I thought I'd chuck windows on my gaming laptop an Acer nitro 5 from last year, to see how it's going do some bits I can't on Linux VR, certain multiplayer games etc.
What a disaster! I've spent the whole day brute forcing drivers and generally dicking about trying to get my setup sorted.
Upon installation, Wi-Fi drivers don't exist, so you cannot use the internet while installing if you're on Wi-Fi. Mint's had this since what 2006? But that's cool, Cortana is here to chat away and not understand any requests. Once finally in the OS after 20 questions that could be considered harassment if it was a person, nothing was ready to go. Every single driver needed sourcing and installing.
People have the cheek to complain about Linux's Nvidia install, literally two clicks on most distros if it isn't already baked in. Go to website find driver, download click click click agree click wait more software click click wait.
Plug in my sound card OK it's a bit old now UA-25 but nothing happens...hmm find obscure video partially install a driver from Vista then cancel the installation program so you can side load a driver from 8,1 but wait there's more disable core isolation to allow the driver to work reboot into a now slightly more compromised OS.
OK plug in wheel again not new stuff G25 oh it works cool. Oh, no H-shifter OK download driver. "Can't find device, ensure it's plugged in". Windows decided it knew better, downloaded its own driver that blocks the official one and loads a steering wheel as a gamepad..GG cool cool.
I do not understand why we still have this image that Windows is noob friendly, it's such a convoluted obfuscated process to do anything. It does worse than nothing, it thinks it's smart enough to carry out tasks on the user behalf and just bork it.
All of these issues are because I don't have the new shiny things, but it really highlighted why I love Linux now if you'll excuse me I'm going to install a distro and play on my 20-year-old peripherals
They absolutely exist, but perhaps isn't part of the installer.
Windows Update solves 95% of that automatically these days, as long as you have internet it will sort it out for you.
This an external USB sound card from 2004, Roland has drivers for it working on Windows 98/ME/XP/2000/Vista/7/8/8.1 it is a 20 year old card, it awesome that it works on Linux, but you can't blame Roland or Microsoft for not supporting a 20 year old device on the latest versions of the OS.
You are whining about a modern OS not being compatible with a 18 year old steering wheel? You can't expect indefinite hardware support for every random little device you happen to find, this like the sound card above is on you, not Microsoft.
None of the above quoted examples are noob issues, this is like you are talking to a person in old english from the mideval times and being mad that a random guy in the middle of Londing in 2024 can't understand you.
A noob would realize that their devices were too old and buy new devices.
Windows is noob friendly in that most software have a Windows version, most people use it, it is a known variable.
Like it or not, Windows is the defacto standard, and that means that is it safe in the perspective of a noob user.
I am saying all of this as an IT guy who has worked professionally with both Linux and Windows, I ran Linux as my main OS for a year or two, I LIKE Linux, but this is not fair critisism of Windows.
Windows is still fucking ass though and it's so bad that I can not respect the opinion of someone that claims they are an IT professional and don't main Linux. Like what? And what does that even mean, that's ridiculously broad, what do you do? I'm a network engineer and sysadmin.
Linux is objectively superior to Windows in almost every way. It has vastly superior workflows. It's more customizable. It's insanely more efficient. It's more secure. I feel like I'm wading through 3ft of shit anytime I boot into Windows. Not to mention the ability to actually have ownership of your computer. And that's just talking about the ways Linux is better. That's not getting into why Windows is ass like... telemetry data and ads in the OS and configs reverting from updates and the dumbass way software is installed on it and how shit docker runs in it and I can go on and on. The workflows of Windows are actual dog ass and literally every single popular Linux DE has better workflows and customization.
If you in IT and use Windows for anything other than a gaming machine or something like Photoshop, then I don't want you anywhere near my tech.
lol.
Ridicolous. You act like this is the first person to realise Windows is jank. How many USB steering wheels have you bought during your lifetime?
None, I was gifted a Sidewinder Forcefeedback steering wheel by my dad when I was 8-9 something, but it used the old gameport.
I don't see how this is relevant though....
Why not?
Why not? Linux development is mostly volunteer, and these things are easily compatible with Linux. It seems like you can absolutely expect support for every device, it's just that Microsoft isn't willing to provide it.
Notice that you had to exaggerate a 20 year timespan into a 500 year timespan to make this analogy work?
Because it is a paid OS and it's developers are writing code for financial gain, if they are not being paid to write the code, it doesn't get written.
Voulenteers write the code because they want or need to, if there are no drivers for a device in on Linux, you need to write it yourself.
Yes, that was deliberate. Have you ever noticed how much faster technology develops compared to languages? That is why the analogy works.
The analogy doesn't even work if we ignore the massive difference in time scale. Languages develop organically, they are not managed. Comparing a managed and developed system and a twenty year timespan to an organic language system over a five hundred year timespan is just ridiculous.
They are being paid to write the code. Microsoft is just choosing which code they should write, and it doesn't include any old devices because they want you to buy new devices.
It's perfectly reasonable to expect compatibility, and lay blame when there isn't any. Microsoft simply doesn't provide it.
I disagree with you, but don't have the energy to keep arguing, this argument has been going on for days, and I made my point back on day one.
No shit. But that only explains why Windows is bad. It doesn't mean that Windows isn't bad. We shouldn't give Windows pity points just because poor Billy Gates is addicted to money.