Goodbye Windows, Hello Linux
this is literally E-waste
Reminds me what Spotify did with the Spotify car thingI love how in a world where we banned straws we are somehow OK with Microsoft pushing people to recycle their old but otherwise adequate system for what, to the vast majority of people, are some paper thin security advantages.
Anybody who asks me about Windows 10’s EOL date will be introduced to the option of using Linux before i’ll help them select a replacement system. Especially if they literally only use a browser there really is no reason to go through hoops or spend money to stick with Windows.
Just switched to Linux Mint. So worth it
“Trade it in or recycle it” basically means “your best bet to solve this problem is to pass it on to someone else, who will pass it on to someone else, and so on until it arrives at landfill”.
This is incredibly infuriating and I’d honestly consider it ecoterrorism and abusive.
Hold on to your butts.
Big influx of Linux-compatible office PCs hitting eBay soon.
That and/or a big influx of vulnerable unpatched Windows machines…
Any unpatched windows machine can be patched into a Linux machine.
…that’s why you turn them into Linux machines.
This seems much more likely lol
You can literally buy new thinkpads with ubuntu pre installed for $140 dollars off the price of a windows PC
That’s cool, but a lot of people (myself included) aren’t able to justify a brand new laptop. I can absolutely afford a new laptop…I just have no desire to buy one when older ones work just fine and have plenty of life in them.
My current laptop is a T495 that I bought at a flea market two years ago for $100 and it still handles all of my needs completely fine. My kid is using a T470 I bought not too long before that for around the same price, and it does everything he needs too (though it could stand to handle Minecraft JE a bit better…but in fairness he installs nearly every mod he finds and I never really taught him about adjusting settings).
If you aren’t doing high-end gaming or video editing, practically any computer can handle like 95% of other daily home computer tasks.
That said, his laptop speakers are blown…so maybe it’s time I start looking for an upgrade for me. Kids are good for that type of stuff. Still remember convincing my wife we needed to get him a Switch for Christmas…his first Christmas. I wouldn’t buy myself a switch…but for my 5 month old kid? Yeah he needs Breath of the Wild.
I got a Framework a little while back for this reason… The modularity of it means that I can upgrade it piecemeal as needed without having to buy a brand new laptop, or suffer with outdated hardware before I can justify buying a new laptop.
It was not cheap though.
Oh I misread that and thought you said they thinkpads themselves were $140 lol
Very good point!
Well at least the second hand laptop market will be flooded by the companies deciding to upgrade to newer laptops for Win11, so a small upside.
Glad those tariffs hit just in time
Trade it in to who? Who’s buying PCs that can’t be used? I mean there’s the retro market, but AFAIK they aren’t buying anything after Windows XP.
That moment when Microsoft tells people to throw away perfectly good working computers because they’re running Windows 10. When Windows 10 was just coming out or had just come out, Microsoft promised that Windows 10 would be the last OS of theirs, and there would only be updates. Also Microsoft is constantly sending messages to people running Windows 10 urging them to update.
I really wish there was something regulatory that could be done about this. There are millions of perfectly good fully working computers that are going to go in the fucking trash because of this. I understand the desire for a TPM on every machine. It makes sense in a way. But the pure environmental impact is just indefensible. All of those computers had a significant environmental footprint to build them and ship them and again to dispose of them plus building and shipping their replacements.
If Microsoft had such a hard-on for TPM, they should have worked with computer manufacturers to make some sort of retrofit system or way of easily determining if a TPM can be added to an existing computerLet’s not pretend Microsoft is trying to do anything else but make more money with the TPM requirement.
Oh of course. For them and their OEM partners too. Nobody else benefits from throwing 2-5 generations of perfectly functional hardware in the fucking trash.
That all said though, Microsoft has been one of the biggest pushes behind replacing passwords with more secure authentication. And TPM does play a role in that. Certainly not the driving factor for throwing away millions of perfectly good computers though.
I remember that “promise” too. And here we are
Im so glad I fully switched to Linux a year ago. Never going back to Windows.
i’ve been on linux on and off since 1998, however I fully switched about 5 years ago and never looked back.
I was curious around 3 months ago, between distro swapping and I installed W11. It lasted 2h until I rage installed linux and took me an entire day to wash the windows taste off. bleah…
I have to use Windows 11 on my work machine and it reminds me every day why I will never go back.
I opened the process manager a week or two ago for the first time in a while, and holy shit how do people live like that??? If it were my personal laptop, I would have had a fucking aneurysm trying to figure out what the fuck all that shit was.
Same
Same
Weird hill to die on perhaps; but I’ll never forgive Microsoft for arbitrarily deciding to not support my Core i7 6700K 4Ghz CPU on Windows 11.
Simply because: I cannot find a single actual technical reason why it wouldn’t be compatible (yes, my mobo also has TPM). It’s even higher specced than many other ‘supported’ chips.
MS apparently just decided I hadn’t spent enough money lately. Well now I won’t - on your products - ever again, while this i7 will continue to run Win 10 for games and Linux for all else.
Gaming is great on Linux nowadays btw. I installed Fedora a few weeks ago and haven’t had a single problem with any of my games - I’m getting better framerates, too.
Any reason you went with fedora? I’ve been partial to fedora for a decade, but last I knew it wasn’t recommended for a daily driver given the upstream fuckery from redhat.
Asking cuz I’m about two weeks from kicking win10 in the dick and moving to alma or something.
I’m actually using Nobara, but it’s not very popular so I just say Fedora in day-to-day conversation. From my understanding, Fedora-based distros play better with Nvidia GPUs.
Best of luck to you my friend. Like I said, fedora was my go-to for years, and I regularly fought against the Nvidia drivers and kept going back to windows.
I’m running AMD now, so I’m hoping my experience is better than it was when I was using nvidia
I’m responding to you, but this is more for others to see since you moved to AMD.
I used Nvidia cards for many years on Linux and only recently switched back to AMD. The main issues I ran into with Nvidia were related to driver updates breaking things rather than things not working in general. So, I eventually found that holding Nvidia drivers to versions that worked without issues was the best bet and only updating them on occasion after they had been out for a bit and the consensus was that they weren’t breaking stuff.
Just to make things easier on others (or myself of the amd drivers have similar issues), how would one go about holding the driver at a specific version?
I’m on a Debian based distro, but it is super simple. To hold a driver, or any package to a version just use “sudo aptitude hold <name or package here>” to undo this at any point just use “sudo aptitude unhold <name or package here>”. If you use the GUI package manager, there is a “Lock Version” option in a menu that does it.
If you’re on a Redhat based distro, Federa et al, I believe the keyword is “versionlock” for yum or dnf, but I would definitely recommend looking at a reference for the command before blinding following me on that one.
Just to make things easier on others (or myself if the AMD drivers have similar issues), how would one go about holding the driver at a specific version?
If you’re into gaming, Bazzite is based on Fedora (SilverBlue, so immutable), and it works amazingly for gaming and everything else.
It was my first experience with anything Fedora after coming from Arch, and I have to say that I’m pleased.
Everyone should use the most polished, solid and up to date distros. Opensuse and Fedora. There is no fucked up. Fedora is a serious project that Red hat uses to base their distro on. And Opensuse is German engineering. Serious is not even the correct word here, they are state of art distros.
Good to know, thanks! Like I said, I’m going to be diving back into Linux in the near future, so I’ll be looking into the best distro to try.
Any good step by step explainers nowadays? Been over a decade sinceI set my last Linux machine up for a friend, and have been thinking about trying one for a Jellyfish server.
Knowing that my gaming PC could get a few extra frames might intrruige me into performing the upgrade there too if the jellyfish machine goes well.
Most distros have a great getting started guide.
If you have an Nvidia card, make sure you’re looking at distros with Nvidia support and are using the correct installer version for Nvidia support.
Some great distros to look into with above in mind:
- PopOS
- Ubuntu: Nvidia requires a few additional terminal commands unfortunately.
- Mint
- Fedora
- A handful of others that I’m sure you’ve seen mentioned
Also avoid Arch linux unless you’re ready to dive into the deep end of linux. As much as I thing it’s a great distro, and abstracts away a lot of the difficulties or Arch, Garuda Linux, should probabaly be avoided as well until you’re more comfortable with Linux due to its Arch roots (even if the docs are robust, they dive deep on tech concepts and require tons of requisite knowledge).
Awesome, that’s some great leads especially with a Nvidia card.
I’ll try and pick the easiest one without any grub work, I faintly remember my old school courses and have a faint reminder of hearing about grub. Didn’t sound like something to touch without the knowhow, Ill be careful.
Thanks!
I can help you through a fedora install, I just did it for the first two times myself. If you want to dual boot, it’s easiest to have windows set up first too, so you’re in good shape for that
Might take you up on that in a couple of months if I don’t feel like destroying the old gaming PC hahaha
That’s what’s nice about dual booting! You can add a hard drive and use both! Easy to set up so you can choose to launch windows or Linux when it boots up! Gives you the opportunity to play around and get a feel for it without giving up your tried and tested setup!
My GPU runs out of memory if I try to play DRG on linux (fedora), Zerotier and XLink Kai run but won’t connect or plainly don’t work inside the games I’ve tried with, and the mumble server just won’t work (even using the docker) because it seems my motherboard’s network isn’t compatible or something, so if I want to use Linux I’d have to upgrade my pc anyway.
Gaming on Linux has taken huge steps, but I’d hardly call the current state as great, it’s ok and improving, but still requires tinkering and knowledge beyond just turning it on, installing and using… And something might not work because fuck you.
You’re also describing what happens on Windows. Gaming on PC requires some tinkering and knowledge. If you want to turn a machine on, install a game and play it you’ll buy a gaming console.
Regarding Mumble, Zerotier and XLink Kai, sorry to read that. Hopefully there’ll be something in their docs that help you or other alternatives you can switch to. Deep Rock Galactic can be a bit of a resource hog, but there’s probably a solution for that too. Have you used the latest community recommendations on it’s ProtonDB page? https://www.protondb.com/app/548430?device=pc
Three consecutive replies because of an app I’m testing. Sorry about that.
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I’m in a similar boat. My computer meets all of the other requirements like TPM and whatnot, yet they are arbitrarily deciding that my processor is too old. And for some reason you can walk into your local computer store and buy a laptop with the shittiest processor and other specs possible that somehow runs Windows 11. Just because the processor on the new shitbox was manufactured more recently. Ridiculous.
assuming you use steam, see which of your favorite games run with proton compatability layer and which absolutely require windows. You may be suprised.
WINE works surprisingly well too. I’ve seen people talk about gaming on Linux using Lutris or launching it through Steam as a “Non-Stean game” but I just put my files in my WINE directory and have better success.
I run everything on steam with proton that I did on my windows PC, nothing was left behind. If you ‘add a game’ from outside steam, you can run the installer and then change the game location to the executable. Ubuntu or Ubuntu mate are what I install on everything. Recommend.
In the same boat with the same CPU. The beast is running Cyberpunk 2077 fairly well at 1440p with a DLSS/ray tracing card but it can’t run Windows 11 🙄🙄🙄
I have that same issue. My older laptop barely misses the cutoff, even though everything meets the requirements except the cpu. I have a newer laptop with Win11, and the old one runs circles around it. It’s faster and has way more RAM, yet somehow won’t run 11? I’m going to keep it and just run Linux instead. I’ll use the crappy Win11 lappy just for MS office and keeping papers from blowing off my desk.
I’ll use the crappy Win11 lappy just for MS office
LibreOffice works very well. I use it often in a company that uses Office exclusively, and I’ve never had a compatibility issue.
I use power query and so far haven’t found a replacement that works in Linux. Otherwise I would drop MS office altogether.
It boils down the CPU microarchitecture
6700k is 64 bit.
They mean the x86-64-v1, x86-64-v2 stuff https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X86-64#Microarchitecture_levels
This bit me before. It seems like some PlayStation game ports use those commands. Both Helldivers 2 and Death Stranding wouldn’t work for me because of this.
I figured it was related to the hardware architecture, but I’m curious if this is for security reasons (potential exploits that the OS can’t resolve) and/or just a support bandwidth concerns managing 2 OS code bases (on top of the obvious revenue from new licenses).
If the hardware security isn’t the issue, then switching to Linux is a good money saving choice for those that are tech savvy.
end of support for windows 10
beginning of support for linux mint
Yeah, my old desktop computer is getting turned into my first dedicated Linux machine and my current desktop isn’t getting updated to 11 until October 13th.
i just switched my laptop to mint and my desktop is next :) surprisingly so many “windows only” steam games run perfectly fine in linux
Pretty much everything (except for games with kernal level anti-cheat as others have said) works now.
Even if Steam says “unsupported,” there’s a decent chance it will work out of the box, or maybe with a little tweaking. Protondb.com is a great resource for this.
Proton is fucking great.
Except for some games with Anti-Cheat you can basically play anything that runs on Windows on Linux too
and really i wouldn’t want to play those ones anyway :)
So far I’m aware of fortnite, fc, battlefield and destiny. Which I don’t want to play anyways
I’m trying but the girlfriend refuses. She watches YouTube on the TV and does everything else on her phone; literally only uses the laptop to play The Sims 4 (which her 1080ti can handle just fine), yet she’s convinced that she will need a brand new gaming machine with a 4090/5090 as soon as Microsoft dumps WIn10. She’s afraid that she’ll completely break the OS if she switches to Linux. (Which is plausible, though unlikely.
I’m hoping she’ll change her mind as soon as she realizes just how much more GPUs cost these days, especially mobile ones.
Create a live USB stick and demonstrate it to her, without deleting Windows. Bonus points if you rice the fuck out of it with some kawaii shit for your GF and make Sims 4 work with Wine.
Wine need not apply. That’s old school. Sims 4 works great in proton. Basically just install steam and the rest is handled.
Better yet, install bazzite as your distro, gaming works out of the box.
Proton is based on Wine, when people say Wine in a gaming context, there’s a decent chance they just mean Proton. Also there’s absolutely no need for gaming distros in this situation, gaming works out of the box on any (semi-normal) distro, the most you’ll have to do is flick a switch in Steam.
Edit: Or in this case with the Sims install Lutris I guess, since it’s an EA game, but that also isn’t much more difficult
That’s fair, I’m a bit uninformed on wine and proton’s roots. However I’d argue that for someone like OPs girlfriend, a somewhat-immutable atomic based distro like bazzite might be better. Especially if it’s only used for gaming and YouTube 🤷♂️
But different strokes for different folks, so perhaps they’d be better off just installing steam on their distro of choice 👍
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It’s not fully immutable like steamos. But yes I do see your point, it could be confusing.
If all she uses the computer for is playing Sims 4, another option is just let her continue to use Windows 10. If she’s running it through Steam she’s probably got another 3-4 years before that stops working.
As others have suggested, I’ll probably just throw LTSC on it and call it a day. That’s what I did for my DJ laptop (the mixing hardware isn’t compatible with Linux), and it works phenomenally. It’s the perfect Windows OS for a single-use PC.
Use an immutable distro so even if she breaks it it’s easily fixed
Install win 10 LTSC
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_10_version_history Windows 10 ltsc 1809 will be supported until late 2029 if you or someone you know is set on continuing to use Windows 10
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Is she stupid?
This is me. I’ve always been too lazy to switch (I have some of the worst hardware for it. I’m running my old surface pro into the ground and have hardly any internal storage so hard to dual boot for testing).
But now, well hey, Windows 11 is stupid, windows 10 has been spying since forever.
Linux it is, thanks Microsoft for giving me the push I needed.
You know, later in the year. When I have to.
I’m only human
I have Linux on a jumpdrive can I install it on my main drive without it effecting my other drives?
Only the drive you install it on will be affected, but the other drives likely won’t be formatted to work with Linux.
Then how do I upgrade to Linux on my gaming computer.
Actually, Linux does support NTFS, although you won’t be able to run executables from it. I suggest getting an external HD/SSD to make a backup of all of your drives, then proceed with the switch to Linux.
I always had a fat32 partion available for sharing stuff when i did dualbooting. Just for saving some stuff, but limited to 4 gb files then. Ntfs works as well so either partion or separate drive
Are you just wanting to back up save files? I agree with the other person here, just backup the files that matter to you onto an external drive and then install Linux
Dude I have no external hard drive that can store all the stuff saved on my two separate drives. No way to back all that up.
Buy one. It’s like 100$ and you’ll have a backup solution.
Guess I should will need at least a 3 terabyte one.
It’s called dual-booting, and yes there are so many tutorials availiable. But you have to be a little more careful in that process. I do dualboot but almost never uses windows. I have heard situation where windows updates messing linux installs on same drive. The safest route might be to do what others suggested but it is possibe to install that way. Be careful with partitioning and formatting. You also have to determine the sizes for each partitions yourself too
I think so?
