4 ms·

When your OS is pure spyware, maybe it's time to look into switch to a less abusive option. The more people that switch, the stronger signal it sends. This too

When your OS is pure spyware, maybe it's time to look into switch to a less abusive option. The more people that switch, the stronger signal it sends. This tool is equivalent to dating an alcoholic that beats you whenever they're drunk, so you keep trying to take away all the alcohol instead of dumping them and finding a new partner. The signs were always there and they just keep getting worse, it's time to move on.

real0mar 1mo ago
Too many games are Windows only
- bigfishrunning 1mo ago
  This is why I own a playstation
  - technothrasher 1mo ago
    Because your PlayStation couldn't possibly be spying on you?
    - bigfishrunning 1mo ago
      Because my playstation spies on my games, not my whole life. It's limitation of scope.
      - celsoazevedo 1mo ago
        I guess for that you could have a Windows machine just for gaming. No need to deal with the trade-offs of that come with using a console (if that matters to you).
        dspillett 1mo ago
        Though that would likely be a bit more expensive, or if cheaper it might be by compromising on GPU performance.
        bigfishrunning 1mo ago
        Not having a windows machine is one of the benefits of not having a windows machine! Using a console for gaming is cheaper, more secure, and more reliable then using a windows machine. The only downside is i don't have access to the wide ocean of steam and gog releases, but it's a fair trade as far as I'm concerned.
- arcfour 1mo ago
  Very few are these days with the enormous amount of resources Valve has been pouring into Proton. The only truly Windows-only games I have encountered were online multiplayer with anticheat and that was almost always because the developer chose not to support Linux (e.g. EAC, Rust) and not for lack of support for Linux. Perhaps that wouldn't happen if more people switched...
  - r_lee 1mo ago
    those are the vast majority of games that people play and people won't switch if there is no way to switch, it's like asking people to go on a hunger strike
    - arcfour 1mo ago
      Speak for yourself, there are hundreds of thousands of people playing games that do not fall into this category on Steam right now.
- GreenVulpine 1mo ago
  This hasn't been the case for at least half a decade. Most games run perfectly fine if not better on Linux. The only exceptions are purposely broken remote rootkit "anticheat" gsmes which no sane person would want on their system anyway.
- fabian2k 1mo ago
  With the exception of multiplayer games with invasive anti-cheat measures, a very large number of games works very well on Linux now with Wine/Proton. When using Steam this mostly works just out of the box without fiddling.
LetMeLogin 1mo ago
Not everybody has a possibility. Each system has pros and cons. I'm daily driving both Windows and Linux, and each has its own issues unfortunately, so using tools like OO is a necessity of making my(and others) life bit less miserable. For Linux I have bunch of custom repair scripts because of certain bugs I encounter(which are tracked too but not solved). Unfortunately this is the game no one will ever win, unless you will move, drop tech, and start breeding dogs, but then you need to sell them, and where would you advertise? :)
- callc 1mo ago
  IMHO: I like the issues faced on Linux more, since I can solve them. I too have a handful of repair scripts. I feel like an adult to be given access all the internals. I don’t feel that way on Windows (and any other locked down OS). We should put in the volunteer hours to upstream these fixes to make it nicer for normies :^)
embedding-shape 1mo ago
Well, when this alcoholic is the only one that works properly for the sort of audio and 3D/VFX work I do, and a bunch of tools are only able to run (well) on Windows (Yes, I've tried WINE and everything else under the sun, for a decade), so dual booting is really the only option here, unless I wanna throw out a bunch of licenses I've paid thousands for and stop accepting that sort of work. Ableton is probably the biggest reason I still have a Windows installation, and the one I try to get working (properly and well) with Wine/Proton maybe once a month or so. Cascadeur, Unreal Engine Editor, rekordbox are some of the other software I can't get to run well enough on Linux (yet) to fully migrate. But, on the other hand, lots of other software I use professionally works amazingly on Linux, better than Windows in fact, like Houdini, Unreal Engine (the runtime, not the Editor), DaVinci Resolve and Blender. I'm not worried though, eventually it'll be runnable on Linux no doubt, but personally we're not quite there yet, sadly.
- SV_BubbleTime 1mo ago
  >when this alcoholic is the only one that works properly for the sort of audio and 3D/VFX work I mean, that seems universally truer than not.
- belthesar 1mo ago
  I know this doesn't address all your concerns, but I switched from Ableton Live to Bitwig Studio for unrelated reasons to my leaving Windows behind, and I was thoroughly pleased with how easy the transition was between the two DAWs (I guess it shouldn't be too much of a surprise given how many ex-Ableton devs work on Bitwig), and how well the Linux build of Bitwig worked. Bitwig on Linux, with Pipewire as the audio engine for low latency operation, is essentially an identical operating experience for me. Getting your plugins working is a different story. A small but growing number of mainstream audio plugins have native Linux builds available, a wide swath of them work quite well with yabridge (https://yabridge.org/ https://yabridge.org/ - so shim to expose Windows audio plugins running in WINE prefixes to Linux audio plugin hosts), and a few required alternatives to be found. I found the workflow decent enough to use, but as one might expect, some plugins not working well via yabridge/WINE made things a little janky, and once I picked up a Mac device again, that became my production machine. That said, WINE's come a long say since I last tried this out a few years ago, and I'd be interested to see if things work better. My point, I suppose, is to share a reasonably good success story (though perhaps still not of a grade that you'd be comfortable switching to for paid work), and perhaps to encourage you to consider some alternatives to the tools you use. Tool changes are expensive, sure in cost, but moreso in time, so I don't suggest it lightly. That being said, I think that it might be worth it to grab a Bitwig trial and see how you like it. I'd grab it both on Windows and Linux, so you can try it "how it should work" when your plugins and the DAW are working in harmony while also getting the Linux toolchain working. And from the cost perspective, Bitwig does not have crossgrade licenses, so you can buy Studio once, and run it on any supported platform.
jeanmichelselli 1mo ago
I completely agree with this comment! If your OS does not behave like an OS anymore, better to switch to a real OS at that point. That's it. I've always been disappointed by Windows "OS" in the past but now it's really too much..
AmazingTurtle 1mo ago
I use cachyos as my daily driver for a long time now. I play quite a few games. Only league of legends forces me to dual boot into windows every once in a week or so - fuck the anticheat cartel
- rdudek 1mo ago
  I'm approaching a year now on CachyOS and it has been a wonderful experience. All the games that I play run just fine, maybe a few FPS drop compared to Windows, but it's not a big deal for me. I also don't play any competitive online games that require 3rd party anti-cheat spyware. Biggest positives, I got very comfortable with terminal and CLI work. My development work has definitely improved.
trinsic2 1mo ago
That's exactly the way I framed the relationship between Microsoft and its victim in a companion article[0] I wrote in 2025 looking back on my switch to Linux. Since then I started realizing how parasitic the proprietary software industry really is. [0]: https://www.scottrlarson.com/blog/publication-looking-back-windows-to-linux// https://www.scottrlarson.com/blog/publication-looking-back-w...
nilslindemann 1mo ago
Fine, I will switch when your OS has Autohotkey, Total Commander, and allows me to log in as Administrator.
- nilslindemann 1mo ago
  Oh, I also need a way to compile CodeBrowser 4.9 [1] [1] https://github.com/nilslindemann/Code_Browser_49 https://github.com/nilslindemann/Code_Browser_49
- vablings 1mo ago
  If you need Autohotkey you can still run that under wine (if you are ahk on windows applications), you can run total commander under wine. You can log in as admin I think its time to make the switch
  - Der_Einzige 1mo ago
    If they’re running auto hotkey they’re also likely gamers, likely needing to run games that either can’t emulate or lose performance when running via proton or wine. AKA, this advice, like most “switch to Linux” advice, is tone deaf.
    - orbital-decay 1mo ago
      Not sure why you think it's gaming related but fine, I just don't think AHK can do anything special. OP sounds rather like he's trying to find gotchas and justify staying on Windows, not genuinely find the replacement, which is also a thing in these discussions (see his adjacent post with a vague dismissal, I personally used a heavy TC setup under Wine and it was indistinguishable even 15 years ago). All these features are either readily available or the apps themselves are Wine-ified with no performance loss, I have tried that and I don't think you have. All you need to switch to Linux or Mac is overcoming some friction which is of course inevitable, but utility software like this is definitely not a hard blocker.
      - 1mo ago
tgv 1mo ago
I have a PC mainly for Hauptwerk, which uses ilok, which doesn't run under Linux and probably never will. I've got an MBP, but getting one with 128GB of RAM was terribly expensive, and is probably unaffordable now. Hauptwerk doesn't even run natively on the arm. The End.

real0mar 1mo ago

Too many games are Windows only

bigfishrunning 1mo ago
This is why I own a playstation
- technothrasher 1mo ago
  Because your PlayStation couldn't possibly be spying on you?
  - bigfishrunning 1mo ago
    Because my playstation spies on my games, not my whole life. It's limitation of scope.
    - celsoazevedo 1mo ago
      I guess for that you could have a Windows machine just for gaming. No need to deal with the trade-offs of that come with using a console (if that matters to you).
      - dspillett 1mo ago
        Though that would likely be a bit more expensive, or if cheaper it might be by compromising on GPU performance.
      - bigfishrunning 1mo ago
        Not having a windows machine is one of the benefits of not having a windows machine! Using a console for gaming is cheaper, more secure, and more reliable then using a windows machine. The only downside is i don't have access to the wide ocean of steam and gog releases, but it's a fair trade as far as I'm concerned.
arcfour 1mo ago
Very few are these days with the enormous amount of resources Valve has been pouring into Proton. The only truly Windows-only games I have encountered were online multiplayer with anticheat and that was almost always because the developer chose not to support Linux (e.g. EAC, Rust) and not for lack of support for Linux. Perhaps that wouldn't happen if more people switched...
- r_lee 1mo ago
  those are the vast majority of games that people play and people won't switch if there is no way to switch, it's like asking people to go on a hunger strike
  - arcfour 1mo ago
    Speak for yourself, there are hundreds of thousands of people playing games that do not fall into this category on Steam right now.
GreenVulpine 1mo ago
This hasn't been the case for at least half a decade. Most games run perfectly fine if not better on Linux. The only exceptions are purposely broken remote rootkit "anticheat" gsmes which no sane person would want on their system anyway.
fabian2k 1mo ago
With the exception of multiplayer games with invasive anti-cheat measures, a very large number of games works very well on Linux now with Wine/Proton. When using Steam this mostly works just out of the box without fiddling.

LetMeLogin 1mo ago

Not everybody has a possibility. Each system has pros and cons. I'm daily driving both Windows and Linux, and each has its own issues unfortunately, so using tools like OO is a necessity of making my(and others) life bit less miserable. For Linux I have bunch of custom repair scripts because of certain bugs I encounter(which are tracked too but not solved). Unfortunately this is the game no one will ever win, unless you will move, drop tech, and start breeding dogs, but then you need to sell them, and where would you advertise? :)

callc 1mo ago
IMHO: I like the issues faced on Linux more, since I can solve them. I too have a handful of repair scripts. I feel like an adult to be given access all the internals. I don’t feel that way on Windows (and any other locked down OS). We should put in the volunteer hours to upstream these fixes to make it nicer for normies :^)

embedding-shape 1mo ago

Well, when this alcoholic is the only one that works properly for the sort of audio and 3D/VFX work I do, and a bunch of tools are only able to run (well) on Windows (Yes, I've tried WINE and everything else under the sun, for a decade), so dual booting is really the only option here, unless I wanna throw out a bunch of licenses I've paid thousands for and stop accepting that sort of work. Ableton is probably the biggest reason I still have a Windows installation, and the one I try to get working (properly and well) with Wine/Proton maybe once a month or so. Cascadeur, Unreal Engine Editor, rekordbox are some of the other software I can't get to run well enough on Linux (yet) to fully migrate. But, on the other hand, lots of other software I use professionally works amazingly on Linux, better than Windows in fact, like Houdini, Unreal Engine (the runtime, not the Editor), DaVinci Resolve and Blender. I'm not worried though, eventually it'll be runnable on Linux no doubt, but personally we're not quite there yet, sadly.

SV_BubbleTime 1mo ago
>when this alcoholic is the only one that works properly for the sort of audio and 3D/VFX work I mean, that seems universally truer than not.
belthesar 1mo ago
I know this doesn't address all your concerns, but I switched from Ableton Live to Bitwig Studio for unrelated reasons to my leaving Windows behind, and I was thoroughly pleased with how easy the transition was between the two DAWs (I guess it shouldn't be too much of a surprise given how many ex-Ableton devs work on Bitwig), and how well the Linux build of Bitwig worked. Bitwig on Linux, with Pipewire as the audio engine for low latency operation, is essentially an identical operating experience for me. Getting your plugins working is a different story. A small but growing number of mainstream audio plugins have native Linux builds available, a wide swath of them work quite well with yabridge (https://yabridge.org/ https://yabridge.org/ - so shim to expose Windows audio plugins running in WINE prefixes to Linux audio plugin hosts), and a few required alternatives to be found. I found the workflow decent enough to use, but as one might expect, some plugins not working well via yabridge/WINE made things a little janky, and once I picked up a Mac device again, that became my production machine. That said, WINE's come a long say since I last tried this out a few years ago, and I'd be interested to see if things work better. My point, I suppose, is to share a reasonably good success story (though perhaps still not of a grade that you'd be comfortable switching to for paid work), and perhaps to encourage you to consider some alternatives to the tools you use. Tool changes are expensive, sure in cost, but moreso in time, so I don't suggest it lightly. That being said, I think that it might be worth it to grab a Bitwig trial and see how you like it. I'd grab it both on Windows and Linux, so you can try it "how it should work" when your plugins and the DAW are working in harmony while also getting the Linux toolchain working. And from the cost perspective, Bitwig does not have crossgrade licenses, so you can buy Studio once, and run it on any supported platform.

jeanmichelselli 1mo ago

I completely agree with this comment! If your OS does not behave like an OS anymore, better to switch to a real OS at that point. That's it. I've always been disappointed by Windows "OS" in the past but now it's really too much..

AmazingTurtle 1mo ago

I use cachyos as my daily driver for a long time now. I play quite a few games. Only league of legends forces me to dual boot into windows every once in a week or so - fuck the anticheat cartel

rdudek 1mo ago
I'm approaching a year now on CachyOS and it has been a wonderful experience. All the games that I play run just fine, maybe a few FPS drop compared to Windows, but it's not a big deal for me. I also don't play any competitive online games that require 3rd party anti-cheat spyware. Biggest positives, I got very comfortable with terminal and CLI work. My development work has definitely improved.

trinsic2 1mo ago

That's exactly the way I framed the relationship between Microsoft and its victim in a companion article[0] I wrote in 2025 looking back on my switch to Linux. Since then I started realizing how parasitic the proprietary software industry really is. [0]: https://www.scottrlarson.com/blog/publication-looking-back-windows-to-linux// https://www.scottrlarson.com/blog/publication-looking-back-w...

nilslindemann 1mo ago

Fine, I will switch when your OS has Autohotkey, Total Commander, and allows me to log in as Administrator.

nilslindemann 1mo ago
Oh, I also need a way to compile CodeBrowser 4.9 [1] [1] https://github.com/nilslindemann/Code_Browser_49 https://github.com/nilslindemann/Code_Browser_49
vablings 1mo ago
If you need Autohotkey you can still run that under wine (if you are ahk on windows applications), you can run total commander under wine. You can log in as admin I think its time to make the switch
- Der_Einzige 1mo ago
  If they’re running auto hotkey they’re also likely gamers, likely needing to run games that either can’t emulate or lose performance when running via proton or wine. AKA, this advice, like most “switch to Linux” advice, is tone deaf.
  - orbital-decay 1mo ago
    Not sure why you think it's gaming related but fine, I just don't think AHK can do anything special. OP sounds rather like he's trying to find gotchas and justify staying on Windows, not genuinely find the replacement, which is also a thing in these discussions (see his adjacent post with a vague dismissal, I personally used a heavy TC setup under Wine and it was indistinguishable even 15 years ago). All these features are either readily available or the apps themselves are Wine-ified with no performance loss, I have tried that and I don't think you have. All you need to switch to Linux or Mac is overcoming some friction which is of course inevitable, but utility software like this is definitely not a hard blocker.
    - 1mo ago

tgv 1mo ago

I have a PC mainly for Hauptwerk, which uses ilok, which doesn't run under Linux and probably never will. I've got an MBP, but getting one with 128GB of RAM was terribly expensive, and is probably unaffordable now. Hauptwerk doesn't even run natively on the arm. The End.