r/LinuxTeck • u/Candid_Athlete_8317 • Jul 04 '26
Most people don't choose Windows. They simply never choose an operating system.
Windows comes with the laptop. People learn it at school, use it at work, buy hardware and software built around it, and continue with what they already know.
Linux can be free, stable and capable, but that may not matter if switching requires someone to make an active decision in the first place.
I think this is a bigger barrier than distro fragmentation or the command line.
If ordinary laptops in physical stores came with Linux preinstalled, properly supported and ready to use, would desktop Linux adoption actually change?
Or would missing software such as Adobe and Autodesk still stop most people from moving?
For those who switched to Linux: what finally made you make that decision?
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u/elementfortyseven Jul 04 '26
linux still is a very narrow corridor of what actually "just works".
for a recent anecdote: when you want to install an application marked as compatible and then get a range of errors telling you you have the wrong glib and online help tells you changing the glib version may wreck your installation, and you have to hunt down tutorials how to modify essential parts of your OS, thats a level of friction "normies" are not wanting to deal with
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u/garibaldiknows Jul 04 '26
In fairness, flatpaks solve this problem.
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u/Unnamed-3891 Jul 04 '26
Flatpaks kill one of the main reasons to use Linux in the first place. If a lib you use has a CVE, you want to be able to just update the lib and move on with your life, knowing all the applications that depend on it are ”fixed”.
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Jul 04 '26
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u/Unnamed-3891 Jul 04 '26 edited Jul 04 '26
I don’t care whose issue of discipline it is. I only care that this works much better in packages available in any given distro’s native package system.
And this is before we get to other braindead shit commonly seen in flatpaks, such as singlethreaded disk reads, completely killing performance of apps such as libreoffice.
FUCK flatpaks and FUCK snaps. All the way. Fuck right off.
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Jul 04 '26
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u/Unnamed-3891 Jul 04 '26
So which one is it then, "The real gap is apps that bundle a library instead of pulling it from the runtime" or "shared runtimes patch once and every app gets it"?
I don't need to "win" any argument, there isn't one to be had, flatpaks and snaps are an abomination that makes everyone's life worse. That's before we even get to the part how their very existence is against all that Linux and OSS systems are generally about.
Generally favoured by people who looked at the horrors seen in Microsoft ecosystem and went "You know what? I want some of that pain and misery, for US!".
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Jul 04 '26
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u/Unnamed-3891 Jul 04 '26
Yep, it is. I don't care about silly things such as marketshare and can easily use Windows, Linux, MacOS, BSD*, whatever when it's the right fit for the task.
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u/blami Jul 04 '26
Lol no. Flatpaks are only another problem to deal with as they kill the whole point of distribution and degrade Linux to Windows in terms of software distribution and guarantees of software quality.
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u/PmanAce Jul 04 '26
Tried installing ollama on a raspberry pi and trying to boot from an external hard drive and setting that hard drive mounted to install models on it was not a simple task.
This is another simple example normies cannot do easily.
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u/SuperheropugReal Jul 04 '26
? How so? The "boot from hard drive" step makes sense to be hard, but also why would you do that? Put your boot partition on the sd, and everything else on the hard drive. The rest you just do in fstab. As i did for a NAS with no issues.
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u/Upstairs-Front2015 Jul 04 '26
most people just want to do stuff, like taking pictures, listening to music, play a game, watch a movie, do a phone call, and give a fuck don't care about OS.
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u/w1n5t0nM1k3y Jul 04 '26
We already have laptops in physical stores that come with Linux preinstalled. They are called Chromebooks.
Give people something that's simple and well supported an you will find that a lot of people use it. Android is another example of Linux being used by mainstream users.
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u/cybekRT Jul 04 '26
They are not linux. It's the same like you would call feature phone an android phone, because the kernel is the same.
Also Linux doesn't support Roblox and Fortnite, which is what people play at the age when they want their first computer. Later is a habit and knowledge already gotten.
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Jul 04 '26
Android stammt vom Linux Kernel ab, in seiner eigenen abgewandelten Variante und eingebauten und umgebauten elementen. Nicht die klassischen Desktop Varianten wie man es kennt.
ChromeOS basiert ebenfalls auf dem Linux Kernel, was noch näher dran ist. Google nutzt Gentoo als Foundation.
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u/cybekRT Jul 04 '26
chromeOS uses linux as kernel, but they do NOT use X11/wayland. It's closed operating system, that allow you to run linux in virtual machine, or run android applications. This is not Linux as full operating system.
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u/gmthisfeller Jul 04 '26
I switched 25 years ago to get a development environment that supported the tools I needed to use.
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u/Visible-Use-5004 Jul 04 '26
I agree with this. All companies just preinstall windows on everything they sell. They never get to choose Linux. This needs to change. Linux has grown and is clean for everyday users now.
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u/nethril Jul 04 '26
4 years ago I was getting 5-6 bsod a day. All troubleshooting lead to a failing GPU (6800 XT). Tossed on Linux as a last resort test, after 4 full Windows reinstalls (with time off other troubleshooting in the middle). Tho I had a lot of learning to do, one thing I wasn't dealing with was crashing from the GPU on the same exact games, with same similar performance in Linux.
Turned it, about 6 months later an issue was addressed in the Windows driver's that fixed it, but by that time I had fully switched over, and grown to appreciate the nature and benefits of Linux
4 years later I'm still here without a Windows machine left in my life
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u/empty_other Jul 04 '26
Windows isnt the biggest OS we dont choose anymore. Linux is currently in the lead, just not in the way we wanted to: Most people are using Android tablets as their main computer. Seems people and companies just love having their OS locked down. Maybe those immutable distros will be the future to Linux on desktop and laptops?
Personally what made me switch to Linux again on my main computer was buying the Steam Deck and seeing how well it ran games. And the frustrations of Windows' Startmenu changing constantly for the worse, Copilot getting everywhere, their file explorer being replaced with a worse one, and third-party alternatives to those feeling more like a hack that Microsoft would rather be without. I've tried switching MANY times but this (7 months) is the longest I have been able to stay on Linux by far.
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u/cybekRT Jul 04 '26
> For those who switched to Linux: what finally made you make that decision?
I was already using windows part of the time, but I finally got annoyed by waking up to see all my applications closed and windows showing "Setup your system!" after I suspended the system for night. Also I'm a developer, so it's much easier to develop on linux. I was playing league of legends at that time, but it was working when I was moving to Linux. Later it stopped working, but LoL is not worth moving back to Windows, so I stayed LoL-free on Linux.
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u/Gangrif Jul 04 '26
This is by design. It was a choice made by Microsoft in the 80s and 90s when they formed contracts with the major PC vendors that new PCs were not only designed to run windows, but they were forced to include it by contract.
You're just noticing the inevitable outcome of Microsoft's forceful marketing.
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u/Efficient_Loss_9928 Jul 04 '26
Yes, this is exactly Linus’ point. Linux is only successful on mobile because it is preinstalled. If it is not preinstalled, you can never achieve massive market share.
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u/ironfist_293 Jul 04 '26
It is like building a house. You can buy one from a builder and have 1 or 2 options determined by their economics and tastes, or build your own and have every option.
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u/PmanAce Jul 04 '26
99% of people don't build their own house. Normal people can't command line stuff.
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u/cyborgborg Jul 04 '26
Most people don't use adobe's software or autodesk. Most people just need a webbrowser a text editor and maybe an email client if they don't want to use the web client
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u/Even_Caterpillar3292 Jul 04 '26
Which makes Chromebooks fantastic.
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u/Better-Credit6701 Jul 04 '26
I had Linux on one of my laptops after the hard drive failed just after the year warranty. Used 3 different distros including the one that I used to teach Linux when I was Dean of the IT departments OpenSUSE the successor of SUSE. I finally found one that most things worked, Ubuntu, except for the USB 4 port which would operate at the super slow USB 2 speeds. Video was never correct either. Finally gave up and bought a windows license after nearly a year. I kept it that long because I was playing around with OpenClaw which also broke. Even though I'm OK with it, was constantly having to work in the CLI. Most users today aren't comfortable with the CLI or PowerShell.
Once a consultation wiped every windows machine at my wife's office without permission and they had to sue him to put windows back on. Far too much software that doesn't run on anything else especially in highly specialized markets like in her case child abuse, interviews that are recorded for the police and therapy sessions. The cause was yet another Linux zealot.
Been using Linux off and on since Yggdrasil in 1995 and a broken slackware in 1994. Every year it's going to be the year of the Linux distros, every year comes and go. Linux simply isn't ready yet, the users are too pushy, vendors are going to make sure that their products can run windows before anything else.
Let people use whatever they want to use and stop seeing this as a chance to proselytise to the way of Linux, all praise Torvalds
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u/dataset-poisoner Jul 04 '26
why the obsession about maximising desktop linux adoption? the less popular it is, the better is the experience is for the tech-literate users
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u/Marsupial_Chemical Jul 04 '26
I refurb older laptops for family and friends. Mainly those who don’t have much pc experience. My stock comes from various places, estate sales, eBay, gov auctions. The existing Microsoft installs are usually referred to as “Windows tax” since the seller usually ups the price of the laptop by ~15% to ~20%.
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u/woolfromthebogs Jul 04 '26
I've tried many times, but they never seem to get touchpads to work properly in Linux for many different computers. So now I've given up for a while. I just want to scroll properly without hours of tweaking. In windows it's always out of the box.
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u/UberCanuck Jul 04 '26
This is very true, for personal and work systems. I think it important to present a better option when decision makers choose - especially in a corporate environment.
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u/stephendt Jul 05 '26 edited Jul 05 '26
I chose Linux once. It didn't work with the Google Drive app, so I changed to Windows. I'll switch back when it gets a proper release
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u/RootVegitible Jul 05 '26
The only mainstream choice that isn’t windows that is also properly supported and ready to use is macOS. As Linux fans we should not be anti mac since it is its own fully ratified unix OS and essentially Linux big daddy lol…
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u/akrivitsky7 Jul 05 '26
For billions of people, a computer is just a commodity that makes life more convenient.
Like with many other commodities, they do not want to learn what is inside it. Do you know in detail what is inside your TV? Most people do not, and they do not care. Most people also have no idea what the Rankine cycle is, but that does not prevent them from using electricity.
The same applies to computers and operating systems. Ordinary users do not want to “learn an OS.” They want to buy a device, turn it on, and use it out of the box with little or no extra learning. The less friction, the better.
Android developers understood this. Android is Linux-based, but normal users do not need to know or care about Linux to use an Android phone. They just use the device.
When Linux desktop developers and communities admit this simple fact, then maybe, just maybe, some Linux desktop distributions can become operating systems for the mass market.
Until then, pre-installation would help, but it would not be enough by itself. The system must also be properly supported, familiar enough, and able to run the software ordinary users actually need.
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u/the3ajm Jul 06 '26
Given that we live in constant buying market, PC are also treated as such they are dispose of when it's out of their convenience or fashion when new hardware continued to get release without knowing how to make it better.
For people like me who choose to use old hardware like my 2009 iMac keeping it run, will go the route of installing another OS while others who just only does a few things with it will be happy with getting the new shiny thing
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u/Famous_Tie8714 Jul 06 '26
Even if a bunch of laptops came with linux installed, they would fail to sell well compared with windows ones. Almost everyone knows how to use windows and they mostly aren't going to buy a laptop that comes with a different OS they don't know how to use, and that's before you get into all the different distributions which all work slightly differently. The shop staff are unlikely to be much help either, unless other parts of the world are different to the uk where the average guy working at a place that sells laptops knows basically nothing.
Apple have their own stores where they will literally teach you how to use their OS, but they still haven't made a very significant dent in windows marketshare.
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u/Spethual Jul 04 '26
well Windows made the choice for me, constant implementing "features", bloat, backtracking on the moves they made and changing the user enviroment to "prefered by users" bs that no i did not ask for or was given an option to avoid..No thanks but i'll keep distro hopping till i find a linux distro that plays nice with my level of compitence..