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Windows 10, Yay or Nay?

I run Cinnamon on Fedora 23. That may be kinda surprising since one of the main reasons I made the move to Linux over 14 years ago was to get away from Windows' way of working, to try different ways to do things.

And I did. I used Fluxbox for years. I tried to like KDE from time to time. Too buggy, too bloated, always seemed like a poor man's Windows. Gnome 2 was OK and stuck to my desktop for a while.

When Gnome 3 came out, I figured my initial dislike would give way to satisfaction once I figured out how the heck the designers intended it to work. After a couple of years I had to quit. Either Gnome 3 was so advanced it was beyond my meager mind or it just sucked. Whichever was true, the result was the same. It was a pita.

So it was that Gnome 3 drove me Cinnamon. It was relatively lightweight, stable and familiar in an oddly comfortable way, like old shoes that are worn out but feel so good you still wear them even though they,'re a little embarrassing to look at.

That's Cinnamon. It's like stinky old Windows 98-2000-XP. You think there must be something better by now, but everyone's used it and can slide right into it and go, comfortable in that old shoes kinda way.

Cinnamon has forced me to admit that the old Windows 98-2000-XP UI actually works pretty well. It makes some sense. And it makes my Linux box easy for anyone who ever used XP to sit down and get things done immediately.
 
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If Gnome 3 had the tools and options that its predecessor had, then it would have been a force to be reckoned with.

As it is, by the time those tools show up, they'll be shipping Gnome 4.

KDE 4 with the Plasma desktop is more tweakable than Win 95/98; but there are so many options and ways to do things that it can be pretty overwhelming.

I got four separate desktops, with different sets of shortcuts and wallpapers on each. I can flip between them with a simple key combination, and it is awesome.
 
OK,slightly back on-topic:
I tried loading W10 up when 1st released,it FUBAR'ed by data connection(s).
FWIW,my PC isn't much: Gateway z6970 AIO 23"w/64bit i3Intel/3.4gHz/6 GB RAM.
Wasn't in a hurry,I don't use my PC for much other than browsing & modding my phones.
Yesterday,I was finally officially prompted by MS to d/l & install,it was a slow day,why not.
Only thing I had to do was remove a VPN & the install went smooth,no problems so far,my PC sees my phone(s),so,that's all I really need other than the stock functionality.
The VPN & Desktop remote was for work,they haven't updated yet for W10,their loss,not mine................
 
mikedt said:
I'm a Mac. :thumbsupdroid:
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I thought about giving Mac a go,but,I'm not swimming in cash as you are,living the High-Life & what-not,
Mr. Continental.............. :p ;)

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KOLIO said:
I thought about giving Mac a go,but,I'm not swimming in cash as you are,living the High-Life & what-not,
Mr. Continental.............. :p ;)

462d9e16eccff044ceca6e05e49a4b73.jpg
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Well I like to have nice things occasionally. :) And it was replacing my seven year old and rather worn-out white Macbook. I paid 6200 yuan CNY for the Macbook Air, but on the other hand one can pay that much for just for a high-end Samsung Galaxy or an iPhone. :thumbsupdroid:
 
mikedt said:
Well I like to have nice things occasionally. :) And it was replacing my seven year old and rather worn-out white Macbook. I paid 6200 yuan CNY for the Macbook Air, but on the other hand one can pay that much for just for a high-end Samsung Galaxy or an iPhone. :thumbsupdroid:
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Nuthin' wrong with that,just havin' a little fun..... ;)
As you brought up phone expenditures ,it's definitely a case of Pot/Kettle, guilty as charged. :paperbagdroid: :D
 
KOLIO said:
Nuthin' wrong with that,just havin' a little fun..... ;)
As you brought up phone expenditures ,it's definitely a case of Pot/Kettle, guilty as charged. [emoji14]aperbagdroid: :D
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I was in the local Microsoft Store today. Couldn't believe how much they're charging for Surface devices, and I honestly thought things like Macbook Air seemed like a bargain in comparison. Surface Pro 4 was 7800 yuan CNY, keyboard not included. On the other hand I bought a Chinese, Ramos Windows 10 tablet for 1300 yuan CNY a few months ago, which is actually quite nice.
 
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I got my son a Surface 2 last year with a keyboard because the Surface 3 (current model at the time) was too much for too little. When the SP4 came out, i thought WTF? "Starting" at $899.00 U.S. means you don't get out the door for less than $1k.

I'd like to try 10 on a tablet (.vs my touchscreen Asus Zenbook) but not at those prices.
 
lunatic59 said:
Any OS needs drivers to communicate with the hardware, it's just that external libraries aren't a requirement in Linux, although you can still use them. They tend to be compiled into a monolithic kernel.

Interesting that you use Cinnamon ... it's generally considered the closest UI to Windows. ;) (Yeah, I use it, too. I detest Gnome 3)
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Where do you get a safe copy of linux and what firewall and antivirus, antimalware, antispyware do you use? Does Office work?
 
The popular distros come with iptables (firewall) and ClamAV (antivirus) although that's more to keep you from passing malware to a Windows machine as linux malware is fairly rare.

Look at distrowatch.com for links to various popular and esoteric distros.

As for Office, there has never been a working version of MS office for Linux. LibreOffice is the de facto office suite with most linux distros now. and it handles MS documents quite well.
 
recDNA said:
Where do you get a safe copy of linux and what firewall and antivirus, antimalware, antispyware do you use? Does Office work?
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distrowatch.com is a good place to go shopping for a Linux. Clean links, good info on the various distributions out there.

Most distros have baked-in firewall capabilities, and CLAM AV is a solid anti-malware program, though the risk to *nixes is still minimal, as long as you're not scraping the metaphorical gutters of the internet.

Open Office/Libre Office is about 90% compatible with MS Office, and free; but I believe one can still get MS Office to install through wine.

Personally, I dual-boot Windows and Mint, using the Win side on those occasions when setting up Mint to do the task at hand is problematic. This happens around once a month.
 
My first experience with the new version was very brief so I didn't get to see a lot. Judging from what is saw at that time was a beautifully designed OS. That's all I can say, I can upgrade to Windows 10 on my laptop but, I don't have any free space for the thing!
 
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