This post idea was inspired by a recent post by [email protected] in this community.
I have been a Windows user for my entire life. I recall having an iMac in my bedroom as a small boy, maybe 7-8, playing random offline games on it, but aside from that, my experience growing up was with Windows 98, XP, Vista, 8 and 10. I wouldn’t say I was ever a “power user” per se, although I could do several tasks that were more technical if needed, like locating driver files, updating .dlls, configuring compatibility settings, etc. I think being a good Googler made me seem more capable to my family than I really was, and I’m sure a lot of people here would share my experience!
With the impending sundowning of Windows 10, an OS that I “begrudgingly accepted” (rather than actually enjoyed using, as with Vista), and realizing that 11 was only going to bring more ads, force-installed applications, background processes that were nigh-impossible to disable without a lot of tomfoolery, AI bullshit and general bloat, I figured that I would try dual-booting Ubuntu, installing it on a partition of my storage HDD. Windows did not want to play ball, no matter how much I begged and pleaded and bargained, and eventually I was met at a point where I had to decide what to do going forward. My system was just not behaving the way I wanted to with two OSes (“This town ain’t big enough for the both of us”), and figured,
Oh, what the hell. I’ll primary Ubuntu and when I need to use Windows I’ll run it on a thumb drive or something.
Well, it’s been several weeks now and, even with a couple bumps along the way, I have not booted into Windows once since the switchover. How many of you had a similar experience? I was frankly a bit scared of CLI and thinking that I was going to brick my PC before I even had a chance to use it, so I kept all my personal files safely tucked away in a removed HDD until the break-in process was relatively complete. As time has gone on, I’ve gotten comfortable enough to have a backed up copy of my files on here, and every new program I go to install that I used on Windows has worked swimmingly on Linux.
I can only thank the helpful, enthusiastic people here in the Linux community for making my experience so smooth. It’s rare you encounter a group of people where you can post what is ostensibly a stupid question, and be pummeled with dozens of well-formed, thoughtful, detailed responses to the question. There’s very little of that infamous grandiosity and self-righteousness that I’ve heard runs rampant in the Linux world, and maybe Lemmings are just more prone to being helpful than the wider internet, but for what it’s worth, I appreciate everything you all have done here so far.
I feel so much more capable as a computer user with Linux than I ever did on Windows. I’m automating tasks, I’m fine-tuning network drivers, I’m getting in the weeds of file architecture, and it’s all been a real blast to learn about. I actually feel a desire to learn so that I can help others have a similar experience to what I had coming into this.
Gabba gabba we accept you one of us one of us!
Two tips:
KEEP BACKUPS, ALWAYS. Systems can be reinstalled in short order and you can set /home/ on a different partition to make it easier, but keep backups of the important stuff still.
Youtube “bash tutorial beginners” and find one to follow along with, it’ll come in handy if you haven’t yet.
Welcome friend!
This post idea was inspired by a recent post by [email protected] in this community.
❤️❤️❤️
I wouldn’t say I was ever a “power user” per se, although I could do several tasks that were more technical if needed
It’s great to see other people out there too who aren’t programmers or have an IT-background.
When I entered the Linux-world 3 years ago, I had a very rough start. I had to learn everything from scratch and didn’t even know how to download something from GitHub.
Nowadays, and I’m extremely glad for all those evolutions that occured in this time frame, everything is way more accessible now.
Still, you will probably encounter some stepping stones, just like it is usual when learning something new! ✌️
Just keep going, and eventually, you’ll use Linux as intuitively as everything else.I’ll primary Ubuntu
Good choice! You’ll hear people say “Ubuntu sucks, switch to xy”, but, honestly, it isn’t bad and a good choice.
As long as you’re happy, everything is great!
You’ll distrohop someday anyway, so enjoy your peace for a while… 😅I can only thank the helpful, enthusiastic people here in the Linux community for making my experience so smooth. It’s rare you encounter a group of people where you can post what is ostensibly a stupid question, and be pummeled with dozens of well-formed, thoughtful, detailed responses to the question. There’s very little of that infamous grandiosity and self-righteousness that I’ve heard runs rampant in the Linux world, and maybe Lemmings are just more prone to being helpful than the wider internet, but for what it’s worth, I appreciate everything you all have done here so far.
I had the same experience. The patience and welcomeness is just unmatched. 90% of my experience has been just like that, and only a small percentage are jerks. Just remember, those 1% are a loud minority, so don’t get discouraged when there are asshole comments one day.
I think the whole “noob-support”-thing is some kind if generational contract. We all got help learning our first steps in the Linux world, with the same experience as you, and now wanna pay that back.I feel so much more capable as a computer user with Linux than I ever did on Windows.
Same. Starting Linux was the first domino piece for me.
Now, I have a homeserver, flashed my first Android custom ROM the hard way, radicalised myself in the FOSS-mentality and began to interact intensely with the community (Github, Lemmy, etc.). Using Linux made me a cliché somehow, it’s a slippery slope.
Thank you for your post! It was a great read! 🙌
Welcome to Linux! Enjoy the stay.
Now when it comes to me, I had my windows system break on me when I tried to diagnose a HDD issue and decided that since it’s just a data drive I can just disconnect it and see if it was the right drive. How wrong I was, couldn’t even get it to boot after that. So since I didn’t like how windows 10 handled stuff like that and knew at the time that it would get worse… I set up a dual boot with windows 10 and Ubuntu. Figuring that I would probably use windows the most and only sometimes use Linux. After a short while I actually had moved everything I could to Ubuntu and only used windows for the very few things that were just too stubborn at the time. Mainly anti Cheat stuff. It was still 2018 after all. Since that eventually got solved I ditched windows completely and have never looked back. Though I still sometimes wonder about a few of the issues I see and hear about on windows these days.
8 months here. The simple idea of having to use windows again makes me throw up a little bit in my mouth.
People switching nowadays have it so easy lol. When I switched, you’d still have to configure ALSA or OSS, tweak xorg.conf, use Nvidia because AMD was just not working (I did try and dual boot Linux before when ATI still existed but didn’t fully switch), DXVK didn’t exist, Vulkan didn’t exist and WINE was still pre-1.0. And all this during a time when Microsoft had what some people consider the best version of Windows.
I don’t really miss those times. And I know that it was even less convenient before. I also had a copy of SUSE Linux 9.0 or something from a family friend who ordered these from SUSE. And Mandrake I tried very briefly. But I wasn’t really computer literate enough to teach me all that stuff myself so I consider my Linux journey starting in 2007 when I ordered a new PC and decided not to install Windows on it so that I wouldn’t have that alternative in case something doesn’t work.
The first time I installed Linux, I had to calculate vsync modlines for the monitor to get X running. It wasn’t worth it, and I used Amigas and then NeXTSTEP (for x86, I wasn’t rich) and Solaris at Uni and work for a few years until it was easier to get X running.
It should be noted for the newer users that miscalculating your modelines could destroy your screens, so getting them right was kind of important.
Im planning on giving it a try. Thought I would try dual booting pop os.
Windows wants me to update to 11, but my processor is too old. So if I’m going to update my processor, I’ll need to update the motherboard. But the OEM license is tied to the motherboard. So I’ll have to buy a new copy of windows just to get on 11.
So just gonna see if all the things I like to play work on pop os.
I think the biggest thing is that I use c# for hobby programming, and I know .net core should run on Linux, but not sure about the IDE.
Hey there. I run Linux on my daily but also work in a Windows-centric PC repair shop.
“Official” answer: You can move your key over to a new mobo by signing in to Windows with a Microsoft account, installing your new hardware, and activating Win 11 through the Settings->Activation->Troubleshooting (button)->“I recently changed hardware”. And that will pull your key back down from your account. But it does lock you into an account.
“Unofficial” answer: you can absolutely update to Win 11 on old hardware. The easiest way is to boot a Win 11 iso in Ventoy. That works fairly often. You can alternatively edit the installer to not do the TPM check in the installer, which you can search for guides for online/YouTube.
Alternatively: you can hop on g2a, kinguin, etc and buy Windows keys cheap.
To be clear I know this is all bullshit, but it’s options. Hope this helps!
Welcome to a larger world. IF you ever need dual boot working well on linux, I found the best robust method is install Windows first, leave space for more partitions. install Linux and make a separate boot efi partition. Many distros offer to probe for foreign OS. this will find windows and add a chainloader entry to grub. Set the Linux partition as the boot one in BIOS/EFI. Grub will start and if you choose Windows it handsover the boot to Windows boot ( and Windows doesn’t know it). Windows will leave your EFi linux boot alone. You can also share a ntfs partition between them if needed
Windows will leave your EFi linux boot alone.
I wish that was True. Windows loves to overwrite boot partitions during major updates in my experience.
Thats why you have two. windows efi and linux efi on separate partitions. Windows never knows the other one exists and ignores the rest of what it sees as unalloated space. it even lets you shut down a windows update, boot linux and come back to windows later which continues the update. I have been running this way for 7 years, Windows has not touched my other EFi partition.
Oh, I see. I had it on different disks with one efi partition at the start of each. Windows didn’t like that.
Should still be fine if you set BIOS/EFI to only boot from the Linux EFI, and it has chainload entry to Windows. If you left it up to some Windows Dual boot thing it will wreck you for sure
