• mightyfoolish@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    I believe I said it in a different post but 2023 was the year of the Linux desktop. Hardware like Bluetooth and webcams just work. Applications and games have gotten so much easier install thanks to Flatpak and Steam.

    Now Plasma 6 is upon us. HDR could be supported this year. At this point avoid Linux only if it’s missing a specific app you need.

    • jkrtn@lemmy.ml
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      9 months ago

      I like Linux, and I don’t plan to use anything else, but yesterday my internet broke because swapping the GPU changed the name of the network interface

      • ProxyZeus@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        I mean most video games just work and I game on my machine daily. The ones that dont are limited to weird kernel based anticheats and that is very few games out of the millions of games out there.

      • mightyfoolish@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        I admit I don’t play video games anymore. Especially not in the last year (I did have my eyes on Baldur’s Gate). Perhaps I’ll start Palworld in a few weeks. I got a lot of games off Humble Bundle (I subscribed to Humble Choice for a year and honestly even with the discounts it wasnt worth it) and Fanatical.

        The only game I couldn’t get working was the Batman Arkham Trilogy. Everything else I was able to manually force on Proton and play it. Monster Hunter World, Temtem, and GTAV were probably the games I played the most.

        Mods suck for the most part on Linux. Though, I never try to mod new games.

        • tomjuggler@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          Yeah looking at you Roblox 😠. Has anyone hacked that anti cheat nonsense yet? Right now I’m mirroring my android phone on my desktop to be able to see what I’m doing (I’m over 40 but I play with my kids in case you wondering)

    • umbrella@lemmy.ml
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      9 months ago

      a not insignificant part of linux users are probably running privacy stuff to mask what they are doing/using, so yeah

  • filister@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    And yet still below the “unknown” OS? What the heck is this “unknown” OS that fares better than Linux?

  • TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    Desktop linux has become great since I first tried installing it in 2002. I remember being in my barracks and I had to switch back to windows because I had no way to get the modem drivers I needed.

    As amazing as the linux desktop experience has become, windows has really done this to itself. The windows experience 10 years ago was ‘fine’. Like it wasn’t amazing, it could be improved upon, but it did what it needed to do without bothering the user much.

    Windows the OS has lost the thread completely. Its a travesty. I no longer recommend for non-power users to build their own PC (I’ve helped several family members who were going down the “I want a powerful computer, should I buy a mac?” direction and would steer them to build-a-pc+windows) strictly because Windows has become something entirely different than an operating system. Unfortunately, no Linux desktop experience is quite to the point where I could recommend it and not-expect to get a constant barrage of calls from a family member when they need to install a basic piece of software or their blue tooth headphones wont connect. Because of what Windows has decided to become, after decades of being anti-mac because of their ‘ecosystem’/ anti-collaborative approach, I’ve turned a corner and now recommend Macs for non-power users, but linux for every one else.

    This increase in popularity has the potential to create a sea-change in that regard, especially if we can get people to support (financially) the teams that are putting these distros together. I really need a linux distro to recommend that won’t get me calls where I have to hop in and figure out why an nvidia driver that was working suddenly stopped working, what the hell is blueman doing, issues with audio drivers, issues with software compatibility.

    Like I cant reasonably put my MIL on a linux laptop that I put together for her and expect her to have a good experience. So she gets a mac. But my nieces and nephews? No they are starting linux from day 0.

    • Aggravationstation@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      My non-tech literate aunt has been running her Ebay business from a laptop running Fedora with unattended upgrades for 3 years now. She manages her expenses in Libreoffice calc and accesses everything else through Chrome and prints labels on an old USB HP printer. I don’t think she’s even noticed I switched her over from Windows 10 when her machine was getting slow.

      My Dad’s laptop is also on Fedora (though he mainly just uses an Android tablet these days) and I intend to install it on my Grandma’s PC when Windows 10 stops being supported. So for the people who’d be happy with something like a Chromebook, which is a good chunk of older folks, it’s perfect and I can easily provide support.

      That being said if I had to deal with helping kids who wanted to game and use Bluetooth bits and pieces surrounded by RGB crap then yea outside of a few well supported options it could be a nightmare depending on what they’ve got.

    • grue@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      I’ve had my computer-illiterate boomer parents buy Macs for over two decades now because I wanted to keep tech support to a minimum (and because I saw the writing on the wall for Microsoft’s abusiveness even back then). However, at this point their next computer is going to be running Linux because I genuinely expect it to be no more trouble than Mac OS.

      (In fact, their “next computer” is really just likely to be their current Mac but with Linux installed on it, because it’s so old that the latest version of OS X it can run is EOL’d. To be clear, that is Apple deliberately making tech support trouble for me, in a way Linux never would.)

      • A_Random_Idiot@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        I have several idiot family members running linux.

        Its been zero problems. Of course they are not power users, everything they do is pretty much via a browser. Though one does have a scanner/printer set up (that runs with no issue)

        only tech support I’ve ever done is get the question once a year asking “ubuntu says I should upgrade to this new version, should I?” and I say yeup.

  • bean@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    Dumb questions maybe. But I mostly keep Windows for like Battle.net games. Is there any way to play Overwatch II or Diablo IV in Linux? With proton or any other way? Legit would tip me into that realm. I’m a Debian fan if that matters. But I’m comfortable in other distros. Except Arch 😆

    • daddy32@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      Diablo IV steam version has officiall support for Linux as far as I know. Or rather, support for Steam Deck via Proton, which is practically the same thing.

        • daddy32@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          That would be the easiest path, but would cost you!

          You can try to install the battle.net version via Lutris: https://lutris.net/games/diablo-iv/ and it should work. I haven’t tried this game in particular, but had a great experience with Lutris in the past.

          It is a great front end for Wine/proton and a database of install scripts and configurations for many games.

          Bit off-topic, but if you would want to also play games from the Epic store or GOG, be sure to try Heroic Launcher.

  • egeres@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    LETS FUCKING GOOO

    As a sidenote, I bought a whole new SSD and I plan to switch from windows 10 to ubuntu (yeah I know) when I have more stability in my life. At the moment I don’t want more changes in my life because I have a lot going, but it’s coming

    • kinther@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      The haters will tell you Ubuntu sucks. Every distro has pros and cons. Use whatever you feel comfortable with, and if you feel like trying something else, do it!

    • discount_door_garlic@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      ignore anybody giving you grief about whatever distro you use - people need to realise that gatekeeping an OS over minor UI experiences is a dumb fight that discourages normal users getting involved. Whether ubuntu is your gateway into other linux, or the system you end up using for 10 years - you do you, whatever is working is fine. In any case, ubuntu today is much better than it was even 5 years ago - like the comments on this thread say, things just work. You’ll still probably have to use terminal more than you should, but linux is becoming very usable for everybody.

  • Gakomi@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    Wtf is unknown? What, are they implying that people made their own OS? If the unknown is due to those pc not reporting what OS they have, well that’s most definitely Linux because Windows user tend to not care that much about privacy and Apple people tend to kiss Apple ass no matter what so they will not try to ofuscat their OS for privacy as for them having an mac or whatever is something they want to show off!

  • Unreliable@lemmy.ml
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    9 months ago

    I was running Bazzite for several months before I switched back to Windows. Unfortunately for me I have a broadcom wifi adapter, it kept disconnecting every 10-15 minutes, and that doesn’t bode well for gaming. Outside of that I really enjoyed using it! At least my steamdeck counts towards usage of Linux…

    Edit: also steam having to download pre-cached shaders almost every time I started up my computer was kind of annoying. I know you can disable that, but then you’re leaving performance on the table iirc.

      • Unreliable@lemmy.ml
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        9 months ago

        Ooh I know, but there’s also a few games here and there where anti-cheat doesn’t work on Linux. Yes I know dual-boot like you said but I’m too lazy to switch between both.

    • mlg@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      Broadcom drivers are a PITA even with akmods or dkms

      Had similar issues where card would just randomly disconnect, although for some reason never when it was under load.

      Even followed the Arch wiki and tried some alternative driver modules with no luck

      Luckily it was a desktop so I eventually just switched to ethernet

  • doingless@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    It’s going to grow. When Windows 10 support ends I’m moving a lot more hardware that way.

  • Neon_Shadow@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    Awesome news. I plan to make the full switch to Linux next week. League of Legends is the only reason I use Windows. Next week, they are adding Vanguard, and that’ll make it impossible to play on Windows.