Wow things have changed quickly!

[KarsusTG]

I needed a linux ISO for a work project and popped over to distrowatch. I cannot believe both how fast the order has changed, and how many more people are downloading the iso's.

Manjaro is #1? I expected it to continue to climb, but #1 seems crazy to me. It's still arch linux which is a bit out of the reach of noobies making the switch.

Solus and Elementary are basically tied for #5? That is just nuts, especially considering Solus' lack of compatibility.

Even my MX Linux is at #8 which is both awesome and crazy to me. Sure it's an amazing Debian setup, but it's based on debian stable. Most people seem to want as close to bleeding edge as they can get without the instability associated with being on the edge. This is almost on the opposite side of that coin... (Which is why I love it.)

openSUSE has been reduced to #11. I would have thought this would be in the top five inside a decade. It is basically an OS designed for enterprise use, much like Fedora.

Also, look how many more people are diving into this! The top five used to be around 4-5k hits per day combined. Now they are close to 11k hpd...

This is awesome. I hope we continue to see these jumps. Hopefully as interest builds, we can start getting much better support from devs and hardware manufacturers. I would love to have full battery life, and better touchpad drivers for my laptop.

 

[Spartacus]

I'm an independent IT guy and I only deal with MS products currently, but I agree this is a good thing.
MS has been going the wrong direction in a lot of ways, and they are going to pay for it in terms of market share eventually.

MS had better re-evaluate their OS business and make some better pro-consumer choices.

Those bigger Linux numbers are coming from somewhere. Those numbers are no longer MS numbers.

.

 

[heatlesssun]

MS had better re-evaluate their OS business and make some better pro-consumer choices.

Those bigger Linux numbers are coming from somewhere. Those numbers are no longer MS numbers.

Windows 10 has it's problems but it is remarkable. There's nothing in the desktop space that comes close to replicating what it supports across a wide range of devices including prior versions of Windows. That said, there are plenty of reasons to use Linux even on a desktop, I'm prepping to install Ubuntu 18.04 on my Surface Pro 3 and might look again at setting up a gaming setup on my sig rig.

 

[Mazzspeed]

Just like Apple with OSX and their desktop range of products, it's obvious that Microsoft's interest in looking after the enthusiast with their Windows operating system is dwindling. Microsoft are making great money out of their cloud division and Office 365 subscription models, they've broken up their Windows division and their recent build conference barely even mentioned Windows as an operating system. Shareholders are happy as shares are up, Microsoft don't have the motivation to constantly improve Windows.

https://www.cnet.com/news/microsoft...i-couldnt-be-happier-build-2018-google-io-f8/

They're the facts, I'm in no way interested in getting into heated discussion over an operating system and no one's going to change my opinion if they attempt to do so - So don't bother.

There is absolutely no doubt whatsoever that the popularity of Linux as a desktop OS is growing and I totally agree, this is a great thing! As an individual that doesn't believe in being tied to one OS I'm personally finding that Linux is capable of achieving more and more of what I need my desktop to do, as a result I'm finding that it's quickly becoming my desktop OS of choice due to the fact that Windows has undeniable issues that annoy me that are difficult if not impossible to control and Linux just offers me so much freedom. Freedom appeals to me.

The only reevaluation I can see MS doing in relation to Windows is more integrated cloud support in an attempt to promote their cloud division and the possible removal of win32 applications in favor of a central software repository of some description - Whether that's the Windows Store or something else remains to be seen. Certain Windows users frown at the idea of a central software repository like the Windows Store, personally I see it as a great idea with very little negatives, provided Microsoft drop the idea of using such an idea as a money spinner for Microsoft.

 

[heatlesssun]

Just like Apple with OSX and their desktop range of products, it's obvious that Microsoft's interest in looking after the enthusiast with their Windows operating system is dwindling.

Perhaps, but the number of things that Windows 10 supports that are unique and impossible to reproduce in the enthusiast space on other desktop OSes is large. VR, as much as I get that folks like you hate when I talk about it, that about as enthusiast as it gets right now on PCs.

Two years after the fact with Windows having support for three VR platforms, Linux is still in beta? That's enthusiast to you?

There is a ton of shit that Windows 10 supports that's unique. I have 3 3D monitors, a 4k monitor and 2 VR headsets plugged into my system while it 100% support for everything I need to do on my Windows 7 to become Windows 10 PC at work. It's an insane amount of tech to plug into a computer that most people don't even know exists. And it all tends to work. And I'll be the first to admit that there's a lot of flakiness with this kind of setup, like the broken Netflix Window 10 app at 4k.

Then there's stuff like WSL. And a Surface Book 2. It's amazing what Windows 10 can do. Far from perfect but when it comes to pushing limits, remarkable stuff.

 

[Mazzspeed]

As an enthusiast I do not find any OS to be a 'one size fits all' solution and I'm not in any way amazed by Windows 10.

 

[B00nie]

There is a ton of shit that Windows 10 supports that's unique. I have 3 3D monitors, a 4k monitor and 2 VR headsets plugged into my system

You know what? The majority of this planet do not and never will. So that argument has run its course and committed suicide ages ago.

 

[KarsusTG]

As an enthusiast I do not find any OS to be a 'one size fits all' solution and I'm not in any way amazed by Windows 10.

I actually have come to really like windows 10, on my laptop. Being able to flawlessly drop my running laptop into a dock with an external 1070 and have it just work so I can get back to my work and email is just awesome.

I really cant stand it on my desktop, where I have Debian via MX linux distro almost entirely because I don't want to screw with setting Debian up from scratch. I love that my up-time on my desktop is whatever I need it to be because it's so fricken stable.

I have converted my home server to windows server 2016, but it's overkill for what I need it to do. I think I am just going to get a strong Synology NAS to replace it. The only good thing about the server being windows is it can be folding 24/7 @90% for 33. Which tells you just how little processing power you actually need for a media/storage/backup server.

Perhaps, but the number of things that Windows 10 supports that are unique and impossible to reproduce in the enthusiast space on other desktop OSes is large. VR, as much as I get that folks like you hate when I talk about it, that about as enthusiast as it gets right now on PCs.

Two years after the fact with Windows having support for three VR platforms, Linux is still in beta? That's enthusiast to you?

There is a ton of shit that Windows 10 supports that's unique. I have 3 3D monitors, a 4k monitor and 2 VR headsets plugged into my system while it 100% support for everything I need to do on my Windows 7 to become Windows 10 PC at work. It's an insane amount of tech to plug into a computer that most people don't even know exists. And it all tends to work. And I'll be the first to admit that there's a lot of flakiness with this kind of setup, like the broken Netflix Window 10 app at 4k.

Then there's stuff like WSL. And a Surface Book 2. It's amazing what Windows 10 can do. Far from perfect but when it comes to pushing limits, remarkable stuff.

Meh, as you know I am sort of ambivalent towards the VR stuff. It's been around for several years now and still has like half of 1% or something for an adoption rate. It's just too expensive, too bulky, and too quirky at the moment. Like 3d monitors and 3d tv's, so few people have even seen them, much less used them because there is little interest in it at the moment.

I feel these numbers from distrowatch are a pretty good sign of where things are eventually going to go. A great many of us have said it for years, if you want to work in IT you really need to learn linux. If nothing else, having it as your DD will keep you used to it. I have seen too many people over the years in a Fedora enterprise environment say "yeah, yeah, I am really proficient in Linux workstations" then when they get in front of one, it's up to professor google because they don't remember most of the terminal commands. Either that or 999 apropos commands trying to figure it out. Not that you need terminal for much it Fedora...

 

[SmokeRngs]

Manjaro is #1? I expected it to continue to climb, but #1 seems crazy to me. It's still arch linux which is a bit out of the reach of noobies making the switch.

Manjaro is based on Arch but it isn't Arch. I installed it quite a while back alongside Win 7 when I was redoing my machine and I haven't had an issue with it from installation. It's by no means a difficult distro to use and in fact quite a bit easier to use and get around in than the openSUSE distros I've used almost exclusively in previous years. I'm not surprised one bit that it's quite high on the list.

 

[Mega6]

One OS just doesn't cut it. Each as it's strengths and weaknesses. Win10 for games and VM, kali for hack, I use Fedora for stable Linux, Linux VM, Containers, ect. and as a lightweight dist. on older machines.

 

[Mazzspeed]

I actually have come to really like windows 10, on my laptop. Being able to flawlessly drop my running laptop into a dock with an external 1070 and have it just work so I can get back to my work and email is just awesome.

I really cant stand it on my desktop, where I have Debian via MX linux distro almost entirely because I don't want to screw with setting Debian up from scratch. I love that my up-time on my desktop is whatever I need it to be because it's so fricken stable.

I have converted my home server to windows server 2016, but it's overkill for what I need it to do. I think I am just going to get a strong Synology NAS to replace it. The only good thing about the server being windows is it can be folding 24/7 @90% for 33. Which tells you just how little processing power you actually need for a media/storage/backup server.

A great example of how one size definitely does not fit all! Although I tend to prefer Linux servers, especially for file sharing duties. Windows server is just bloated with stuff I'll never use, that bloat puts me off the product. I wish I could buy Windows server with no GUI.

I'm impressed by operating system improvements that actually highlight progress. 4k and 3D, not to mention VR does not highlight any meaningful progress to me - Such uses highlight marketing in my humble opinion. I'm more impressed by improvements such as snaps, the idea that you can install software quickly and easily that's neatly packaged with everything it needs in it's own container sandboxed away from the rest of the OS. When the time comes for you to uninstall the software you installed it's removed efficiently and easily leaving the actual OS completely untouched, a brilliant idea with benefits beyond just sandboxing! It's the reason why I don't understand the opposition by Windows users to the Windows store, assuming Microsoft wants to use it to the benefit of it's users and not just to make more profit. The concept of installing software from one controlled central location that's sandboxed in it's own little container would rectify overnight one of the major issues with Windows. Windows users need to let go of the age old 'install some random file from the dirty internet' concept - It's old, outdated and filled with security holes.

Having said that, Ubuntu has to improve the security of it's snaps store and inspect software for malicious content as it seems certain contributors have been a little sneaky. I'm sure such issues will all be sorted in time.

 

[Mazzspeed]

One OS just doesn't cut it. Each as it's strengths and weaknesses. Win10 for games and VM, kali for hack, I use Fedora for stable Linux, Linux VM, Containers, ect. and as a lightweight dist. on older machines.

See I do things the other way, too much malicious content under Windows and my needs don't limit me to mostly Windows. I've recently got rid of my Windows 10 machine for Windows 7 in a very well specified VM under Linux, having dual processors allows me to dedicate a nice number of cores to the VM with no noticeable impact to the host. As a result I've been able to free up a ton of desk space and improve my efficiency by working from the one machine as opposed to working across two machines.

An interesting point is that Microsoft are actually the biggest major corporation contributing to Linux on GitHub, they're one of the biggest companies pushing Linux forward. Most don't realize this.

 

[Mega6]

I spend some time gaming so that's why win10 is the main platform, ssh to kali or VM to Fedora.

 

[heatlesssun]

An interesting point is that Microsoft are actually the biggest major corporation contributing to Linux on GitHub, they're one of the biggest companies pushing Linux forward. Most don't realize this.

With Microsoft push into Azure and the cloud sure. But most all of that effort is on the server side where obviously Linux is huge.

 

[heatlesssun]

Meh, as you know I am sort of ambivalent towards the VR stuff. It's been around for several years now and still has like half of 1% or something for an adoption rate. It's just too expensive, too bulky, and too quirky at the moment. Like 3d monitors and 3d tv's, so few people have even seen them, much less used them because there is little interest in it at the moment.

I feel these numbers from distrowatch are a pretty good sign of where things are eventually going to go. A great many of us have said it for years, if you want to work in IT you really need to learn linux. If nothing else, having it as your DD will keep you used to it. I have seen too many people over the years in a Fedora enterprise environment say "yeah, yeah, I am really proficient in Linux workstations" then when they get in front of one, it's up to professor google because they don't remember most of the terminal commands. Either that or 999 apropos commands trying to figure it out. Not that you need terminal for much it Fedora...

I see your points here. I just installed Ubuntu 18.04 on my Surface Pro 3. It actually is a pretty smooth process and most everything is working except sleep. Close the Type Cover and it just shuts down with a black screen and I have to recycle. Found a couple of possible solutions I'll try out.

It's just when you do get a Linux machine setup, not that it's hard or anything, it just feels so limited due to the lack of 3rd party support. Fire up Steam and so little of my library works there. All of the major apps for desktop Linux are on Windows and so much more. That situation will have to get MUCH better for desktop Linux to become more an expert tool. And there's nothing wrong if that remains the case, but average folks just looking to run whatever apps are going to struggle. If your needs can be served by what's in the desktop Linux ecosystem then sure it's more than useable.

 

[Mazzspeed]

It's just when you do get a Linux machine setup, not that it's hard or anything, it just feels so limited due to the lack of 3rd party support.

You need to change your posting style to reflect the point that 'you' feel limited under Linux due to a lack of third party support. Not everyone uses a PC the way you do, you post in a way as to imply that what you feel covers everyone, we all know this is not the case.

 

[heatlesssun]

You need to change your posting style to reflect the point that 'you' feel limited under Linux due to a lack of third party support. Not everyone uses a PC the way you do, you post in a way as to imply that what you feel covers everyone, we all know this is not the case.

I said that if one can live within the desktop Linux ecosystem it's more than useable. But it's plainly obvious just how far behind it compared to Windows the moment one fires up something like Steam.

 

[Mazzspeed]

I said that if one can live within the desktop Linux ecosystem it's more than useable. But it's plainly obvious just how far behind it compared to Windows the moment one fires up something like Steam.

I know you did, but your context always implies that you're trying to push your needs from a PC onto everyone else, no matter what the disclaimer afterwards. This is not only wrong, it's very annoying. You don't like being singled out and you don't appear to cope well with criticism, probably best you avoid such scenarios by posting in the correct context and avoiding comments that imply everyone needs VR, just as an example.

 

[auntjemima]

I use Windows 10 for my day to day and Linux for my folding and data retrieval software.

I run Ubuntu MATE. I have been meaning to try other distros, mainly one built off Arch, but I don't really have the time these days. The last time I installed an OS was when I took my tablet that windows 10 kinda messed up and installed Ubuntu on it. Hassle, but learning experience.

 

[heatlesssun]

I know you did, but your context always implies that you're trying to push your needs from a PC onto everyone else, no matter what the disclaimer afterwards. This is not only wrong, it's very annoying. You don't like being singled out and you don't appear to cope well with criticism, probably best you avoid such scenarios by posting in the correct context and avoiding comments that imply everyone needs VR, just as an example.

Regardless of how one uses a PC, the large and rich ecosystem of Windows provides a lot of options that simply aren't available under desktop Linux.

 

[Mega6]

lets not degrade into win vs linux. both have there selling points and weaknesses. once u go past bare "OS", they follow distinct paths. workstation+ = linux. desktop = win

 

[Mega6]

now past that you have to bring in windows server. 2xxx

 

[Mazzspeed]

Has anyone here been experimenting with Snaps under Ubuntu? Quite simply one of the best ideas ever, color me impressed! It's also great that snaps are gaining popularity. I don't run plain old Ubuntu 18.04, but I hear there's a new snap store? A great idea as in the past you literally had no idea if an application was packaged as a snap or not without attempting to cross reference the particular application using snapd in terminal.

- Secure.
- Sandboxed.
- Absolutely no chance at dependency issues.
- Minimal modification to the underlying OS.

And simple to use, definitely a major advancement. Having said that even apt and rpm are simple to use nowadays, gone are the nasty times of compiling software from source for your particular distribution thank God.

I think there's a popular subreddit devoted to Linux that recently surpassed 300,000k users! And no real threads with users asking for advice relating to issues either, just positive, enthusiastic Linux discussion - Amazing.

 

[KarsusTG]

I see your points here. I just installed Ubuntu 18.04 on my Surface Pro 3. It actually is a pretty smooth process and most everything is working except sleep. Close the Type Cover and it just shuts down with a black screen and I have to recycle. Found a couple of possible solutions I'll try out.

It's just when you do get a Linux machine setup, not that it's hard or anything, it just feels so limited due to the lack of 3rd party support. Fire up Steam and so little of my library works there. All of the major apps for desktop Linux are on Windows and so much more. That situation will have to get MUCH better for desktop Linux to become more an expert tool. And there's nothing wrong if that remains the case, but average folks just looking to run whatever apps are going to struggle. If your needs can be served by what's in the desktop Linux ecosystem then sure it's more than useable.

This is true, and that is entirely a vender thing. If Autocad and Solidworks ran reliably on linux I might never look at a windows workstation. Which is sad, because Nvidia provides quadro drivers for linux and you could squeeze more performance out of linux easy. That is why most folding servers are linux, yada yada ad nauseam.

Honestly though, for laptop/tablet/(laplet?) you really need to go with windows. I really wish we could get good precision drivers and touch support for linux. Not to mention battery life.

I tried putting Fedora on my thinkpad and everything worked right away, but palm rejection was terrible and scrolling/gestures were borked. I got two hours out of my battery doing normal light coding/compiling/web browsing on a battery that normally goes about 6, and if you dropped the workstation into the dock (with the port replicator on the bottom) with the laptop already on you might as well be summoning Cthulhu and take the world with you because you were visiting hell either way.

The ecosystem thing is truly the only thing holding Linux back though. Which is sad because the ecosystem wont come to linux until the demand is there to justify spending the money building it, but the demand wont arrive until there is an ecosystem. That leaves it in the current state of just us enthusiast types slowly building up in number until we hit some critical mass.

I just wish we could replace directx. That shit needs to die and be replaced with something cross platform.

 

[heatlesssun]

Honestly though, for laptop/tablet/(laplet?) you really need to go with windows. I really wish we could get good precision drivers and touch support for linux. Not to mention battery life.

These are the kind of refinements where there's clearly work to be done under Linux. Precision trackpads finally made trackpads under Windows not suck. It's one of the first things I notice about the OBE with Linux on something like a SP3. The subject gets discussed a bit but I've never really found anything that really addresses the issue.

The ecosystem thing is truly the only thing holding Linux back though. Which is sad because the ecosystem wont come to linux until the demand is there to justify spending the money building it, but the demand wont arrive until there is an ecosystem. That leaves it in the current state of just us enthusiast types slowly building up in number until we hit some critical mass.

Exactly. The most important thing I believe is getting Linux preinstalled on many, many more devices. I get that Linux is pretty easy to install and get the basics running. But then the battery can't just go to hell or trackpads become far less responsive. That kind of thing gets fixed when working with OEMs directly and getting into the details of power management.

 

[B00nie]

Honestly though, for laptop/tablet/(laplet?) you really need to go with windows.

That is incorrect. I have been extremely satisfied with my Macbook pro. I would never in a million years consider to run a Windows laptop after around 10 years of Mac experience.

Also the 4 linux based laptops I have in my family have served admirably. For example my mother used to average 2 weeks between some sort of an infaction or malware on Windows where on Ubuntu I have to do an update once twice a year and thats it. Same thing with my father-in-law whose computer had 50 infections the last time I got it for fixing. I fixed it permanently by installing Ubuntu and he hasn't had a problem since.

His biggest problem was to learn the different GUI of libreoffice, he is a civil engineer and worked with Excel as long as it has existed.

 

[Mega6]

Dual booted my cheap HP i3 and Fedora works perfect. Really can't remember the last time I booted it into windows.

 

[heatlesssun]

Dual booted my cheap HP i3 and Fedora works perfect. Really can't remember the last time I booted it into windows.

It always comes down to specific hardware. Even on a device that many fans would shun like a Surface Pro 3, most everything gets support out of the box, even touch and the pen worked. Then there are things like a precision trackpad and gestures and closing the Type Cover and that takes some effort. Then there scaling on Steam which out of the box is too small on high-DPI screen. But even in Windows 10 scaling was just recently addressed in Steam.

There's discussion on there on everyone of these topics with various approaches. As I said before, it always comes down to specific hardware but these are things that tend to just work under Windows 10 now. That's why I say it's important for mainstream Linux adoption to get it preinstalled lots of different devices. These kinds of issues wouldn't be there if OEMs were putting Linux on hardware from the factory because they'd have to sort these things from the start.

 

[jardows]

Interesting to see TrueOS at #10. I still prefer base FreeBSD though.

 

[KarsusTG]

That is incorrect. I have been extremely satisfied with my Macbook pro. I would never in a million years consider to run a Windows laptop after around 10 years of Mac experience.

Ewwww!! you are one of THOSE people... hehe j/k!

I had the first generation mac pro that had intel cpu's. It honestly was a great laptop, but it was virtually impossible to find software for it and it was about $3k. There is a guy Louis Rossman I believe his name is, that has a youtube channel of doing component level repairs on Apple products and he is always showing just how shoddy the work on the modern mac's are. They are nice looking though, I will give them that. I have seriously considered picking up one of those mac mini nucs'.

Some of those old apple products where ridiculously tough. I had an early generation ipod that was litterally run over, took a 5.56 ricochet, and went into the ocean with me not once, but twice.. The buttons were a little stuborn, but the thing still worked and charged years later.

Also the 4 linux based laptops I have in my family have served admirably. For example my mother used to average 2 weeks between some sort of an infaction or malware on Windows where on Ubuntu I have to do an update once twice a year and thats it. Same thing with my father-in-law whose computer had 50 infections the last time I got it for fixing. I fixed it permanently by installing Ubuntu and he hasn't had a problem since.

His biggest problem was to learn the different GUI of libreoffice, he is a civil engineer and worked with Excel as long as it has existed.

I used to take the dell E6400's and put Ubuntu on them. It runs well, is snappy and is perfectly serviceable. But still to this day, the track pad drivers suck, and if you have to deal with integrated and discrete graphics both you are in for a headache. Also, no matter what, you will have shitty battery life.

Linux on a laptop is perfectly serviceable for an older person that just needs to check email and some light web browsing. That is the whole premise behind chromebooks.

 

[Chuklr]

...

Linux on a laptop is perfectly serviceable for an older person that just needs to check email and some light web browsing. ...

This matches why Linux works for me on a couple of laptops. I fire them up when I feel like it, but it doesn't give an extra thrill when I do.

I will continue running Windows because I purchase the TurboTax product to do my federal income tax and do not choose to use the online/free to use version available to me with my Vanguard accounts.

Just my two cents.

 

[ChadD]

Manjaros #1 spot is 100% justified.

On the face of things, it would seem that distros like Suse Fedora and Ubuntu should be the front runners for everyday users. However ime they are some of the worst options for every day switch type users imo. They are great distros and fantastic workstation systems. When setup properly by Linux pros all 3 are rock solid and perhaps the most polished to be reliable pro workstations systems.

Everyday users however don't wanna have to install PPAs, they don't wanna to have to see pages of verbose code rolling as Suse boots, or have to figure out how to turn on some non-free repository to install a driver or codec ect... even asking average users to grok how RPMs or DEBs work is a stretch. As a Linux guy I hate explaining that no .DEB and .RPM are not like setup.exe files. lol Really though Suse and Fedora as well... brand new first time to Linux users are going to have a hard time just getting basic things like xvid/x265/mp3 ect to work as they would expect out of the box. (not an issue at all for any of the major Arch based distros)

Manjaro draws on the Arch base which is massive... and end users can easily turn the AUR on. Between the Arch base repos and the AUR the chances of a regular user not being able to find an easy one click install for the absolute latest version of any Linux software is exactly zero. Meaning they don't have to really figure repositories out at first... they don't have to hunt web sites for .deb or .rpm installers, arch based distros are as I see it the most user friendly distors there is as far as installing software goes. (arch itself isn't a joy for new people to install but... manjaro and antergos both make it as easy as installing windows or ubuntu)

I mostly use Antergos (#9) myself these days... mainly because it really is still pretty much just a fast Arch installer. I mean I could just install arch but why do all that terminal typing and package installing if I can just click 8 or 9 prompts in a live session and end with a perfectly functioning lean arch install no different then the one I would have installed anyway. (antergos gives you an option of all the standard Desktops, and asks if you wanna install things like Libre, Chrome and the like... you can even just install with no DE and then it really is just a graphical arch installer)

Manjaro is very much like Antergos in that regard with a few more tweeks. The Manjaro team puts a lot of love into their distro. Their goal however is not "workstation" its desktop... and its an extremely solid desktop. I would never hook a company up with a bunch of rolling release manjaro workstations... but for a home user looking for a latest greats Linux that doesn't require them to mess with repositories. I prefer a more pure arch experience myself... Manjaro does a few things like change the default schedualer and the like that are aimed directly at Desktop type users. (all in all Manjaro and Antergos are the two distros I recommend to windows users wanting to check out Linux.)

 

[ChadD]

I said that if one can live within the desktop Linux ecosystem it's more than useable. But it's plainly obvious just how far behind it compared to Windows the moment one fires up something like Steam.

Steam... Games... Steam. That is your only issue from what you yourself have said 100s of times now.

I think you have to consider that... the vast majority of PCs in the world do not have steam installed and are not being used by gamers. Unless your counting face book games.

There are of course quite a few of us gaming and using steam on Linux just fine thanks. As far as all the but windows choice goes... Linux is still growing no matter how you want to spin BS steam usage numbers. And in general the vast majority of windows only games outside the top 20 AAA type games are crap anyway. Still soon it won't matter at all. DXVK has come a long way.... no its not ready to be a one click install and go for everyone quite yet but it will be. Its impressive how far they have gotten that project in such a short time, and popular games like Overwatch, Shadow Warrior 2, and the Witcher 3 ect are performing within a few FPS of windows native.

 

[Deleted member 245375]

I will admit I toyed around with Manjaro Gnome on my "new" laptop, an i7 quad core workstation laptop with an Nvidia Optimus setup (which I personally hate but I'll survive) Quadro K2100M 2GB in it and was pleasantly surprised at just how damned smoothly it ran overall. Everything ran great, and I'm even considering giving it a go as a host OS for a short period of time but I need to do more research as the rolling release nature seems to bork VMware rather consistently and that's a bit of an issue for me personally.

But if I can get a rock solid Manjaro build and VMware working stable and solid I'll end up converting my current Windows 7 Pro daily runner to a VM and then just run it as a guest and see how things go.

Damned impressed with Manjaro and I just started using it literally 20 hours ago.

 

[ChadD]

I will admit I toyed around with Manjaro Gnome on my "new" laptop, an i7 quad core workstation laptop with an Nvidia Optimus setup (which I personally hate but I'll survive) Quadro K2100M 2GB in it and was pleasantly surprised at just how damned smoothly it ran overall. Everything ran great, and I'm even considering giving it a go as a host OS for a short period of time but I need to do more research as the rolling release nature seems to bork VMware rather consistently and that's a bit of an issue for me personally.

But if I can get a rock solid Manjaro build and VMware working stable and solid I'll end up converting my current Windows 7 Pro daily runner to a VM and then just run it as a guest and see how things go.

Damned impressed with Manjaro and I just started using it literally 20 hours ago.

I can't claim to have much experience running VMware under arch. I do understand that at times the rapid nature of kernel updates can cause issues. On the plus side though Arch has one of the best communities around... and in general any issues can be fairly quickly solved.

I would say install it from the AUR.. and you are likely to run into fewer issues. Gotta love the AUR. The guy maintaining vmware-worktation in the AUR is on top of things pretty quickly keeping everything updated.
https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/vmware-workstation/

 

[Deleted member 245375]

Yeah, I've been reading for the past day or so on AUR and Arch, I haven't toyed with Arch in almost a decade but figured what the hell, let's see what this workstation laptop can do with it and again I was very pleasantly surprised at how well it works. Considering I have a 2880x1620 HiDPI panel in this laptop and I prefer to work at 1920x1080 it was awesome to see the scaling working from the gitgo without any issues. Would be nice if they'd offer more granular control over it - at 2880x1620 the only option that's workable is the 200% one, but 1440x810 isn't quite enough space for the things I like to have on the display so, a 125-150-175% option would be nice, Windows 10 can do it but I just can't tolerate that OS.

But, something new to toy around with and that mention of DXVK got me interested now as well. I don't game on my hardware, but I'm interested in seeing what's possible, sure. Just added another 8GB of RAM on Monday so, 16GB to go (it can max out at 32GB which would be nice but I'm good for a while).

 

[Mazzspeed]

Would be nice if they'd offer more granular control over it - at 2880x1620 the only option that's workable is the 200% one, but 1440x810 isn't quite enough space for the things I like to have on the display so, a 125-150-175% option would be nice, Windows 10 can do it but I just can't tolerate that OS.

Fractional scaling is a tradeoff at best. Apple do it well, but they do cheat with resolution scaling as you can't render half a pixel and even then it's not always perfect. Integer scaling with applications designed for UHD is always the better way to do things, sadly until developers are 100% onboard it's something that's just not going to happen.

I've given up on 4k even under Windows, at least Valve have finally rectified the scaling issues with Steam.

 

[B00nie]

This matches why Linux works for me on a couple of laptops. I fire them up when I feel like it, but it doesn't give an extra thrill when I do.

I will continue running Windows because I purchase the TurboTax product to do my federal income tax and do not choose to use the online/free to use version available to me with my Vanguard accounts.

Just my two cents.

We have fully automated tax reports, all I need to do is check if it's correct and do nothing if it is. If it needs changes I login with my electronic id and correct it online. Just my two cents.

 

[Chuklr]

We have fully automated tax reports, all I need to do is check if it's correct and do nothing if it is. If it needs changes I login with my electronic id and correct it online. Just my two cents.

It's nice it work that way in your country and I'm happy that you are comfortable with the system.

I stated that I choose not to do my USA Federal income taxes using the online/free versions that are available to me. That is a the choice I made and I'm certainly not going to change that choice to move all my systems to Linux. This is not the first time I've explained this to folks in this forum.

 

[B00nie]

It's nice it work that way in your country and I'm happy that you are comfortable with the system.

I stated that I choose not to do my USA Federal income taxes using the online/free versions that are available to me. That is a the choice I made and I'm certainly not going to change that choice to move all my systems to Linux. This is not the first time I've explained this to folks in this forum.

Yes and my point was that there may be better choices available.