Switching to Linux: Reclaim Your Freedom
44 comments
·January 31, 2025rednafi
mtillman
Many years ago Apple added twitter support at the OS level. At that moment, they chose to become an ad network instead of a technology company. The hardware is very nice of course and just like you it’s the only reason I stay.
__MatrixMan__
> has horrible window management
I keep thinking I'll get used to it, but it's been years and every day I hate it a little more.
My escape is to maximize a terminal on a large monitor and use https://zellij.dev/ as my "window manager"
jazzyjackson
Asahi Linux has come a long way. I think the only finicky thing I dealt with was Bluetooth audio so switched to a USB DAC which works fine, and they don’t have hdmi over usbc working yet, but the hardware hdmi port works fine.
Besides that the fedora gnome desktop has won me over, I was able to install everything I wanted from the software app (logseq, gnucash, thunderbird, filezilla), stable as a cow
A couple of QoL wins against macOS (besides coming with a package manager {even windows has winget now!} and, you know, being free): they’ve combined the functionality of Spotlight with Mission Control/alt tab, just tap cmd and switch apps or search for app/file/setting. I cannot reacclimate to having two different shortcuts on Mac now. Drag window to the side for split screen or top for full screen works fine. The other is small: when I mouseover the volume slider in the taskbar I can scroll to control it. Mac does not, have to click and drag. Call it a finishing touch.
I liked it so much I slapped an SSD into a 2014 Intel Mac mini (can you believe we had gigabit and usb3 over 10 years ago?) and put fedora workstation on that too. Truly the year of the Linux desktop (for me anyway).
al_borland
The other advantage I see to macOS is commercial app support. Like it or not, it can be a fact of life for many. Photoshop users don’t want to use GIMP.
While Electron has made Linux on the desktop much more viable in this respect, there is are some key apps that macOS has where Linux is lacking.
And of course there is also working between mobile and desktop, which macOS/iOS seem to do best. Part of me longs for the days when this wasn’t a concern, but this is a big thing these days and makes running Linux on my main computer a problem.
rufus_foreman
>> Photoshop users don’t want to use GIMP
GIMP users don't want to use Photoshop.
bobajeff
Linux actually has some commercial apps available. Though I'm not sure how they compare to their Mac and Windows versions. Yes some apps aren't available but that's true of Mac as well, though to a lesser extent.
sweeter
I have an M1 mac with Asahi Linux and Hyprland, and I just love it. Its sleek and powerful but has the freedoms of Linux and I hate that MacOS feels like playing in a padded room. Like wth is up with Finder? Its awful. But if I ever need photoshop or w/e, I just boot into the Mac partition and call it a day.
takoid
I need a Windows laptop for work but really appreciate the exceptional build quality of my MacBook Air. I had a ThinkPad, but it creaked and didn’t feel nearly as solid. Are there any Windows laptops that come close to MacBook-level hardware quality?
lhamil64
When my work laptop got an upgrade recently, I received a Dell Precision 5690 and it seems pretty MacBook-like, like they tried to clone a MBP. Granted, I haven't ever owned a modern MacBook so maybe it's not quite as high quality but it's definitely sleeker than my old ThinkPad. The one thing that's very non-Mac is the power adapter. It's a brick, and while it's USB-C, they used a non-standard voltage/wattage so it's unclear if/how well third party adapters would work.
dehrmann
I'm in the middle of sorting out my next laptop (leaning towards an M4 Macbook). I've used a Thinkpad for years, but the the product direction of Windows has been annoying, and while WSL is decent, it's not great. Someone suggested I try Linux, and I did. This was on a 6-year-old X1 Carbon, so it's relatively well-supported. I ran into a few hard blockers. 1) Couldn't pair my Airpods Pro after 15 minutes of googling 2) Would get stuck on the lock screen on resume, sometimes for a minute, sometimes indefinitely 3) VMware kernel modules were a headache 4) Occasional lockups (could have been VMware modules). The soft blockers were 1) Less consistent UI than Windows 2) Poor hidpi support (but it's improved) 3) The UI feels 5% off in a lot of ways, and I'm not sure how to describe it 4) full-disk-encryption is an adventure. I didn't even make it to testing my webcam.
ghthor
Touching on UI. My experience is the opposite. I started by installing Xubuntu so XFCE desktop. I wanted the GUI shell to be fast and low reasources, and choose XFCE. 16 years later and my desktop shell is the same traveling with me through district hopping to Arch and now NixOS. Same UI and no one’s aiming to change it.
Disk encryption, straightforward luks w/ pass phrase. Setup was 3 terminal commands and and done. Pretty sure the GUI installers you just enter a passphrase and it’s done. All the knobs are available if the default isn’t good enough, using a key file on an external disk, etc.
Poor hdpi is real, it’s bound to change as us old graybeards finally get new monitors
null
codr7
Currently stuck in WSL2 on my Thinkpad, newish hardware that could use some more updates before jumping ship.
christophilus
I’ll chime in with a different anecdote than all the whiny ones. Fedora + Niri on a Dell XPS is great. Stock Fedora + Gnome is also great. I don’t miss Windows or OSX at all. The games I care to play work fine thanks to Proton. I don’t care about Adobe or MS Office. If you don’t care about those, either, then find a laptop with good Linux support and decent build quality and come on. It’s more than fine.
BimJeam
Break free from commercial vendor lock-ins and start using free systems. What do you think, is it inevitable these days?
zb3
Normal people will probably not read these long essays, but they might complain about their M$ OS getting worse.. and that is a great opportunity to present linux as the solution (because it is), you can then explain how programs they use will continue to work (it's 2025, they will in most cases) and how there's nothing to fear.
For me, it actually worked! Of course I did offer some help just in case she got stuck or something, but it went relatively smoothly.
Dalewyn
>you can then explain how programs they use will continue to work
Microsoft Office and games. No, not LibreOffice and Tux Racer.
Wine has gotten a lot better compared to years past, but if you need/want Windows software you still need Windows.
You also only get one shot at convincing them, since first impressions are everything. A better argument might be recommending MacOS, at least Microsoft Office works just fine there.
Also, if you're using esoteric hardware: Forget it.
zb3
> Microsoft Office and games. No, not LibreOffice and Tux Racer.
Not everyone will be as displeased with LibreOffice since not everyone uses MS Office professionally.. I'd argue further: for MOST people this is acceptable!
> Wine has gotten a lot better compared to years past, but if you need/want Windows software you still need Windows.
Not the case for PhotoScape for example (which was on the "required" list in this case). Also fortunately more and more programs are cross-platform, and again, for MOST people they're acceptable.
> Also, if you're using esoteric hardware: Forget it.
What?? It was the opposite, Linux doesn't require TPM, runs fine on older laptops and even runs faster with lighter DE's..
freeone3000
ok, but what if you need something off-the-wall, like a scanner?
allears
Unfortunately, there aren't any Linux drivers for the audio hardware I use. The hardware replacement cost to switch to Linux would be prohibitive. I also would have a much narrower choice of audio and DAW apps.
synack
Could you email the hardware vendor and ask nicely for Linux support? They won’t develop it if customers aren’t asking.
1970-01-01
Linux in a nutshell: Just awful in a laptop, meh in a desktop, and first-class as a server.
sho_hn
I'm heavily biased and an expert user, but I do also have a Mac from work, and my Linux laptop genuinely is more trouble-free with docking and Bluetooth acrobatics than the Mac (a M1 MBP).
Every time the Mac decides today's another day when flipping it shut will randomly also disable the external display, I get a little more frustrated, or when it's dumb about not switching my headphones out of bi-directional headset mode to a HQ audio profile once a call ends. These things are just flawless on my Linux system.
Battery life on the M1 Mac is absolutely stellar and probably about double of the Intel-based Linux one, though, which I agree is a valid deciding factor for quite a few users because it can really change how you go about your day.
7mediaws
I always buy Lenovo laptops. Never really had an issue until the latest Lenovo I purchased. The suspend/sleep gets weird sometimes. Other than that, I am pretty satisfied with my dev box.
kjellsbells
Presumably because servers have components that are predictable and stable over their production runs, whereas laptops seem to be assembled out of whatever bits the supplier has on hand that week?
dehrmann
There are two main issues.
Servers are configured differently (config files, puppet) with static configs. This works great for server deployments. On laptops, too much is always changing--new networks, powering on and off, etc.
The other issue is yes, drivers, but not only because of supplier pressure. There seem to be more peripheral devices (sound, webcam, bluetooth) from low-end vendors, so the devices are buggier and less likely to get support. Servers care about disk and network. There aren't as many vendors, and the have incentives to have decent Linux support.
Zamiel_Snawley
In my experience, Linux works quite well on laptops that are intended to run it.
I’ve only tried the System 76 Lemur Pro and the Framework 13, both of which worked smoothly. The Framework has better build quality, and I can wholeheartedly recommend it to anyone who wants to try a Linux laptop.
gbin
Framework has been rock solid—I've had it since the first batch, and it's worked flawlessly across three mainboards, two screens, and two webcams (all upgraded along the way).
Arch Linux ran without a hitch. KDE on Wayland is now incredibly polished and, surprisingly, a far better UX for me on a laptop than Apple's.
syntacticbs
I run Linux on my laptop and desktop and have a MacBook.
I wouldn't recommend it for your laptop unless you're an enthusiast. Suspend/sleep is still janky, power saving is poor and dock support is hit and miss depending on the day. And this is after applying a lot of tweaks.
For desktop it's fantastic and I would recommend. It's not without some issues but what OSes is actually without any issues.
For server, I can't imagine using anything else.
d3Xt3r
As a ThinkPad Z13 user, I've had none of the issues you've described. I've been running Linux (Fedora + Arch) on it for three years now and it's been a first-class experience. Everything worked out-of-the-box, with literally zero issues. I can't think of a single thing that I'd want to improve, from a laptop user's perspective. For me, this is the definitive Linux laptop experience.
I had a similarly good experience with my previous laptop, an HP Elite Dragonfly. Only niggle was that not all bits of firmware was upgradable via fwupd, so I had to ocassionally boot into Windows to do the firmware updates. But other than that, I don't recollect any issues with it either, suspend/resume/power management all worked as good as Windows. In fact, battery life was better than Windows when I applied powertop's tweaks.
And I'm sure the laptop experience is equally good on "native" Linux laptops, such as the ones from System76, Slimbook, Tuxedo etc.
So personally, I wouldn't make a blanket statement like "I wouldn't recommend it for your laptop unless you're an enthusiast". To be clear, I'm not claiming that the issues you describe don't exist, but at least for laptops known for having official support for Linux, the experience should be good.
tmtvl
I have a Slimbook Elemental 15 (or some such) and it's crap. The keyboard has a backlight you can change the colour of... with an application which is only available on specific distros (it isn't even on the AUR) and even then half the time it doesn't work.
Its audio system is also fucked, if you plug in headphones tte thing will play from the headphones at the volume of the speakers. The system doesn't see the headphones, it only has a generic audio output and switching between speakers and headphones happens IN HARDWARE.
The battery life ain't great, though I don't know about hibernate 'cause I ain't wasting 32 gigs on swap. Suspend seems to work fine, though I don't know how much power it'd drain over the course of, say, a night.
Marsymars
Asides from what sibling comments have mentioned, this is in large part true for me because I've yet to experience a Linux desktop environment that I've found to be great from a UI perspective. On a server, that's not applicable.
Terr_
Ubuntu works fine on the Dell XPS 15 9500 laptop I use for work. It came preinstalled with Windows, but I shrank the partition so I can dual boot. (Having all data encrypted-at-rest was a requirement which made things a little trickier.)
The only weirdness I've encountered is some crashing in some lid-open-or-closed software, probably because I tried to make sure it wouldn't sleep just because I wanted to carry it to a conference room.
belter
This comment is unworthy of your user name. The modern experience of Linux is miles ahead of Windows and as good as Mac: https://www.zdnet.com/article/the-4-best-linux-desktops-base...
talldayo
It seems like the perception that MacOS and Windows are miles apart in quality stems from the two ends of the horseshoe theory refusing to admit they're next-door neighbors.
1970-01-01
'the modern experience' is dogshit sliding down a wet stick for laptops. average it all out.
d3Xt3r
As a ThinkPad user, I disagree. I've been using Linux (Fedora + Arch) on my Z13 Gen 1 for three years now and it's been a first-class experience. Everything worked out-of-the-box, with literally zero issues. I can't think of a single thing that I'd want to improve, from a laptop user's perspective. For me, this is the definitive Linux laptop experience.
I had a similarly good experience with my previous laptop, an HP Elite Dragonfly. Only niggle was that not all bits of firmware was upgradable via fwupd, so I had to ocassionally boot into Windows to do the firmware updates. But other than that, I don't recollect any issues with it either.
And I'm sure the laptop experience is equally good on "native" Linux laptops, such as the ones from System76, Slimbook, Tuxedo etc.
So to make a blanket statement like "'the modern experience' is dogshit sliding down a wet stick for laptops", is pretty disingenuous and very disrespectful towards all the developers who've worked so hard on making Linux viable.
null
I loathe macOS but stick with it mostly for the hardware. I use a beefed-up 16-inch M3 Max for work and a baseline 15-inch MacBook Air for writing and OSS work.
I love the Air’s hardware and wouldn’t trade it for anything. Before switching to Mac, I was running a maxed-out 16-inch Dell XPS and enjoyed using Ubuntu and Pop!_OS on it. But the hardware just wasn’t there—the trackpad felt cheap, and the keyboard would creak. There were just too many small issues for such an expensive device.
Otherwise, macOS is bloated, slow, and has horrible window management. I also prefer GNU tooling over BSD, and having to install everything separately is an extra hassle. Plus, it’s getting more restrictive over the years, which I’m not a fan of.