Ubuntu vs Windows

[Danielh90]

Hello I'm having a hard time. I am running ubuntu (just installed it today) but I miss windows. I feel like My Job will need for me to learn windows and ubuntu. But Idk what operating system I would like to go with for my main pc. Should I stick with ubuntu or should I switch back to windows? 

[Arty]

My desktop is windows

my laptop is linux with a windows vm just in case i need it.

 

 

Its a matter of what you need it to do.

[suchamoneypit]

If your gaming, unfortunately windows is a must. For general everyday use, I find ubuntu great. If Linux supported every game, I would not use windows. For compatibility reasons my server also runs both, 8 cores on linux, and 8 cores in  VM for windows. My gaming Pc is obv windows.

[Danielh90]

1 minute ago, Arty said:

My desktop is windows

my laptop is linux with a windows vm just in case i need it.

 

 

Its a matter of what you need it to do.

 

2 minutes ago, suchamoneypit said:

If your gaming, unfortunately windows is a must. For general everyday use, I find ubuntu great. If Linux supported every game, I would not use windows. For compatibility reasons my server also runs both, 8 cores on linux, and 8 cores in  VM for windows. My gaming Pc is obv windows.

I'm a gamer/developer so I could go both ways. Idk what to do.

[VmKid]

In my experience, the question of "what OS should I use" should always be answered with "which one will allow me to do the most things I want to do"?

 

If you can't decide, you can also ask yourself "do I have enough disk space to dual-boot or run a VM"?

[suchamoneypit]

Just now, Danielh90 said:

 

I'm a gamer/developer so I could go both ways. Idk what to do.

If your PC has the cores/performance to spare, sounds like Linux with a windows VM is a good option.

[manikyath]

to be honest, if you "miss" windows, chances are windows is the better option for you, at least on bare metal.

 

that said, there's options like dualboot, running linux on a VM, running two OSes at once (wendell actually did a video quite a while back with a linux system running a windows VM with a gpu passtrough and steam big picture for "in-box" streaming to the linux OS), and probably other even more mindblowing things.

 

at some point, my end goal will be running both windows and linux on the same displays, as if being one unified experience. and we're *almost* there, its just linux's multi-monitor stuff that's still a bit too twitchy for it to be happy on my system  (technically, i'm running 4 displays)

[tlink]

you could run an optimized KVM if you know how to do that and if your hardware supports a hardware hypervisor, it would allow for easy switching between the two instead of dualbooting. 

 

 

[Danielh90]

13 minutes ago, manikyath said:

to be honest, if you "miss" windows, chances are windows is the better option for you, at least on bare metal.

 

that said, there's options like dualboot, running linux on a VM, running two OSes at once (wendell actually did a video quite a while back with a linux system running a windows VM with a gpu passtrough and steam big picture for "in-box" streaming to the linux OS), and probably other even more mindblowing things.

 

at some point, my end goal will be running both windows and linux on the same displays, as if being one unified experience. and we're *almost* there, its just linux's multi-monitor stuff that's still a bit too twitchy for it to be happy on my system  (technically, i'm running 4 displays)

I think I may test out ubuntu for the rest of the year or this month and see how I like it and after I use it for a month I can decided if I want to go back or not. 

[paddy-stone]

I like both, I have windows and ubuntu in dual boot on my main desktop, same again on my desktop I am now considering selling. Ubuntu only on my laptop ATM as I was performing some tests and maintenance and haven't got around to deciding if I even need windows on it now.

 

I think if you can't decide, dual boot it, and try to execute the same tasks on both and see which one you end up liking more after the month. At the very least you will end up learning a few things in linux that might come in useful

[kirashi]

I used to dual boot, but got tired of GRUB always clashing with the Windows bootloader with updates, so I went back to full Windows.

Up until Windows 10 supported the Ubuntu Subsystem, I ran a Ubuntu VM through VirtualBox on my system.

Now that BASH is available on Windows, I have had no reason to run a VM or dual boot, at least on my desktop PC.

 

I do still have a Ubuntu / Windows 10 dual boot setup on my laptop, but ever since needing the Adobe Creative Suite for work, I really can't use Ubuntu.

(I'm looking at you ADOBE; when are you going to support other Linux distributions than macOS?)

[Canada EH]

2 hours ago, Arty said:

My desktop is windows

my laptop is linux with a windows vm just in case i need it.

 

 

Its a matter of what you need it to do.

How does that work with programs that need windows, like gaming and steam?

Which VM is the best?

I am about to install Ubuntu today. Will do another quick check of the versions and install.

[Arty]

2 hours ago, Canada EH said:

How does that work with programs that need windows, like gaming and steam?

Which VM is the best?

I am about to install Ubuntu today. Will do another quick check of the versions and install.

some Steam games are on linux

i use vmware, you run windows inside linux. so the programs think its on windows

[Canada EH]

Can I redownload (for free) Steam games bought for Windows to Linux?

I keep reading about VMware, I will give that a go.

 

[Azgoth 2]

I'd stick with Ubuntu for a bit longer.  When I first started out with Linux I didn't like it much either, and spent a lot of time booted back into Windows.  Stick it out a bit longer and see if your mind changes.  It might help to switch to a different desktop environment like Cinnamon or KDE, which have a somewhat more Windows-like look and feel than Unity, Ubuntu's default one.

[Danielh90]

27 minutes ago, Azgoth 2 said:

I'd stick with Ubuntu for a bit longer.  When I first started out with Linux I didn't like it much either, and spent a lot of time booted back into Windows.  Stick it out a bit longer and see if your mind changes.  It might help to switch to a different desktop environment like Cinnamon or KDE, which have a somewhat more Windows-like look and feel than Unity, Ubuntu's default one.

I did Cinnamon and used Numix theme and I like it much more. I'm stick with it for a month and see how I like it. 

[Canada EH]

I am going to put a bunch onto a USB drive and give them all a whirl.

http://www.pendrivelinux.com/yumi-multiboot-usb-creator/

[elkenrod]

2 hours ago, Danielh90 said:

I did Cinnamon and used Numix theme and I like it much more. I'm stick with it for a month and see how I like it. 

Good.  If you force yourself to stick with Linux, it will give you time to acclimate.  There are a lot of positive aspects to running Linux, but you have to give yourself the opportunity to discover what those things are.  I prefer Cinnamon to Windows, but I only came to that conclusion after months of using it.

 

Specifically, the command line allowed me to do more, quicker, than Windows ever did.

[Danielh90]

50 minutes ago, elkenrod said:

Good.  If you force yourself to stick with Linux, it will give you time to acclimate.  There are a lot of positive aspects to running Linux, but you have to give yourself the opportunity to discover what those things are.  I prefer Cinnamon to Windows, but I only came to that conclusion after months of using it.

 

Specifically, the command line allowed me to do more, quicker, than Windows ever did.

Can you tell me some examples how you use the commandline? Also Could you take a screenshot of your desktop? I would like to see how you have it setup. If you don't mind. 

[elkenrod]

I'm running Linux Mint 18 at the moment.  I have a triple monitor setup.  This is what my desktop looks like (attached).  It's bare, but that's exactly how I want it.  There is a menu bar at the bottom of each screen, and it only shows what's minimized on each monitor.   You can customize it just about any way you want.  When I'm working on multiple things it looks a bit different, but what's nice is that I can start all of my work without using a mouse, just keyboard.

 

The power of running the command line is in the scripts that you can create.  Once you learn basic commands and scripting you can do things much quicker than in windows.  Want to back up all the files in your download and My Documents instantly?  You can make a script for it.  Want to back them up automatically every 3 days?  You can make a script for it.  It sounds like a lot of work, but in reality your typing like 30 characters to a text file and saving it.  This site taught me a ton of what I know about linux and scripting.  The limit is basically your knowledge of the system and your own creativity.  A very basic script I made is called "wishlist" so that whenever I thought of something I needed to buy I would just press a couple of keys and enter the name of the item and hit "Return".  The item was added to the list and all I had to do was open it when it was time to shop at the beginning of the month.

 

I included a second image of what it looks like when i'm working on stuff.  Again, I can open all this up with a few keystrokes, no mouse.  On Windows this is possible too, but I have to use software like displayfusion and other stuff that isn't as intuitive or easily repeatable.

 

Sorry in advance for the large images.

[Danielh90]

7 hours ago, elkenrod said:

I'm running Linux Mint 18 at the moment.  I have a triple monitor setup.  This is what my desktop looks like (attached).  It's bare, but that's exactly how I want it.  There is a menu bar at the bottom of each screen, and it only shows what's minimized on each monitor.   You can customize it just about any way you want.  When I'm working on multiple things it looks a bit different, but what's nice is that I can start all of my work without using a mouse, just keyboard.

 

The power of running the command line is in the scripts that you can create.  Once you learn basic commands and scripting you can do things much quicker than in windows.  Want to back up all the files in your download and My Documents instantly?  You can make a script for it.  Want to back them up automatically every 3 days?  You can make a script for it.  It sounds like a lot of work, but in reality your typing like 30 characters to a text file and saving it.  This site taught me a ton of what I know about linux and scripting.  The limit is basically your knowledge of the system and your own creativity.  A very basic script I made is called "wishlist" so that whenever I thought of something I needed to buy I would just press a couple of keys and enter the name of the item and hit "Return".  The item was added to the list and all I had to do was open it when it was time to shop at the beginning of the month.

 

I included a second image of what it looks like when i'm working on stuff.  Again, I can open all this up with a few keystrokes, no mouse.  On Windows this is possible too, but I have to use software like displayfusion and other stuff that isn't as intuitive or easily repeatable.

 

Sorry in advance for the large images.

ok Thank you. 

[Danielh90]

I'm still trying to figure if I would like to switch to ubuntu  or windows. I am missing windows. The only I'm missing about windows is Adobe Photoshop. 

[/dev/God/Haruhi]

2 hours ago, Danielh90 said:

I'm still trying to figure if I would like to switch to ubuntu  or windows. I am missing windows. The only I'm missing about windows is Adobe Photoshop. 

But for that you can use Wine. Depending on your needs Wine should do the trick. Worst case you can always dual boot, and thanks to SSD speeds you will be more than set. I don't need more than 30 to 40 seconds to switch OS's, and most of it is spent on POST rather than actual OS booting (it made me regret to wait until 512Gb SSD were less than 150 euros).

[Danielh90]

10 minutes ago, /dev/God/Haruhi said:

But for that you can use Wine. Depending on your needs Wine should do the trick. Worst case you can always dual boot, and thanks to SSD speeds you will be more than set. I don't need more than 30 to 40 seconds to switch OS's, and most of it is spent on POST rather than actual OS booting (it made me regret to wait until 512Gb SSD were less than 150 euros).

Ok Thank you. Does wine have the latest version of Adobe Photoshop? 

[/dev/God/Haruhi]

Wine is a program that allows to run Windows programs on Linux, to an extent. It does so by being a middleman, catching and implementing windows calls and sending them along to linux. It should allow you to install your copy of Photoshop on Linux. There are programs that will help you to configure wine, since it can be a daunting process (it does have quite a lot of config options), PlayOnLinux should be able to help you in that regard.