customizability was a big factor for me, and id just rather control my machine than shitty microsoft. Especially regarding updates and being forced to switch to Windows 11, which my 1600X didnt support? come on man, corporations suck
Never switched completely, win 11 iot edition just lives in virt manager now when i need office or candy crush saga or some other bullshit I don’t have patience to figure out on wine
Could’ve sworn I’d told this story here before, but I don’t see my name in the thread so…
Back in 2004 (I think), I needed to get some work done at a weekend, but I’d forgotten to activate Windows on my machine. It just so happened that it was the weekend when Microsoft’s activation services (both online and phone) were offline. I got so angry with the whole thing that I went to the newsagent, picked up the first magazine I could fine with a Linux DVD on the front (openSUSE, as I recall) and hosed my machine as soon as I got home.
Honestly, as a desktop experience, it was pretty crap back then. However, I was up and running within a couple of hours, and got my work done.
I continued with it out of sheer bloody-mindedness, and after bouncing around a few distros (including using CentOS at work) switched to Ubuntu 6.06 LTS when it came out. It’s been my daily since then.
It’s probably been about 10 years since I’ve had any major OS-related issues, to be honest.
The highlight so far has been my wife hating Linux when I gave her an old laptop to try out, so much that she bought herself an HP 360 laptop with Windows on…and then, a few months later, sheepishly begging me to put Ubuntu on it.
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I got my first taste of Linux with OpenSUSE 10-something back in my university days around 2005. From that point on, I kept up with Linux news, but I never fully committed because hardware and peripheral support was pretty hit-or-miss.
Over the years, depending on what PC or laptop I was using, I’d install various distros to play around with — including Unix alternatives like FreeBSD and even OpenSolaris. Usually, this would last for up to six months before some OS-level failure forced me back to Windows. Internet access wasn’t always readily available back then, and finding the right troubleshooting info was often tough.
Eventually, around 2021, I settled on Fedora KDE, and so far, it’s been more than enough for everything I need. Gaming was never really an issue, software compatibility was — but these days, things are smooth enough that I only spin up a Windows VM once in a while to update peripheral firmware.
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Had been using Windows XP and that kept getting full up with the usual junk getting slower. So I used the unattended install procedures to make an automated install disk for Windows XP. Every couple of months I would use the automated install disks to get my system back running fast again.
But it was never perfect and one day I decided just to go all in on Linux. I’d used it a bit before, usually dual booting with Windows 2000, Mandrake or Redhat or Fedora. From then on anything that was work/uni related I did on Linux using various tools to make Microsoft Office work.
I still dualbooted to get games and the things that didn’t work on Linux to work but I tried very hard to get things to work on Linux using wine, and WineX and Lokis. I got COD and COD2 to work, they were very easy. Medal of Honour Pacific Assault and Brothers in Arms were pretty easy. UT99, UT2004 and Quake 4 had native installers but I had Quake 4 working before I found that.
At work I was running Linux since 2013, Mint, Debian, Ubuntu - it was a no brainer. At home for games I ran Windows 7 to play the games that still wouldn’t work, but as soon as GTA5 started working on Linux in 2019, I didn’t need windows no more.
Ironically now GTA5 doesn’t work on Linux again thanks to the new copy protection, which is literally just a checkbox for Rockstar to enable. I only play Squad these days but I use my computer for so much more that I c[w]ouldn’t do on windows. AI, telegram bots, software dev etc etc.
Now whenever I see windows its like ugh people still use this crap!? Dad needs help with his windows 11 I’m just running blind clicking whatever to see if something works.
Even the wife runs Ubuntu on her laptop.
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Windows ME was trash and Linux was actually interesting. So I migrated in about 2002. First Mandrake, then Gentoo, then Ubuntu (back when Ubuntu was the cool distro).
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Ubuntu was the Cool distro?
It was easier to use than Slackware, less corporate than RedHat, and put together better than Debian.
Switched while I was building my first PC in 2022, since I figured dualbooting might be a good idea for troubleshooting. Went with OpenSUSE at the time, though I Did almost rather ambitiously go with Gentoo (Which has since been installed on a Laptop).
Ended up really enjoying and sticking with Linux, and Microsoft’s more recent behavior with Copilot and General Win11 Nonsense I hear about has cemented this as a great choice on my end.
Now, this is a story all about how
My whole OS got flipped, turned upside down,
And I’d like to take a minute - just sit right there,
I’ll tell you how a penguin fixed my Microslop nightmare.
Way back in the day, man, Mandrake was the scene,
Staring at all those logs, fat 20 inch CRT screen.
Messin’ around in terminals when I had time,
While daily drivin’ Windows, it was a crime.
Everything was easy with a point and click,
Till the system started pulling that telemetry trick,
Forced updates in the background, ads inside the start,
Selling off my habits ‘n tearing privacy apart!
Till one day I had a flash: I was no longer the client,
I was just the product for a corporate giant.
One final freeze, saw the trackers in the stack,
Said, “Man, I’m wipin’ every drive and I’m never looking back!”
Spammed the DEL key to get to that boot screen,
Didn’t take long - I had root of every single machine!
No telemetry pinging, no corporate attack,
I claimed open source and I’m never lookin’ back!
It started in the homelab with the servers I ran,
Then the hasty switch hit like an avalanche plan.
I didn’t stop at containers or storage arrays,
I nuked NTFS, cleared my life of that Redmond haze!
Took a couple days to get my toolchain in gear,
Findin’ drop in replacements, making workflows clear.
Gettin’ cozy with the syntax, memorizin’ the shell,
Kickin’ registry keys and corporate licensing to hell.
Now Arch was the way, that was a fact,
Daily pacman -Syu, keepin’ them dependencies tracked.
Then CachyOS pulled up and took the crown,
Hands down - the fastest distribution in town!
Optimized binaries, that Zen kernel speed,
Compiled for my hardware, givin’ everything I need.
Frames locked high, responsive and tight,
Micro-stutters murdered, every input hittin’ right.
So that’s the whole story, how the battle was won,
Sent that Microslop packin’, straight to the sun.
Bootin’ Cachy on the daily, pure speed on track,
I’m the king of my machine - and I’m never lookin’ back!
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???
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Read up, Garrett said this was the case in 2002. Things may have changed slightly in the last 24 years.
I’ve been using Windows since I first got a computer back in 2012 (i think?).
Tried Ubuntu, was confused by it, but I also largely didn’t understand computers much at the time, so I went back to Windows.
It’s been fine for me throughout the years, never really had any of the issues or experiences a lot of people would ree about online.
11 ran fine for me, I was a early adopter, but the thing that made me start to change my opinion was what I felt Microsoft was removing from Windows. This slow focus shift from control panel to the settings menu. Finding a lot of things I changed and configured in my computer to be made more difficult to do, or obfuscated in some way. DavesGarage has a good video (“What I would change about WIndows”) that largely sums up a lot of pain points I have with Windows.
I got a Steamdeck, and kinda had to learn how to use Linux if I wanted to mod or game on it beyond as a handheld console. Also wanted to poke around on the steamdecks desktop, realizing it was a far cry from my experience on Ubuntu so many years ago.
If it was good enough for Valve, then it was good enough for me.
Between that, and seeing Pewdiepies linux video (I dont watch him, just what was recommended to me since I showed interest in linux) with him using hyprland and a keyboard-centric user experience, I made the switch.
Decided to be committed, and not give up at the first sign of friction. That was 10 months ago, and I don’t think I’ll ever go back. I did sacrifice some things, as I’m a content creator (DaVinci my beloved), but I’ve learned a lot. I fiddle with llm’s, have my own Wayland compositor (built upon tinywl.c) as a DE, and my computer now feels like how it use to feel when I first got one.
(I do have a drive just for windows, Dice pls make BF6 anti-cheat work on linux)
(also my first reply, so sorry if not correct or something)
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…switch? from what 
this might not be aging well. we will see if the ai slop has its way.
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Lmao, I already have those downloaded. It did not age well at all, you’re right
A new era of software is upon us apparently lol
I switched back in 2000.
I was tired of getting bluescreens all the time. Pre-XP, non-NT Windows (before the consumer branch of windows got virtual RAM addressing) was really bad in that regard.
I was also tired of constant vulnerabilities and malware. Pre-Vista (before Windows got proper account management with UAC) was really bad in that regard.
After Vista Windows improved, and through Windows 7, it was still mostly tolerable, but since then Microsoft seems hell bent on making it as bad of a user experience as possible. First with Windows 8’s disastrous UI, and then with telemetry and spying starting in Windows 10, and forced unwanted AI integration with Windows 11 both being a nuisance and making spying and ads even worse.
There is no going back.
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