application installed. Or if you want to use an application that relies on dependencies your package manager has decided are incompatible. The package management paradigm has its own set of limitations and flaws.

rospaya 8y ago

I'm writing this from my XPS 13 using the latest Ubuntu and once I've spent a few hours configuring everything, it works almost perfectly. There's still a few bugs, like Ubuntu not remembering the audio settings.

SmellyGeekBoy 8y ago
XPS 15 9560 here. The audio thing seems to be very recent. I've noticed that my (usually muted) audio is always re-enabled on boot now, but only in the past week or so. I've been running Cosmic since the early alpha days. A minor annoyance as everything else works perfectly on this machine - hopefully it'll get fixed soon in an update.
- dboreham 8y ago
  Audio is similarly broken under Windows too on my XPS13.
emptyfile 8y ago
What? So XPS 13 which you can buy with Ubuntu preinstalled still has parts of the hardware not working after "a few hours configuring everything"? I can't understand how that's acceptable to anyone. Literally every laptop I've installed Linux on had a litany of driver problems.
- rawoke083600 8y ago
  I want to downvote you and shout/hope it aint so.. but your right :(
  - yanonymous2 8y ago
    * you're
- androidgirl 8y ago
  It's possible they don't mean hardware, but rather Ubuntu does not save the settings properly. I have had that issue with the Unity WM

funkythings 8y ago

The only thing that is stopping me to jump to a linux laptop is battery life. MacOs is just optimised to a crazy extent. Nothing really comes close to the same battery performance if you don't want to get your hands dirty with tlp.

rawfan 8y ago
From what I heard, this is not true for the Dell XPS 13 and other new Notebooks that supposedly run well with Linux. I get almost 5 hours out of my decade-old Thinkpad T410 (original battery). My 2018 Macbook Pro 13" with touchbar only gets me through 2/3rds of the workday (older models or 15" work way longer). Apple put in smaller batteries and optimized their own (!) apps to compensate. You're pretty much forced to use Safari if your don't want even worse battery life.
- jammygit 8y ago
  I find its all WiFi. On an xps 13 with ubuntu, I get 10-12 hours on low brightness without wifi, but often 4-6 otherwise with wifi. Its really nice for roadtrips.
  - robocat 8y ago
    I wonder whether that is causation or correlation? AFAIK the WiFi hardware doesn't use much power itself, although I might guess that background protocol chitchat could cause CPU usage. I think that when I am usually using WiFi I am also usually using a browser that chews power.
  - chadlavi 8y ago
    Turning off wifi is probably just turning off your ability to do a lot of heavy processing as you interact with the internet, right?
    - jandrese 8y ago
      This is my thought. Turn off wifi and you're no longer running the cpu and memory monster that is a web browser. But this is something Apple does right. My wife noticed that she can get around 50% more battery life out of her Macbook using Safari instead of Firefox. (7-8 hours instead of 4-5).

apexalpha 8y ago

>once I've spent a few hours configuring everything This is what stops noobs from using it.

izacus 8y ago
Configuring my Mac to my liking also takes a few hours and it doesn't seem to stop noobs from using it.
- addicted 8y ago
  The difference is that “noobs” can be useful with their Mac without any configuration. That’s harder with Linux, although as the author of this article points out, this isn’t true anymore, especially with Ubuntu.
Multicomp 8y ago
The article author touched on this as well. The single biggest hurdle that comes up when my sphere of influence talk about installing a linux distro is the amount of manual fussing and finicky driver work you "have to do". Whether that is the reality in today's distros compared to people trying distros out in years past (hello XUbuntu 7!) is to the side. Perception is reality, and no amount of my arguing has been able to change people's minds unless they are already a tinkerer or an anti-Microsoftie. A sibling comment talks about using xorg vs Wayland and the difference it makes in making the mouse work well or not. That is a perfect example of what holds Linux back from it's (hopefully soon) year of the Linux desktop. If a given Linux distro would target a consistent set of apps that are familiar to users/"noobs" out of the box (the list the author used is pretty representative) as well as some more visible attempts at automatic driver selection based on known hardware IDs, it would dramatically lower that friction and thus help combat the possibly unfair perception Linux currently runs into in the mind of plain users. I will say, Microsoft has been bungling things so epically with their windows update boondoggles that I'm starting to encounter users who seem more open to that Linux thing, at least if you pitched it with a distro that tried to have Windows-like look and feel, like the ZorrinOs/Lindows/KDEs of the world.
- 8y ago

ericcholis 8y ago

I recently switched to an XPS 15 9570 from my Macbook Air. I'm giving windows a shot for my secondary dev machine (python, docker, php, etc...), while being fully aware of the persistent Windows 10 issues. So far, the hardest part was adjusting my keyboard workflow from Mac to Windows. For the time being, I'm extremely happy with the hardware and satisfied with Windows. I'll give dual boot a shot in my spare time.

Amygaz 8y ago
Same here, except I bought a precision 5530, after 12 years on Mac (2 MBP, then a MBA). It’s been a few months and I like it, I don’t regret it. I don’t mind Windows 10 at all, it feels a bit more customizable than MacOS actually. I do find the way it puts all the files that makes an app work all over the place. But a lot of people are experts in this. My Linux need is limited so I run the Ubuntu installed from the Microsoft App Store. Rest of my time is splitted between Firefox, Conda and Office. I am not doing any serious CAD, so I didn’t really need the Quadro or the 4K screen, but I have none of the problems that some are complaining about the XPS and it just looks so great. Onyx case also!
- ericcholis 8y ago
  Windows Subsystem for Linux is one of the big reasons why I didn't mind switching. I tried out a few thinkpads as well, but ultimately went with the XPS
stemc43 8y ago
windows for docker & dev box? seems like perfect scenario for Linux here :) Fedora 29 is great tbh - u should give it a try.
- ericcholis 8y ago
  There are a few occasions where some images don't work with file syncing between windows shares and docker. MongoDB comes to mind.

Zhyl 8y ago

There was an interesting thread on Reddit [1] the other day which did a breakdown of the state of gaming in terms of native games and games that can be run easily via Steam Play (aka 'Proton', Valve's in-built WINE+DXVK layer). The results were quite interesting and, as one of the replies pointed out in another breakdown, Linux now competes with (and in some ways beats) gaming on macOS in terms of size of catalogue. Granted there is a ways to go to beat Windows in this space, but the progress over the last 6 years generally and the last 6 months specifically is astounding. [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/linux_gaming/comments/9qopag/5000_linux_games_on_steam_and_a_few_other_numbers/ https://www.reddit.com/r/linux_gaming/comments/9qopag/5000_l...

WorkLifeBalance 8y ago
Beating macOS at gaming sounds like a punchline, that's just not impressive, macOS has only ever been an afterthought for gaming.
- de_watcher 8y ago
  Yes, you've got to try very hard to be worse than MacOS that is openly sabotaging OpenGL and Vulkan efforts.
  - pjmlp 8y ago
    Lack of OpenGL and Vulkan support never mattered on game consoles. Even with Switch's adoption of Vulkan, most games are actually using middleware that makes use of NVN. If a platform is relevant to professional games developers, they will target it, regardless of which APIs and OS it requires.
    - monocasa 8y ago
      Consoles give very strict contracts that you can rely on to not change for the whole lifetime of the console. In contrary macOS changes stuff every year apparently based on what a fortune teller says for Steve Job's ghost. That means that early on, yeah it's as bad as Mac, but it gets way better over the lifetime of the console.

rawoke083600 8y ago

linux and "new" (i'd say new < 3-5 months) is always tricky in terms of support from the major distributions without having to fuzz too much. But i won't have ANYTHING else than linux on my laptop.

f4stjack 8y ago

Although I have used Linux on and off for more than 16 years, its main OS status in my household is nearing its anniversary so I think I am in a position to share my experience. The machines I've installed Manjaro are: - HP Stream 13 (Celeron 1.6 ghz, 2gb ram 25 gb hdd) - Clevo W230ST (i7 3.0 ghz, 16 gb ram, 240 gb SSD) - AMD Ryzen 1600x, Nvidia Geforce 1060, 8gb ram 100 gb SSD First of all, I hadn't experienced a "Okay that's it I am moving to Linux because of X". It was more of a gradual process. My one limiting factor was gaming and after realizing I was able to play 103 over 137 games waiting in my backlog in Steam I decided to give it a try on my Hp Stream - which I call my Potato. It needed some tweaking due to HP using rtl8723be and connecting one antennae for some reason. I needed to compile a kernel module to select the right antenna. But apart from that it was smooth sailing. My turning point to using Linux, or rather KDE, was the muscle memory I gained and the ease of use. For example when you press alt-space kde provides an easily accessible searcher which I configured to run software only - but it also searches for anything you write in your file system as well. Secondly, yakuake is a wonderful tool which provides a terminal just by pressing F12 and thirdly, last but not the least, KDE Connect is a huge game changer for me. See, if you are on the same wifi network with your pc you can: - see the notifications from your phone and reply back - share the clipboard with your pc and phone - find your phone if you lost it in your home by ringing it from your pc - and it turns off your music player in your pc if you receive a call. I felt like I was missing those features when I was using Windows in my other PCs so I converted them to Manjaro as well. They didn't need tweaking compared to HP; practically everything was working out of the box. The stuff I did was with Clevo I needed to install Bumblebee (which is VERY easy with Manjaro and for some weird reason I couldn't do it in Ubuntu derivatives and ended up with a black screen) to use switchable graphics on it and with the AMD case I installed Nvidia proprietary drivers for performance and gaming reasons. Speaking of gaming steam's proton provides a good experience for most of the games I've tried. Lutris is also good, I tried some System Shock 2 and Fallout on my potato (because my gut feeling was if a machine with limited resources run it adequately I wouldn't have any problem with the others and I was right) and they ran quite good. I experienced some sluggishness with SS2 but well... that was expected to be honest. HP's 3d performance isn't something to write home about generally. As for programming my biggest test was running Microsoft stack. I heard good stuff about .net core so I started with it and saw that even my potato was able to run ASP.Net MVC 5 successfully. For a more native experience I decided to install a server 2016 plus Visual studio in a virtual machine. I used my clevo to do that and was pleasantly surprised that it ran quite well with providing 4 cpus + 4gb of ram to run the container. As a personal note I doubt I'll use it much due to I have exited the IT industry practically and unable to enter it again, not that I want to any more. (people expect a bachelor's degree in Engineering or in Programming here and I am a Humanities graduate with a bachelor in philosophy and a master's in sociology) Other languages which can be installed on linux natively like python, ruby, java didn't cause any problems so all was fine on that front. A question might pop up about Manjaro. Why Manjaro? Well because I think it has a lesser resource overhead compared to Ubuntu derivatives. The fans on my clevo never stopped turning with Mint and Kubuntu but Manjaro KDE is a cooler (no pun intended) experience for it. In addition to that I like AUR and the concept of rolling release. Another distro which is famous for its up-to-dateness is OpenSUSE but it borked post install for some weird reason so I can't say I had a good experience with it. So I hope I helped with my personal experience with "converting to Linux". Thanks for reading!

red-tea 8y ago

I did this ten years ago and I've never looked back. When I see what Windows 10 is today I'm so glad I made the jump. Linux is easier to use than ever. It wasn't always this easy. I run Gentoo at home and everything just works and what's more is I understand why it works (well, mostly).

simion314 8y ago

For power users I would suggest Kubuntu LTS, try the live image, if your hardware works then install it and for a few years you should be good. KDE is more configurable then GNOME and it does not suffer by the GNOMEs architecture and memory issues(aggravated if you customize it with extensions)

daledavies 8y ago

I really have tried to use Ubuntu Destop as my daily driver after using the server varient for many years in work. It's not great for any "design" related task where I would normally jump into Adobe CC, no problem I'll just reboot to Windows for that. Until one day it just stops working... won't boot, logs you out immediately after logging in, random UI components become corrupted etc. At this point I always end up thinking... Well I've got reboot into Windows now anyway so why bother sifting through Stack Overflow for hours trying to fix Ubuntu.

rbanffy 8y ago
> Well I've got reboot into Windows now anyway so why bother sifting through Stack Overflow for hours trying to fix Ubuntu. For the rare occasions I wanted to wipe clean my Linux install without inflicting any pain on myself, I keep everything that lives under my home folder on a separate filesystem. This way, I can easily wipe the OS clean and not worry about my data. A similar setup for dual booting can be handy, provided the other OS can use the filesystem I keep my important data in. Having said that, the only times I experienced problems like the ones you describe was when I was so bored I decided Debian Sid would be a fine work OS. In other words, I was asking for it. What have you been doing to your machine?
CaptSpify 8y ago
As a Linux user and advocate, it's really frustrating to see these types of comments being down-voted. Linux still has a ton of issues OOTB, and disregarding negative experiences like this won't make them go away. I wish that instead of preaching Linux when it clearly isn't ready, we'd spend more time making it ready.

zhte415 8y ago

On reflecting the writer's use-case, and my own use-cases for enjoying both Linux (Ubuntu, but Gnome3 no Unity) and Windows: I've used Linux for 15 years. It truly was a pain getting things like ADSL modems (wired) connecting. But that was 15 years ago and not the point of this post. I use Linux at home - Gnome gives me no task-bar, or a highly customisable one if I want that. I'm focused in the application that I'm in. The UI supports the *NIX philosophy that one app does one app's job well, and if more need to be binded together, that's OK too. I feel peaceful in Linux. Terminal is running and that's an alt-tab away. Mouse to the top-left gives me other apps, though only ones I regularly find useful. Mint might not give the same. Linux, or my Linux setup, allows me focus. I use Windows at work - Windows has a taskbar. Everything is in the Windows menu. The taskbar can be hidden but mouse-over activates it, and the Windows menu can be customised, but it still feels there as a distraction. Office is an outstanding piece of software today; Outlook: I used to receive 400+ email per day, and know people that get 2000+ everyday too - Outlook makes that almost manageable; Excel and Powerpoint are astoundingly good at their scope; Word, I transitioned to pmwiki (need for collaboration and flexibility); Sharepoint and AD integration... obviously this is a corporate environment. Windows feels distracting. Adding a Linux sub-system doesn't change this UX (for me). What works for me - In a working environment I have Linux running on a VM and spend 60% of my time in this. At home I have a Windows VM running 20% when I want the best of Windows (which, for me, is Office). Not a gamer so no input there. Choose the most comfortable tool for the job. YMMV.

cix_pkez 8y ago
Exactly. I've used all 3 major OSs and when we get into these discussions, you have to look at how each has its own pain points to be fair. Overall, Linux is a clear win for me. But YMMV, indeed.
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 8y ago
  It's a big problem though that when pain points are brought up the response is often to just point at one of the other OSs's pain points and dismiss the criticism. Unfortunately we can do very little to make Windows or MacOS better other than complain to the deaf ears of the companies that own them, but theoretically Linux Desktop could be better if complaints weren't simply dismissed in this fashion.

Wehrdo 8y ago

Glad that Ubuntu works well for the author, but I've used Ubuntu on and off for a good 5+ years, and could fill a book with small things that just don't work quite right, and cumulatively makes it feel like I'm fighting the computer instead of working with it. As a brief taste: * No trackpad swipe gestures (plus many more subtle trackpad issues) * Pre-Wayland the only way to attach a second screen at a different DPI was with xrandr that caused random flickering * Accidentally bricked it once because I restarted while updates were happening in the background (no indication they were, and no prompt to let me know before restarting) I could go on for awhile...

jjoonathan 8y ago
On my Dell Precision 6800: * "Supported" ubuntu was so old that neither Chrome nor Firefox would update * Latest ubuntu constantly toggled the backlight at 30fps (yes, really). * They didn't provide a driver package, instead they provided a utility to bake drivers into install media. Naturally, it didn't work, the documentation described a significantly different version. * All these problems were well-represented in forlorn solutionless forum / stack overflow threads.
- rbanffy 8y ago
  Usually Ubuntu takes care of browser updates by itself - you don't (shouldn't) update browsers yourself.
- PascLeRasc 8y ago
  Where did you get info on what the "supported" Ubuntu version is? I've installed 18.04 on C2D machines and it looks like your machine has a Haswell CPU. The latest version of any Linux distro you want will work. Also, did you ever try these utilities to set the backlight PWM? https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/backlight#Backlight_PWM_modulation_frequency_.28Intel_i915_only.29 https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/backlight#Backlight_PWM...
  - jandrese 8y ago
    I think he's referring to the version that Dell ships with the laptop. But that laptop has been out of support from Dell for so long I don't know why this is a problem, it's not like you were going to be able to call them up and get support on it anyway. In my experience Ubuntu on Dell laptops tends to just work. Even things you might not expect like the volume keys on the keyboard.

Theodores 8y ago

Ubuntu works great for me and has done on every machine I have installed it on over the last decade or so. I find that the support for drivers is much better than with Windows except for when it comes to wi-fi. This means I have a drawer full of external wi-fi dongles and miscellaneous folders full of drivers that don't quite work. Despite this I find Ubuntu to be a much more productive OS than the alternatives available. What I do not understand is why people are so willing to give Ubuntu a hard time. On any discussion there are people from Windows or OSX that point out their negative experiences of Linux whilst being blind to the deficiencies of their own paid-for OS. It seems as if it is easy to write 'yeah I tried Linux for a couple of weeks five years ago and I thought the start menu was naff plus I couldn't get x to work' or to moan about the command line aspect. It is much harder to write constructively so any discussion of Linux comes down to many subjective judgements.

rbanffy 8y ago
When was the last time `apt dist-upgrade` did delete all your files? Oh... Never ;-) It's hard to read all these opinions when my own experience with Windows is that I won't touch it with a pole. And God help me if the wireless fails (my wife's corporate issued Windows laptop could connect with the Starbucks across the road, but not with the stock D-Link at home) because there are at least 3 vendor specific control panels in addition to the Windows one, all showing conflicting information (and nothing on what actually failed). Windows users are so shenanigan-tolerant when it comes to Windows it's a bit surprising they don't like rock-solid distros like Ubuntu or Fedora.
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 8y ago
  > When was the last time `apt dist-upgrade` did delete all your files? Oh... Never ;-) On the other hand, I have had it brick the package manager to the point that only reinstalling the OS from scratch would fix it, or break perfectly functional existing applications by replacing their libraries with incompatible versions. I think if you look around you'll find that Linux Desktop users are also remarkably tolerant of shenanigans. Editing poorly documented text-based config files by hand, having to compile some applications from source to get an updated version because it isn't in the repo, having to containerize applications because of the interdependency mess, setting kernel boot parameters because of strange driver behavior, etc. Modern OSs just kinda all suck and it's more or less subjective which ones suck more than the others.

bitwize 8y ago

I freakin' love Linux as a personal workstation OS. I got into it in 1995, back in the days when Linux was punk rawk and you had to dig around on tsx-11 and sunsite to find things to run on it. I still dual-booted Windows there for a few years. Then I noticed something: Windows would, suddenly and without warning, stop working. As in, blue screen on first boot. All the way up through Windows 2000 -- 9x, NT, didn't matter. Windows would find a way to fail and, often as not, take the whole disk partition with it. So I decided, okay, Microsoft, if that's the way you're gonna be, fuck you. Yeah, yeah, I know. Windows "Just Works" out of the box. Except when it doesn't, in which case you're up shit creek. The extra tweaking I had to do to get Linux fully going was well worth it because once Linux was configured, it would stay that way -- forever if need be. For that reason I still run the same distro today as I did back then -- Slackware. Where other distros try to win you over with newness and shininess, Slackware is shibui. Shibui is the Japanese aesthetic of crafting simple objects out of natural materials, in such a way that the natural texture of the material shows through and gives the object an understated beauty. Slackware is a simple distro put together in such a way that the "natural texture" of Unix shows through, making it easy to configure to your liking provided you're willing to learn the command line and some basic configuration files. It's very much like a BSD in that regard. I know I'm not a typical user, but I fit the profile of an ordinary Linux user from another era. I'm glad to see more and more Windows users give Linux a try, but I just hope there'll still be room for people like me in the vast and changing Linux ecosystem.

fak3r 8y ago
Like you, I know I'm not the typical Linux user, but I took started out with Linux (Red Hat) in 1996, then got into learning Linux with Slackware. Today I have servers at home and 'in the cloud' all running Linux (mostly Debian), and home systems (old iMac 27", Macbook Air 13") running Linux only (ElementaryOS and Budgie Ubuntu) and couldn't be happier. I use i3 on the desktop and just work so much better/faster than in any other OSs. You get closer to the real power of the hardware too, amazing how much faster everything is w/o the bit OSs of macOS and Windows. At work is a diff story, depending where I am (I'm an IT contractor), but when I have a Windows laptop, I do 95% of my 'real' work on a Linux server I ssh to. I've also gotten into FreeBSD and OpenBSD on servers and they're fantastic there too, but being in a Linux desktop is where I'm happiest. TL;DR me too ;)

linsomniac 8y ago

If you don't have specific Windows apps, I'd be tempted to try a Chromebook these days. Around 2 years ago I got a cheap Chromebook and it was terrible. I think it was $250. Fit and finish and keyboard kind of sucked. I found one of those HP Chromebook 13 g1 boxes, which Woot had refurb for half off at just under $500, and it is much closer to the hardware experience I'm used to with Thinkpads, for 1/6th the price. Now, I almost always reach for the Chromebook instead of the Thinkpad EXCEPT when I need to connect to both of my work VPNs, the Chromebook will only connect to one at a time. I can ssh into my personal and work machines, run my password manager, program via remove vi sessions (though I could stand to use VSCode, I don't have that set up on my Thinkpad either). The Chromebook has been a great experience for me.

StavrosK 8y ago
Chromebooks sound amazing except I don't want to be locked into Google or give them more of my data...
- panarky 8y ago
  Personally I choose Debian, but if the alternative is getting locked into Microsoft and giving them more of my data, then I choose Google.
  - StavrosK 8y ago
    For me, I'm thinking about what I would prefer to give to my parents/family, who right now use Ubuntu laptops. Chromebooks might be a bit slicker, but yeah, there's no contest between Ubuntu and Google in the "big brother" department.
  - Razengan 8y ago
    Surely Google's privacy-invading footprint is far wider than Microsoft's, including Analytics etc.
  - acct1771 8y ago
    Do you trust the hardware?

Razengan 8y ago

To add my own anecdote to everyone else's: I haven't touched Windows or used anything by Microsoft since 2010, save for trying some games that my friends played. These days, if there's a Windows-exclusive game I like, I try to run it in CrossOver/Wine or Parallels/VMWare, or forget about it. Windows machines are synonymous with games consoles for me now, and between my Nintendo Switch, 3DS, and Mac ports, I feel I'm well-catered for with regards to games. I also don't use Google for anything except their search and YouTube, and I was already using the latter before Google gobbled it. iCloud serves my email needs just fine. I also try to block as much of Google's cross-site tracking services on my computers as I can, like Analytics. If you're horrified or disgusted by the idea of someone sticking solely with Apple for so long, consider that you and I only prove the point that it IS certainly possible to avoid one or more of the 3 major computing companies entirely. Once you're used to the alternatives to those, you may never even miss them.

ConcreteRooster 8y ago

Anyone use Linux on the desktop with a document scanner? A big component of my at-home PC use is scanning documents (I'm a self-admitted digital hoarder). I have a Fujitsu ScanSnap S1500, which is "supported" by Linux/SANE. I have tried to use this scanner under Linux, and while it does work, the problem is that the Windows-only Fujitsu software (ScanSnap Manager) does a lot of useful things to the scan data: straightens the document if it was fed in at an angle; converts to PDF; adjusts contrast, white levels, etc so the digital result magically looks like the physical document; and more I'm probably forgetting. I have Ubuntu on a little NUC PC attached to my TV. The other day, I heard the fan running loudly on this system. Ubuntu's update system, across several processes, was collectively pegging both CPUs at 100%, causing the fan to ramp up. Why does an update system (which was waiting on my input) require so much CPU? The huge number of distributions is both a blessing and a curse. Ubuntu has clearly put a lot of effort into the ease-of-use aspect. But what I found (years ago, to be fair) was that if you had any non-trivial problem, the forums weren't terribly helpful. On the other hand, a distro like Arch has fantastic documentation, and really knowledgeable forum users, but you need that because you're doing everything by hand. I haven't found the sweet spot that gives an Ubuntu-like experience out of the box, but has a very technical Arch-like community. The statements the author made early in the article really resonate with me. I consider myself a Linux "pro", as I've been using it as an enthusiast for 20 years, and have been a professional admin for about a decade (server-side, not desktop). So I have fixed or feel I can fix just about any Linux issue. But at this point in my life, after work, I don't have the time or desire to fiddle with things, I want them to "just work".

pmercatoris 8y ago
"I haven't found the sweet spot that gives an Ubuntu-like experience out of the box, but has a very technical Arch-like community." For me, that sweet spot is Manjaro. I have been using it daily on a laptop (T470) at work for nearly 2 years, with barely any problem at all. Moreover, it gives you many very polished DE options (official and community editions).

julienfr112 8y ago

I'm using Ubuntu since almost 10 years. I rediscovered windows 10 and i have to admit it's pretty good : more responsive than Ubuntu, more pretty. On the down side, you have to download drivers even for very common devices like for the wifi card of Intel nucs. I miss also the simplicity of installing software and library (sudo apt get...) Vs downloading an installer, the installer download something, clicking ok ok ok ok ok ...

contingencies 8y ago

My laptop (~99% work only) setup is ZFS root + Gentoo on XPS15: https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Dell_XPS_15_9560 https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Dell_XPS_15_9560 ... but switched from Mac (vs. Windows) after yet another stupid hardware error and Apple quoting more than the price of the thing to fix it. Haven't used Windows personally in over a decade. Manage to game a bit, but in general don't have time anymore. However, just specced a couple of Ryzen workstations at work, and they will run Windows. More expensive than I expected. I don't built machines that often anymore. Since when did you need 700W of power and a dedicated graphics card because CPU doesn't support built-in graphics chip? This is truly a new world. :)

Synaesthesia 8y ago
Try hackintosh. And people tend to recommend way overspecced power supplies.
- contingencies 8y ago
  No time for hackintosh. It's not that people recommend, 450W wouldn't get an image. Had to chuck it out and upgrade. That's hardware today!
Leace 8y ago
Why ZFS instead of btrfs (asking out of curiosity as I'm pondering the issue myself)?
- contingencies 8y ago
  More familiar personally. I think its been stable longer and has more features, but btrfs may have caught up these days.
  - Leace 8y ago
    Thanks for your explanation. If only ZFS was GPL licensed btrfs would probably never exist. I was very much interested in ZFS and invested a lot to learn the internals but the out-of-tree status of it and the fact that btrfs gets better and better with every kernel release probably means that btrfs will get ahead of ZFS some time in the future. (that's just my observation) FWIW it seems anecdotal evidence [0] shows that btrfs is stable for daily use (just don't use RAID 5/6 [1]). [0]: https://www.phoronix.com/forums/forum/software/general-linux-open-source/1055883-btrfs-to-ship-multiple-performance-improvements-in-the-next-linux-kernel?p=1055926#post1055926 https://www.phoronix.com/forums/forum/software/general-linux... [1]: https://btrfs.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Status#Overview https://btrfs.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Status#Overview

mahgnous 8y ago

I had an absolutely horrible experience with the XPS 13 and Ubuntu 18.04. Wireless drivers didn't work worth a crap in it and I was having problems controlling temperatures and it was constantly performance throttling on me. I ended up returning it. (This was not the dev edition)

Paraesthetic 8y ago

The problem here is steam has a long way to go in terms of a catalog for games, and the games that do run are often buggy ports with little support because developers see less users as less critical for patches. That said, I can't move to linux purely because the software I need for audio is far superior on Mac or PC

Leace 8y ago

I've installed Arch on XPS 13 9350 and was also surprised by the amount of things that worked out of the box: touchpad, HiDPI scaling, different scales for different monitors, no issues with the Thunderbolt dock. Actually Windows had more issues for me on this laptop. Or course one can still screw something up but with a little effort it's easy to learn how to get out of trouble. Additionally Linux is like Lego - one can create their own setup, e.g. currently I'm using Yubikey's OpenPGP card to unlock full-disk encrypted disk. Bitlocker cannot use smartcards (but can use TPM).