and what if any do you miss from windows?
For me the Cons are:
- No support to enable Full-Disk Encryption after the System install: This is something baked into Windows Bitlocker. You might say “But you can set it up during installation by just checking th checkbox!”. Yes, you are right. But why can’t I check this checkbox after installation? I know why a lot of people will say “this is not necessary or possible”. In the end the only real reason is “nobody bothered implementing this propperly yet”. But that’s the problem.
- Secure Boot support is still rough arround the edges: I don’t know if LVFS is now able to update the keys for booting shim. But this would help improve the situation. Users should not be bothered with “checking this on their own”. Nobody is talking about “Will my Windows machine be able to boot after this?”. Everyone is just expecting it to work out just fine. Which it proppably will. I would expect it to be the same on Linux.
- Proprietary Software for managing/configuring hardware: I am looking at PC-Peripheral Manufacturers like Logitech, Corsair (Keyboards), etc. Why do I need to use your Software to change Key-Bindings? I know there is VIA/QMK. But not everyone supports it and it is very bothersome to check for everything “Will I be able to use their Software for the product I bought?”. And especially fingerprint readers and IR cameras… Why do they need to be soooo complicated…
- No easy way to synchronize account settings between machines: Say about MacOS what you want…but switching between one machine and another is pretty easy if you are willig to use iCloud. And it is baked into a lot of applications like Safari. There doe snot exist something on Linux that has the same level of integration and is as polished as iCloud.
- NVidia Drivers: Situation has improved. But if you want to still use and old but working Card (1060 for example) on a new Kernel it will get problematic to find the right package to install to get the correct driver. This took my a whole day on OpenSuse Tumbleweed… A lot easier on the AMD side, but they have problems too.
- AMD Hardware acceleration: Whose idea was it to not include the VCE drivers in the open source driver? Shame on you! Why do I need to install the proprietary driver (which will replace the opensource driver) to use this? But then this proprietary driver has its own limitations. So I can’t use my device to the fullest. This situation does not exist on Windows. Are you kidding me?
- Propper systemwide logging for all Apps: Nobody system has this solved. But I would like it so much! It would be so easy when helping people to say “Go to the Logging system, hit clear, do the thing that is broken on your system and send me the logs afterwards”. This could help so much if you are helping multiple people using different systems with different applications. Why no SysLog integration everywhere?
But on the other hand why I am using Linux:
It still best fits my needs. It does what I want when I want. I don’t need to navigate through 3 Menus and multiple selection to store MY FILES on MY SYSTEM. You shall be damned OneDrive! A system update happens when I say so, and no sooner. You can download everything in the background, I am cool with that. But if you dare to restart my system during my workday…then you are part of the problem(s), not the solution!
Pros:
- I never have to worry that my OS is working for someone else by design.
- Never surprised by ads.
- Never surprised by updates that move/remove something in the UI.
- Never have to be worried about some new feature that windows is forcing everyone to use that accesses all my data and might go rogue and delete it all or upload it somewhere.
- BTRFS feels decades ahead of NTFS
- package manager makes it easy to try new programs
- I can try multiple desktop environments
- I can write scripts to customize my experience
Cons:
- Occasionally there is a program that only officially supports windows and I have to figure out how to get it working in proton or a VM. This happens much less now than 10y ago.
- A game might say it works on Linux, but I hit some issue that my friends on windows aren’t hitting, and have to determine if I’m just unlucky or if it’s something to do with proton/Linux.
- there are still some remaining kinks being ironed out with the x11 to Wayland migration.
- sometimes there’s a bug in a package and I have to downgrade it. But that’s not really even an option in windows.
All in all, there is nothing from windows I would say I “miss”. And it feels refreshing to know I’m out of the line of fire of msft.
As someone who uses Windows for work and Linux for pleasure: one of the cons of Linux is the lack of integrated ubiquitous file sharing via SMB and UNC paths. Being able to “cd \\server\c$” and expect that to work with 99% of programs made in the last two decades, is pretty great.
“Hardcode a few pre-selected paths and their credentials in /etc/fstab” just doesn’t cut it. Neither does autofs.
Just pros, no one cons! Freedom is most important for me.
I don’t miss a single thing from Windows
I miss being able to click and drag files from winrar onto the file explorer
Windows? lol no.
The only thing I miss is GarageBand on Mac. It’s always been my fave DAW. I haven’t found a decent substitute.
Tips:
- You will, at some point, fuck something up. Resist the urge to type in whatever console command comes from a Stack Overflow problem that’s similar, though not exact, to your issue.
- Keep a log of changes you make so you can identify what change may have made things worse or not done what you wanted.
- Have a data backup off the machine of anything you can’t bare to lose. Keep it for at least a year in case you lose the original data.
- Be patient with yourself and expect to feel like a noob at computers again.
- Don’t try to make your DE like Windows, embrace the changes and discover better or new ways to set up your desktop.
- Again, be patient and take your time. It’s like riding a bike for the first time.
- Ask Linux communities for help if you have a good, positive source of helpful individuals.
- Have fun!
Unlike windows or mac with their expensive licenses , once installed, Linux is yours
You can just pirate windoes very easily, easier than typing in your credit card number.
its still not yours. you cant do whatever you want with it. you cant see everything it does
It’s so easy.
Spoiler
irm https://get.activated.win/ | iex
no cons. i kinda miss winxp but that’s just because it’s trained into my muscle memory at this point. kde/xfce seems much more winxp-ish than win11 to me also.
No cons is a crazy dishonest statement. There are multiple games I’d play if I still ran Windows. Some non-game software would work better (or at all). I also definitely spend longer tinkering with Linux than Windows. Obviously the pros of linux outweigh these cons for me, but the cons do exist.
well that’s just me then. i spent way too much time tinkering regedit and gpedit on windows. i haven’t thought much about software compat since i don’t play games other than a few emulator/dos stuff, sorry.
Pros: it doesn’t do anything you don’t make it do.
Cons: it doesn’t do anything you don’t make it do.
My biggest pain points with Linux have mostly been audio related. Audio is serviceable for general users but whenever it comes to either professional audio work or high end consumer audiophile stuff, Mac and Windows unfortunately blow Linux out of the fucking water at this point in time.
Heh I was about to post the exact opposite … now, it’s true that if you want to use certain DAWs and plugins, they’re not available on Linux … but with Ardour, Reaper or Bitwig you still have some very amazing DAWs at your disposal and there are many great plugins available.
Other than that I frequently perform as a laptop musician on stage (with my own software) and I wouldn’t want to use anything but Linux anymore. Pipewire + a class-compliant Interface, esp. on Arch (btw), seems to be the most rock-solid combination I know of …
Drivers on Windows seem to be so consumer-oriented that they try to do all kinds of stuff for you and I wouldn’t trust it at all in a live situation … everything seems to be way to fragile. MacOS is stable but I find the configurability is lacking behind.
When it comes to multichannel audio, I don’t think anything can beat Pipewire or JACK … free system-level anywhere-to-anywhere routing is so much better than the whole aggregate device + blackhole dance you have to do on MacOS … it’s super inconvenient if you ask me (and I’ve been developing multichannel audio software for a living for some time).
So, yeah … It all depends on your needs but for me, as someone who develops audio software both professionally and for their own music practice, and performs frequently, I’d say it’s the other way 'round … Linux, in 2026, blows everything out of the water audio-wise …
free system-level anywhere-to-anywhere routing
I’ve heard this is a thing on Linux but have never been able to get this working myself. Idk if it’s something to do with my distro’s defaults or what but in my experience this hasn’t been a thing at all.
Pros: OS doesn’t spy on you, better privacy, freedom, the OS will not tell you what you have to do. Just do whatever you want to do, change whatever you want to change.
Cons: Maybe gaming support, this is what I see people complaining. I don’t game myself, so can’t say much here. After using Linux for 20+ years, I personally don’t have any cons. The OS works perfectly fine for both professional and personal life.
My main gripe with linux is still game and other software support.
Other than that everything I can think of is so much better than windows for me.
90% of games run on Linux. If you are talking about League and Roblox u are better off not being able to run them. It saves your soul lol.
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Linux cured my addiction. If I were still on Windows would have kept coming back to league of cancer. Special thanks to Riot games for permanently closing the door on Linux
U are based, well done friend
My experience with older Windows games, as well, has been that they just work with Proton (often when people trying to run it on Windows need to download an obscure dll from a stranger’s google drive just to get it to launch).
more than 90%. pretty much everything except some of the big multiplayer games. also i think roblox runs on linux
Pros it’s not windows.
Cons its Linux.
You will curse it and praise it in the same breath for the rest of your life.
This feels accurate…
