What would cause one to leave Windows for Ubuntu?

[bodean]

Having used Vista on my home pc and notebook since early betas, I am all of a sudden curious as to the advantages of putting Ubuntu on my laptop. I am thinking of a dual boot as there are some pc games that I play when I travel, and feel they won't run/work in Ubuntu.

Curious as to what the "type" of person is who moves from windows to say, ubuntu, and why?
I know a lot of windows apps would not work (and I would have to find different / new apps to replace what I use in windows)....but just wondering from those who have used windows in the past, what made you switch over.

[Famicommie]

At first, it was idle curiousity. But then, one night my room mate spilt a red bull + gin drink down the fan on the top of my computer. He also used Administrator priveleges to completely screw up Windows, so I spent some time using Linux. The complete customization, the power of the terminal, and having repositories all had some sway in making me stay with Ubuntu. Politically speaking, I find myself attracted to the principles of the free and open source software movement (don't let my user name fool you, I am not a communist :) ).

There are two programs, WINE and Cedega, which are very capable of running many Windows games, by the way. ZSNES is pretty good so far as Super Nintendo emulation goes, X3 is being released for Linux in the near future, and I also play quite a bit of Doom in my free time :D

[ramjet_1953]

If you are perfectly happy with Windows and it does everything that you want, Ubuntu or any other version of Linux probably isn't for you.

However, if you have continual battles with viruses, spyware, trojans, rootkits, etc, Linux offers a much more secure solution.

Also with Linux, it is free. Updates, new releases and most of the software packages are free. Many of these packages are easily as productive as commercial packages that you have to pay hundreds of dollars for in Windows.

If you like to roll your sleeves up and tinker "under the hood", Linux is made for you. It is completely customizable. My own PC runs a Linux kernel that I compiled for myself, which allowed me to tailor it exactly to my hardware and get reid of a lot of the modules that I never use.

If you just want to be a "user" and don't want to tinker, the new version of Ubuntu (7.04) is due to be released on the 19th of this month and it will, in most cases, detect all of your hardware and be as user friendly as any other OS out there.

What I suggest you do is to wait a few days and then download the 7.04 Live CD and have a play with it. It locks your existing hard drive, so that you cannot damage your existing Windows install and will give you an idea of what Ubuntu is all about. Of course, running completely from the CD and RAM it is much slower than a full install, but it will certainly give you a taste of Ubuntu and you will be able to see how it goes with detecting your hardware.

Regards,
Roger :cool:

[aysiu]

If I played PC games, I wouldn't have switched to Ubuntu.

For what I do (email, web browsing, light web design and photo manipulation, word processing, FTP), Ubuntu is perfect. It's free and fully customizable. I don't have to worry about viruses, costs for new versions, or sketchy setup.exe files. Package management is a great way to install, upgrade, and remove software.

[adamklempner]

I switched a few years ago because of an article that I saw in the news. Basically what happened was a Linux company called Lindows, was making a easy to use desktop Linux. Microsoft thought that "Lindows" was too close to "Windows" so they sued them here in the US. Well, MS lost that court case and Lindows was able to continue here. So then MS went and started suing Lindows in every country that they sold the product, namely most of the European countries. They even sent letters to the European Lindows retailers threatening to sue. MS was simply looking to put Lindows out of business by sucking out all of their funding with lawsuits. Long story short, many millions of dollars later, Lindows had to settle with MS and change their name. They are now called Linspire.

It was because of the article on CNN detailing what was going on, that got my interest. I realized how immoral MS's business practice really is, and that this Linux thing must be a serious threat to Windows if MS went through all of those hoops just to shut them up. And then there was the whole SCO fiasco, I won't even get into that.

I then got a copy of Linspire, tried it, and realized I could do everything that I could do with Windows. And it looked a lot nicer than XP, also. I soon realized that I liked being different with my OS. It was fun. I wasn't fighting with Windows all of the time anymore, and I didn't even have to worry about security. Soon it became easy. Especially when I made the switch to Kubuntu. Everything just works. No hunting for drivers. Updates don't require a reboot. No spyware or viruses. KDE is much more customizable than XP. I could keep on going, but I just kept realizing how many advantages there were to this Linux thing after I got into it.

I did my whole Masters of Science thesis and defense on Linspire with out any problems at all. In fact, I even got a couple of my buddies to switch in the process. Now they run Kubuntu and PCLinuxOS. I guess if you like to be different, this a cool way (in a geeky sense) to do it.

And that is my story, in brief. Hope it helps.

[Patrick K]

I've been running W98 since 98. I never saw any advantage in going to XP. Partly because I modify my computer fairly often. With XP, and now Vista, you have to get MS's permission to run their OS after making certain changes (I've change MoBos and drives a number of times and still run the original 1998 install, never have reinstalled).

My plan was to go with Vista but the DRM restriction, WGA, and steep hardware requirements played a major part in my rejecting it. W98 is getting a bit long in the tooth and I wanted a more current OS, so I went with Linux. (Although, I must admit, I'm a bit surprised how rudimentary much of the Linux software is.) I dual boot Ubuntu and W98 (I have one very old app in particular that I cannot find a comparable replacement for).

[delphiguy]

It depends really.

In my case, I've been a Windows programmer all my life we'll most of it. I started in DOS and
now Im programming in Windows.

As a programmer my reason for switching from Windows to Linux would be that some of my clients are
requiring Linux Based apps as opposed to Windows, a few years ago Linux Development might be limited on
the server development (I could be wrong) but lately a lot of companies have started to ditch Windows in
favor of Linux and OpenSource and with that came the demand for Linux Desktop applications. I do still use Windows as this is the primary target of our company, and this is the OS we're using for my day job.

As a user, I switched to Linux because I have no reason to stay in Windows anymore. I mean why continue
using Windows and pay that Licence Fee they charge when I can get all that I needed for free. and from
where I am, WindowsXP Licence doesnt come cheap, its almost a month worth of salary just to get that
License.

Sadly as you've pointed out, most good games dont run well on Wine, but I am not a gamer so I really dont
care. But I've heard that Cedega does the job well, I havent tried it tho. As for the Windows Software Alt,
there's a list in this forum that exactly shows the Linux Alternative Software, or you can run your app
through Wine. I my case Linux fits me well that I only have 1 Windows app running in Wine and that is
uTorrent aside from that its all open source.

Sure Linux can be hard at first but given some time you'll get used to it. This forum is a great source for help.

[RudolfMDLT]

I run an XP dual boot for games... But for everyday life, word processing, email, browsing, development and playing music, Ubuntu is really much better! It allows you to customize your machine like you would customize your office, and as I practically live on the www, having something thats Spam and Virus proof(99%) is a real blessing. Also Ubuntu doesn't have that bad habet of crashing Word, just when you think of saving the last 4 hours of work you did. It's a nice Operating Environment, not just an Operating System.

[NikoC]

I just want to be able to use different OSs, from DOS to Windows to Linux to MacOs. Knowledge is power ;)

[punong_bisyonaryo]

Here is my comprehensive answer to your question:
1. Cost.
Vista Costs $200-$400 depending on which edition you buy. Aero, Windows Mobility Center, DVD Maker, Networking & Sharing Center, Complete PC Backup & Restore, Meeting Space, Tablet PC support, and Media Center is NOT included in the the cheapest edition, and BitLocker (which I believe to be the single innovation that Vista has) is only available on Ultimate and Enterprise (volume-license edition of Vista)

BitLocker also needs your hardware to have a trusted module platform (TPM) or you'd need a USB drive for the TPM.

MS Office is also a separate purchase altogether.

2. If you upgrade computers often, you can only install Vista TWICE due to the Vista EULA.

3. DRM protection being built-in to the OS. Heard of the Zune? Yep, that's M$' music player. Recently, owners of Zune suddenly can't play some of their LEGALLY PURCHASED music. Why? I think it has something to do with the copy protection rules changing, rendering people's entire collections unusable.

4. Vista can "disable hardware it deems unfit". Would you really like to give that decision to M$?

5. Secuirty -- if you still believe they're good at releasing security patches and stuff, ask yourself why Microsoft has a 10-year old vulnerability (search .ANI vulnerability), since Win98.

6. Hardware requirements -- I'll let you figure this out yourself. In the meantime, consider that Mepis running Beryl on idle consumes <100Mb, while Vista on Aero consumes about half-a-gig of ram. Minimum install requirements for Vista is 15Gb compared to about 2Gb.

[punong_bisyonaryo]

owners of Zune suddenly can't play some of their LEGALLY PURCHASED music.

Found the link for the reference to this: http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=3626

I love this one: "the media that Microsoft promised would Play For Sure doesn’t even play on Microsoft’s own device. "

[KIAaze]

For me, it was a robot that made me switch to Linux. :)

We have a robotics club at our school and I was part of it.
I was supposed to work on a vision system.
Our club president decided that Linux would be used on the robot (in fact it had always been like that and I don't really know a lot of robots running with windows ^^) and therefore I had to install GNU/Linux on my PC.
I started with Debian.

At first, I only used GNU/Linux to work on the project and after that I didn't really use it a lot anymore. (especially because I didn't allocate it a lot of diskspace the first time)
But then came Beryl and I just had to try it out. 8)
While trying to get it to work correctly, I tried out OpenSUSE, Kororaa and Ubuntu and learned a little bit about all the different distributions.
I stuck with Ubuntu in the end (altough now with Feisty, Beryl only works under Debian Etch for me).
Ubuntu, because it's easy to use and because of the name.

Now, the more I use GNU/Linux, the more I love it. :D
My Windows partition has been reduced to 10GB and I boot up GNU/Linux 95% of the time now.

And as you may have noticed, I also use GNU/Linux now because it's free as in freedom. ;)

[kevinlyfellow]

linux is more fun, everything in it makes better sense, and it has more productive features.

as for the types of people who use linux, take a look at this microsoft site that was quickly pulled down ;-) http://www.jejik.com/sander/temp/linuxpersonas.swf

[Rhubarb67]

After being a windows user since v 3.0 and now an XP Pro user, the final straw was when I recieved an 'auto upgrade' notice that would interrogate my paid for version of XP and determine if it was a valid licensed version. To me, that was MS telling me that I couldn't be trusted and they wanted to make sure I was being honest.

Vista is another story altogether. Long story short, when I purchase a version of an operating system I shouldn't be limited to how many times I can re-install it! I've reached my limit now and all due to haveing to re-format my HD because of all the trash that windows seems to accumulate over time causing it to slow down.

Rhubarb

"Got Bagpipes"?

[ahaslam]

After 367 days of use my computer needed a reinstall. The disc didn't work & I was 2 days over the warranty. Luckily Linux had caught my attention a couple of months previously & I had a copy of Yoper 2.1 waiting to be installed. Never looked back, the freedom was a breath of fresh air.

;)

[somafm]

If I wasn't a gamer, I would be using Ubuntu on my main machine. But I game too much to use ubuntu as my main os. Therefore it serves most of the other things I do but on a lower-end machine right next to me :)

I know theres WINE and Cedega but my experiance with those was a bad one. Too much configuring and tweaking just to get some of my games to install! Then getting them to run smoothly?... well, I don't think that will happen anytime soon :(

Other than that, Ubuntu serves all my other computing needs!

[click4851]

1. Windows activation

2. Windows DRM

3. Windows security

[jvc26]

Mine was a combination of dislike of the Windows proprietary world, dislike of the way microsoft were getting increasingly controlling of not only what was on your computer, but what components your computer was made up of too. The windows bloat phenomenon, whereby the windows OS was getting larger and larger, no gains in speed and no gains in pretty much anything... made me wonder why I was bothering with windows at all - especially as also you got the XP grind - a month or two after your initial install, slowing to a crawl then you have to go through stripping out the crap, disabling the plethora of rubbish which starts up when you start your computer - oh and then the constant, virus scan, spyware scan, defrag, and so forth - more of time-wasting, effort consuming activity, which wasnt needed. Vista didnt look like an option I could stomach, so with the encouragement of a mate from Uni I changed to Ubuntu, havent looked back and dropped XP 100% a bit ago, and since have tried Fedora, Suse and Mandriva, though still havent found something I like as much as Ubuntu.
Il

[Bloch]

At a guess the original poster is from the USA.
Computers are generally cheap relative to average income, and indeed in absolute value cheaper than anywhere in Europe I know.

The situation is different in other countries. Where a new computer costs 2 months wages, it's worth while sticking some extra RAM and a larger hard drive into an old PIII.

But what can you do with a creaking old installation of windows 98? Or if you get a secondhand computer with no windows XP installation disk?

Bootleg versions bring their own problems - ethical ones too - so for many people in less than G7 countries Ubuntu is a natural choice.

I speak Polish and a casual look around the Polish forums shows a different kind of member than around here. More non-techie, a lot more questions on openoffice, more desperation ("I need to have my essay handed up by Friday" kind of thing), and yeah, more noobies to annoy the gurus.

[tidge87]

There are many many reasons to switch to Linux.

I changed because I felt it was painful to use Windows.

It was slow, unresponsive, had to constantly update virus programs and manually update my programs, its just a mess. Not too mention you have to pay big $$$ to use Windows and even more for the programs.

With Linux, you burn it onto a blank cd, install it.. and you have an amazing operating system that is completely useful once you have it going, its got an actual good web browser, an office suite, networking tools, media player, image organizer, it has it all. Its also super easy to get new programs. Everything is free, the operating system, the programs, everything costs nothing at all, it is also secure, no virus programs needed :D I find that nearly every program on Linux is better than what Windows offers.

Ubuntu is brilliant. You can even dual boot it in your Vista computer to try it out. I have windows vista ultimate that I got for free which I rarely even use, I'd rather use Linux.

That brings me to the question? Why do people buy Windows?

Games? Meh, I'd prefer PS3/360/Wii any day.

[TheLive1]

1. I love the idea of FOSS. Being able to see entire codes if I wanted to, knowing exactly whats happening behind the scenes. Plus I don't like large corporations ayway.
2. Donate when I can instead of having to fork out money whenever new version is out.
3. Linux is way cooler and also more secure. And not to mention is getting easier and powerful to use.
4. Full & total control here, I'm an anarchy kind of guy- I abhore limitations and someone/thing telling me what I can and cannot do.
5. For what I need to do, Linux serves me very well.

Been using PC's since 1992, 14 months since trying out Linux and 8 months running strictly Linux on my machines and haven't looked back not missing a thing. Instead I'm part of something on the up and up. Other OS's have seen their day and are already falling off their peaks.

[Tanoku]

What would cause one, in the first place, to install Windows instead of Ubuntu?

[Hairyred]

Ethics, and Ubuntu is a far superior OS for the tasks I use the PC for. I do dual boot WinXP for a couple of things I can't do with Linux, but I am outa there REAL FAST! In comparison, WinXP is slow, overblown, unsafe, and I have issues with some of the political activities involving MS and BG. I will not be using Vista, neither will I buy any PC or laptop with Vista installed out of principle.

[tidge87]

If you have a bit of time, read this article, it will tell you everything you need to know about why Linux is superior to Windows.

THE DESKTOP LINUX MYTH (http://www.psychocats.net/essays/linuxdesktopmyth)

[justleen]

- its stable. If i manage to screw something, a can switch to a terminal, kill whatever got hung, and continue!
- its free! Free updates, free software, free everything...
- it looks much much better then windows AND its fully customizable (without the need for 3th party tools)
- its safe (without the need for 3th party tools)
- its simple! that might be a silly statement, but if i compare what my wife can do with ubuntu, and what she can do with windows then i must conclude ubuntu IS the more userfriendly OS.
- it comes with Firefox, by default! that alone should be enough reason :)

[AndyCooll]

The reason I initially tried Linux was financial. I had three pc's running pirated Winderz, Office etc. I couldn't afford 3 OS's etc ...and Linux is free.

The reason I stay is one of preference, philosophy and cost. I'm now have a fuller understanding of how my computer works, how Linux works, and I find I can do everything I need in a Linux setting. I'm now more comofortable in a Linux environment than a Winderz one. I am also a supporter of the open source philosophy. And finally the fact that I can update my OS and apps on regular basis and not have to worry about how much they cost or how many pc's I can install them on will always be a wonderful sense of freedom.

:cool:l

[Iceni]

I switched because of vista. I really dislike the constant cluttering always going on, getting worse with every version. At first I tried to set up a dual-boot and failed, so my plan to gradually adjust became my plan to switch 100% to ubuntu right away. Spent about a weeks worth of spare time to get everything the way I wanted and learn enough to fix that dualboot. The dualboot works, but I never use it:)

I am also intrigued by the whole open-source philosophy. I really like the freedom to chose exactly what is happening. I had no problems at all getting used to the differences.

[punong_bisyonaryo]

Going back to the original post, so you're thinking about Ubuntu on your laptop, on the go. I ditched Windows completely after I had one too many difficulties with malware, viruses, etc. almost 2 years ago, and had a competely Windows free laptop. Most common apps I use are blender for 3D work and GIMP as my photoshop replacement. For games, if you're laptop is blessed with an NVIDIA or ATI graphics card, check out http://techgage.com/article/top_10_free_linux_games for the top 10 free linux games (though there are lots of others that are good too).

Granted, there are many Windows games that will not run at all in Ubuntu, whether natively or with emulation software, click here for what I do in those cases: geekmadness.wordpress.com.

[seshomaru samma]

I think Windows is an excellent OS. I do not use it because it costs money.
I used to run a pirated version (+pirated Office & pirated Norton Anti Virus) and to be honest - never had any problems. At work we run a few XP boxes and those that are under my supervision (all running limited rights users + firefox + spyware/virus protection) are very efficient ,fast and relatively malware free (if scanned weekly) . The other boxes ( for example the one run by the boss) often slow down after a few months and fall victims to some crazy viruses. Just today we tried to get rid of a virus that made Office open multiple instances that wouldn't close.
What I'm saying is that with a knowledgeable user XP can be a great OS.
It is however a very expensive OS and very difficult to customize. I have to admit that the command line has many advantages and I often miss it when I use windows. I like the Ubuntu / Linux community and I like the fact that I can make the operating system run the way I want it. I don't mind some hard work and research, the easy way is not always the best.

[notwen]

I have been tinkering w/ Linux on & off since 98 and made Linux my OS of choice in 2001. Mainly due to licensing fees and numerous virus/spyware related issues, I was pushed away from MS products. I now only have 1 windoze install in my home, and it is dual booted for games only. The linux community in general is a great source of knowledge and know-how. Very rarely have I had an issue not resolved or acknowledged. Best of all it's free. =]

[drillchart]

I have used Windows for years and cost at this time is not an issue, I work at a college and get legal copies of xp pro, office 2003 for $21 each. The reason I originally switched was because I was given a laptop and windows crashed when it was installing updates and would not reboot. I decided that I would experiment with a Linux install as I remembered a friend using it in college and loving it. Anyway I installed Ubuntu and worked through getting my wireless card working and a few other issues and finally I was starting like it then problems hit and thinking it was Ubuntu i decided to buy a copy of xp and install that giving up on Linux. Anyway I ended up with some of the same issue with xp and finally diagnosed it as the motherboard.

After a month away from Ubuntu I was given a older p4 machine with no OS on it and I was getting frustrated on my desktop with xp, 4 installs in a row to get a stable install (kept installing parts of xp to different drives, dump windows). So I decided to experiment with Ubuntu 6.10 again and now during my free time I'm setting it up the way I want it and using it for just about everything.

[raul_]

Cost (legally)
I just feel i'm behind the wheel, when using Linux

EDIT: The reason i use Ubuntu over other distros: apt-get spoiled me :mrgreen:

[yeleek]

I'd do away with windows altogether if:

Dreamweaver/photoshop would run under Linux
More games supported Linux (know there are 3rd party options but having looked supported list isn't huge).

Impressed with it thus far tho (ubuntu running in a vm currently)

[RudolfMDLT]

Just to reverse the question - I met a guy at work who discovered windows when he was 16, he was using Linux since he could remember. To him Windows just isn't an option. It's funny how people that grew up with Linux don't switch and how people that grow up with windows, eventually try to find something else...

[Terl]

I have a small partition for windows just for the printer and a few games that don't work all that well under wine or cedega.

For me it is the cost of windows. The upgrades are so darned expensive especially in a multi-system home. I'd rather donate my $ to an open source project that give it to M$.

[rhomp2002]

I tried Ubuntu to see what Linux was all about. After about a week I found that the only time I went to XP was to watch the WMV videos. Otherwise I was doing everything on Ubuntu.

Then I read about the WGA where you would have to either buy new license for Windows if you changed modules or spend time on the phone getting a new key. When I coupled that with the fact that I spent hours running malware/spyware/virus detection/defrag programs almost every time I went to XP and I also had to run updates almost every time I went to XP I just figured M$ can just go to hell as far as I am concerned. Since then I have signed onto XP twice. Now I spend time looking into the various distros of Linux to see how they differ and whether my first choice was the final one or not. So far Ubuntu has met all my needs and thanks to this forum all my questions have been answered promptly and completely. Why bother with XP then.:D :D

[graigsmith]

1. windows is poorly designed, and poorly organised. example, storing all user files, even pictures, videos, under "my documents", instead of something clearly denoting that it is for all files, like a home folder. Plus everything is called, my network, my computer. my programs. do they really need to make it look more personal? it's silly.
2. it has spyware. viruses. windows is a poorly designed os with security holes everywhere.
3. it's not free.
4. it's expensive.
5. the licence is restrictive, microsoft owns it, you only own a licence to use it.
6. you can't easily change graphic themes. and windows is ugly.
7. DRM in windows.

[bobplano]

I am using ubuntu because i always have ideas of what i can make to make things better, and i've started to learn C(++) because it is much easier to make software than something matierial. also on windows i used quite a few open source applications. plus i am "forward-thinking" and getting something as good as ubuntu for free is an awesome deal. and now that vista is coming out with at least a $200 dollar tag and with DRM i decided now was a good time to try something new

[Cariboo1938]

Beside the challenge to learn something new, my main reason to leave Windows for Linux (in the first place) and finally sticking to Ubuntu was that I always felt totally helpless in the face of Windows and being on Mikrosoft's mercy! I'm free now and I'm able to determine what my computer is supposed to do and if something goes wrong or if I get stuck, because I'm not smart enough, I can count on all the wonderful people at the Ubuntu Forums.

[freebird54]

This is fun! I first used Linux (TAMU) back in about 91/92 for a programming project with some others - I hung 4 modems on it, and all 5 of us could program quite well at the same time - on a '386! However - the X was a little sad, and I had an Amiga, and I had to work with Windows/DOS so...

Anyway - had a home system with ME on it. It was pretty good actually, - the first Win system that rarely saw the BSOD, and only needed to be rebooted about once a week! I resisted XP (too expensive/too many holes/Ridiculous EULA) until work provided me a Volume License Key version of XP SP2. It was OK,

THEN came WGA. Suddenly I was illegal!?! Called them up, got nowhere. Couldn't find my product key for ME - and it wouldn't back off returning to ME properly as it claimed it could when I installed it. Didn't want to lose my Visual Studio, so I was forced to use a pirated XP - because my legit one wouldn't work!

Vista is out of the question - the EULA is even worse, the DRM is wasting cycles, and would force another country's idea of copyright on me, it can be sut down on you whenever they decide it shouldn't run (and I already KNEW how poorly that was handled) - and its rental cost is 4 times what an OS should cost. (no you don't buy it - ever READ that EULA?)

SO - try some distros - it would be my 6th main OS (C64/Amiga/ST-PC-GEM/OS2/Windows) - so I figured I'd be able to get going not too badly. Heard of Debian, mostly good things - tried it. Heard Ubuntu was based on it - tried that. Still here :D

So there are MY reasons....

(now MS is trying to tempt me back by making Express (free) versions of Vis Studio programs available... but NAH - not unless I have to work with them again!

[Calash]

A combo of curiocity and necessety. I work in IT, and would like to have experience in as many OS's as I can. Ubuntu came reccomended by our Unix guys, so I gave it a try after I dropped my vista beta.

Honestly I am very happy with it. I do run a Vmware XP session for windows apps that I can not live without, and I have a XP partition for my games. Not that they can not run on Ubuntu via Cedega (or Wine, though I can not get CoH to work on Wine), it is just I get better performance in XP.

[microsoft92sucks]

For awhile now ive had a very strong hate 4 microsoft for many reasons
1. there trying to take over the world first they were a OS then the xbox now the zune and notice there was already som1 big in all these markets. next thell being taking over another market.
2. They dont giv people the choose. It really makes me mad that if u boy a computer it just comes with windows u dont choose ur OS (at least in the USA)
3. U dont own windows u use windows and u cant change it.
4. windows isent even a good OS its probly the worst OS couse of how it crashes its slow compared to others and insecure.
5. It cost $200 when u can get a MUCH MUCH BETTER OS for free (Ubuntu) if u dident know.

[amaroKer]

My curiousity for trying new things compelled me to pop in my first live cd of Ubuntu 6.06. Reasons to stay with it:

1) I realized that using aptitude (apt-get) to download new, free, and diverse softwares was easier than stealing it. I literally had at the very least $3000 worth of pirated software on my computer, and replaced ALL OF IT (except the games) with FLOSS.

2) I could go from the login screen to 1% usage on the desktop in under 10 seconds. Every single time.

3) The "switch user" function actually works! I don't notice any degradation of performance, even when leaving 8+ programs open.

4) Customizable to the extreme (GUI and system). I love making my own panel textures (check out attachment).

5) LiveCDs are great for fixing computers that I break (if it ain't broke, fix it till it is). And I break Ubuntu far less than "that other OS".

6) Bragging rights,

7) I never have to waste my time with virus/spyware scans. And I've never used an easier firewall than Firestarter.

8) It plays nice with other OS's.

I could go on and on. The only reason that I'll ever need XP again is for AutoCAD.

[Browser_ice]

I admit I haven't made the full 100% switch to Ubuntu. But here goes :

1) I originaly had decided to start using Linux because I got tired of having no money for ANY softwares I want to use

2) I am still using XP but only because of specific softwares tools (3d max, GMAX) and games that I cannot use on Ubuntu. Otherwise, I would fully switch if I could use them on Ubuntu. I use other tools but similar are available in Ubuntu (Web development, programing languages, ...).



p.s. I got 3d max from Discreet logic directly (freely) as a thank you for me being a GMAX forum moderator for 5 years.

[KIAaze]

This is all an operation started out by Microsoft to find out what they can improve (or say is better) to keep people from switching to GNU/Linux!!! :evil: :lolflag:

edit:
Another funny fact:
When I bought my computer, it came with XP home (less expensive), but later when I wanted to set up permissions for network filesharing I discovered that there were some options missing.
So I got myself a pirated version of XP pro (was easy, everyone had it ^^). And I only used this since then, before going to GNU/Linux.
Come to think of it, almost everything I ran on XP was pirated. It's normal, everybody does it. Windows is the ideal platform for pirated stuff. :p

[microsoft92sucks]

People we need to find a way to take down microsoft for good. People please spread the word of the greatness of Linux and then once Linux is as big as windows and only then will Games and other software and hardware be made for Linux as much as windows and then will be able to take down windows so tell a friend a family member or just some smelly old guy off the street.
!!!PLEASE WE NEED YOUR HELP!!!

[kevinlyfellow]

People we need to find a way to take down microsoft for good. People please spread the word of the greatness of Linux and then once Linux is as big as windows and only then will Games and other software and hardware be made for Linux as much as windows and then will be able to take down windows so tell a friend a family member or just some smelly old guy off the street.
!!!PLEASE WE NEED YOUR HELP!!!

Cool your jets, linux will take over the desktop market. Its not for everyone yet, but let people know you use it and that your very happy with it. The old way of developing software is being replaced with open source. Microsoft will find themselves all alone in a few years, with the same buggy os they've always had.

[bodean]

Thanks for the comments. If I have vista on my laptop already, and want to dual boot, can ubuntu go on second?

I hear this "new" version due out this week will read ntfs drives? Since my HD is ntfs, this means that I will not need to format to put ubuntu on?

[crimesaucer]

I decided to learn Linux so I could learn the inner workings of the computer. Mostly as a new hobby.

I figured that I would try to learn Linux with ubuntu (I started with xubuntu edgy and have stayed with it), and I would try to treat my computer like an ongoing project of customization that would be comparable to a mechanic routinely working on a car to make it stronger, faster, and better looking.

I had installed a dual booted partition and had thought I would use my Windows Xp a lot while I was learning my first install of xubuntu.

Well, learning xubuntu and customizing it was really fun, and I never really needed to use my Windows Xp partition much since last October.

I still have Windows installed because it came with my computer, and I might as well keep it for a back up OS. Plus, my iRiver T30 device has a problem with Linux. And I never gave wine much of a chance for uTorrent because my uTorrent in Windows is optimized perfectly to download torrents at the best bit torrent rate my isp can offer without bottlenecking it.

But besides all of that, xubuntu has been a faster and more stable experience when browsing Firefox. My windows open faster, don't freeze or get viruses. I prefer using Xine-ui instead of WMP11 when clicking on embedded media.

And my last reasons are that I love using Beryl/Emerald, and creating all of my own personal skydomes, cubecaps, and wallpaper from images off of the web using GIMP. And I also love the fact I can write my own custom gtkrc/gtk-2.0 themes for xfce-engines so that my whole OS matches my Firefox and Thunderbird. And being able to make your own Emerald themes is really nice to.



*** Every customization in these screenshots is something that I created or wrote, or custom installed. Every detail. I know Windows doesn't have much that is comparable in the realm of the customization of Linux.


http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r161/crimesaucer/Screenshot-18-9.png
http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r161/crimesaucer/Screenshot-18-8.png

http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r161/crimesaucer/Screenshot-13-11.png
http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r161/crimesaucer/Screenshot-13-10.png

[bodean]

Also, is there a place I can look to make sure the hardware on my laptop (ASUS V6J) will be compatible with ubuntu?

[aysiu]

Also, is there a place I can look to make sure the hardware on my laptop (ASUS V6J) will be compatible with ubuntu?
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/HardwareSupportMachinesLaptopsAsus

[KIAaze]

And more generally GNU/Linux:
http://www.linuxcompatible.org/compatibility.html

[kvonb]

Curious as to what the "type" of person is who moves from windows to say, ubuntu, and why?

....erm, the type of person who can think for themselves, the type of person who doesn't believe that a money making enterprise has the best interests of it's users at heart, the type of person who is sick of wasting their time on the stress of virus problems, the type of person who despises having a US corporation constantly check through his computer to see if It complies with their rules, the type of person who speaks a language other than English and wants to use his computer in his own language, the type of person who enjoys a challenge and is willing and able to learn new tricks, the type of person who likes to change their desktop to a million different layouts and themes without having to buy a dodgy 3rd party app that sometimes doesn't work!

But above all, the type of person who knows the value of true freedom.

....or maybe it's just the "Thinking Lemming" syndrome, the one in the pack that stops and thinks: why should I follow the rest of them over that cliff? :-k

[Falcorian]

I started working with a research group that uses Linux exclusively, so I wanted to install linux so I could ssh in to work and to learn the command line. I don't remember why I picked Ubuntu, I think it's because a year or so earlier my friends and I had tried it out when trying to set up a media server.

Anyway, I dual booted XP and Dapper for a few months, and I kept shrinking my XP partition for more Linux space as I stopped using XP. Dapper was just superior to me. Finally, I just nuked XP, and have never looked back.

[punong_bisyonaryo]

Thanks for the comments. If I have vista on my laptop already, and want to dual boot, can ubuntu go on second?

I hear this "new" version due out this week will read ntfs drives? Since my HD is ntfs, this means that I will not need to format to put ubuntu on?

If you're referring to the bootloader menu, yes you can put Ubuntu 2nd (why you'd want to escapes me, though, but like everything in Linux, the choice is yours). You will need to edit your grub config file. It's located at /boot/grub/menu.lst.

Also, you will not be installing Ubuntu on your NTFS partition, rather I suggest to make a separate partition for Ubuntu. More on this, if you ask.

Regarding the Asus V6J, I'm not sure if there's a list of laptop compatibility. You could check your hardware individually. I have an Asus L3500H, and unfortunately, the onboard Sis 650 graphics card works in Ubuntu but without 3D acceleration.

[KIAaze]

Regarding the Asus V6J, I'm not sure if there's a list of laptop compatibility. You could check your hardware individually. I have an Asus L3500H, and unfortunately, the onboard Sis 650 graphics card works in Ubuntu but without 3D acceleration.

Yes, there is. It was just given a few posts earlier:
HardwareSupportMachinesLaptopsAsus (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/HardwareSupportMachinesLaptopsAsus)

And it's very useful. I just discovered thanks to this thread and added my own Compaq presario 2500 to the list. :)

Here's the main Laptop compatibility page:
HardwareSupportMachinesLaptops (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/HardwareSupportMachinesLaptops?highlight=%28Catego ryLaptop%29)

[punong_bisyonaryo]

Yes, there is. It was just given a few posts earlier:
HardwareSupportMachinesLaptopsAsus (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/HardwareSupportMachinesLaptopsAsus)

And it's very useful. I just discovered thanks to this thread and added my own Compaq presario 2500 to the list. :)

Here's the main Laptop compatibility page:
HardwareSupportMachinesLaptops (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/HardwareSupportMachinesLaptops?highlight=%28Catego ryLaptop%29)

Yeah, I was typing my post while it got posted. Thanks! I added my L3500H to the list, too:D

[confused57]

Thanks for the comments. If I have vista on my laptop already, and want to dual boot, can ubuntu go on second?

I hear this "new" version due out this week will read ntfs drives? Since my HD is ntfs, this means that I will not need to format to put ubuntu on?

Make sure to use the "built-in" Vista partitioner to resize your Vista partition, not gparted. Gparted in the live cd can then partition the unallocated space to install Ubuntu.

[bodean]

Thanks. What is a good starting partition for ubuntu?
I have a 100gb drive on my laptop

[punong_bisyonaryo]

Thanks. What is a good starting partition for ubuntu?
I have a 100gb drive on my laptop

When I started with a 40GB hard disk, I had XP on it too, which I partitioned to 10GB and 4GB for my Ubuntu. The rest was for my data (FAT32, sorry), which I could access on both OSes. But I quickly ran out of space after getting addicted to installing programs.:) Eventually, I shrinked XP slowly, then to nothingness, and expanded my Ubuntu partition. Right now, I have 10GB for Ubuntu, and 30GB for data (still on that same 40GB hard drive).

[confused57]

Thanks. What is a good starting partition for ubuntu?
I have a 100gb drive on my laptop
I would recommend using the desktop live cd for a period of time for compatibility with your hardware & just to get a feel for the OS. The minimum would probably be 10 Gb, but 20 Gb should be a reasonable size to begin with. You may want to wait for some input from others on the forum to help you decide.

[SorenK]

Three of my friends had the exact same experience:

Their Windows XP Home activation suddenly shut off. They didn't change their hardware or anything. It just suddenly failed and wouldn't reactivate using the online reactivation.

So they called Microsoft. The sales rep wouldn't just reactivate it-- he kept on trying to sell them Vista. One of them eventually yelled at the person and demanded that they activate his windows immediately. He told them he had bought a dell, never upgraded the hardware and had the license sticker right on is computer (they all had similar stickers on dells, a toshiba and an hp computer). They finally got forwarded to someone who took their information and actually did their over phone activation.

But the damage was done. They were shocked that their computer had suddenly stopped working and when they called in, the person who supposed to help them, instead seemed to be a salesmen trying to sell them Vista. All three ended up switching to Linux (Ubuntu) after doing Google searches about operating systems and their specific problem with false activation failures.. I had played with Red Hat and Mandrake back before the turn of the millennium so I was interested when 3 people that I know all suddenly switched to Linux, them having known nothing but Windows for the last decade. One of them recommended Ubuntu to me and I checked it out. I don't know if my XP Home installation will spontaneously shut down or not, but right now, it's a non-issue as I haven't booted back into my Windows partition since.

So that's what caused at least 4 people that I know of to leave Windows for Ubuntu.

[johnny4north]

i m leaving windows for mainly this reason, cost. Ubuntu is free and the packages(software) is free. i have spent aprox. $2,000.00 a year, on O.S's and\or software for 9 yrs{9x2,000.00=18,000.00}:( i have already saved money to buy a 26" sharp HDTV monitor\TV, in just 6mos.:) :) i help my friends by upgrading and installing software{also hardware}. now we will be able to afford the best hardware and software [Ubuntu 7.04].:guitar:

[jdietz]

Those are certainly some tough questions.
I am a new linux user (check my post count). The feature Ubuntu has that the others don't is price: Free. Both of the others cost $$$. This is what attracted me to Ubuntu. I chose Ubuntu over the other distros because "Everybody's using it" (Admittedly that isn't a feature).
I am always going to need a Windows PC because I play games and everyone knows that you can't really play games on Linux. For my other PC, I wanted one that could perform every basic task. Ubuntu already has all the features I need: Word processor, spreadsheet, email, web.
What Ubuntu needs now is better compatibility. I use 6.10, and it was a real pain to set-up and configure. I think it needs GUIs for Net configuration (See/refresh your IP address), and wireless configuration: See available access points, configure ESSID, security type, and security key. A GUI for ndiswrapper would be helpful also, because I (and probably many others) use wireless cards that are not linux compatible. I tried the currently available one (ndisgtk) and it did not work, so I un-installed it, used the terminal for setup and it worked fine. This would help greatly, I think.

[jfl]

As the Harley-Davidson riders say: "If I had to explain, you wouldn't understand" ;)

Seriously, we have 4 computers in the office; they were running W2K which I believe is the most stable Windoze version. We had 2-3 crashes / week.
I installed Breezy on the most mission critical machine (dual boot) and automatic back-up of the critical files on the FAT partition (and on the server).
Then I upgraded to Dapper (ubuntu 6.0.6).
This box have been running continuously since Jan. 2 or 3, used daily, without a hitch.

And also, as a DOS and OS/2 fan, I dislike Micro$oft.

It depends what you want to do; if games are your thing, stay with Windoze; if the computer is an important part of your work environnement AND your are willing to learn, then go for Linux - Ubuntu.

It is not always easy, but you have a tremendous support in these forums.

J.F. Ubuntu 606 rocks

[microsoft92sucks]

Cool your jets, linux will take over the desktop market. Its not for everyone yet, but let people know you use it and that your very happy with it. The old way of developing software is being replaced with open source. Microsoft will find themselves all alone in a few years, with the same buggy os they've always had.

srry but microsoft is EVIL and there bad people.

[starcraft.man]

srry but microsoft is EVIL and there bad people.

I agree that Microsoft is evil, and proved with Vista that it cares more about its corporate backers than the consumer. I wouldn't say they are all evil though, many of the coders are good people just stuck at their jobs, cogs in the machine and not finding offerings for work with google.

Long Live Ubuntu :D.

Remember to convert your friends ^^

[Tundro Walker]

I know it's late in the game on this topic, and I think I already posted to it once, but I just wanted to vent some more, because this is really irking me.

Last Christmas, my brother knew I was thinking of getting an mp3 player, and got me the Creative Zen Vision:M. I was using Win98 at home at the time, and it wouldn't detect the darn thing, even with USB support installed. I tried installing Creatives "special software", but it required WinXP to install. So, I had an mp3 player that I basically couldn't use.

However, since I use WinXP at work, I got the bright idea to take it in. I hooked it up, it did a little something for a while, finally detected it as "MTP" device (Media Transfer Protocol), and I was able to use it like a normal USB drive, just drag-n-drop. But, it's my work computer, with internet restriction, so I couldn't get some mp3 to load on it. Thwarted again.

So, my roomate, an IT guy, gets a 2nd copy of WinXP from his job, because they had too many (they were switching over to Vista). He let me install it on my home computer to replace my Win98. My Win98 was tweaked to all get out with 98lite for speed and reliability...it was really fast and stable, and I was perfectly happy to keep using it. But, MS wasn't happy with me still using it, because I couldn't use current software or hardware. Let's hear it for forced obsolesence. Booo!

WinXP installed far smoother then I expected, and a little tweaking and I was ready to go. I plug in the mp3 player, and nothing. I later found out WinXP will only auto-detect and use MTP devices as USB drives if you have Win Media Player 10 or 11 installed. I didn't. In fact, I got rid of Win Media Player, because I was tired of it letting Internet Explorer pop-ups and such load even though I UNINSTALLED Internet Explorer from the computer, because I don't like it or its security risks (preferring Firefox instead). So, there's another reason to drive me away from Microsoft... When I uninstall software on my computer, in this case Internet Explorer, it better darn well be gone! When I'm doing something in Win Media Player, and suddenly Internet Explorer fires off a pop-up, letting me know that it's not only still installed, but still used as default web-browser for certain things, it's like a punch in the face. So, then I'm totally questioning the Windows Uninstaller. Is it really uninstalling stuff, or is it just some pretty GUI that acts like it's doing something just to appease the user, but in actuallity, it's doing whatever IT wants to do, not what YOU want it to do. So, another issue that drove me away...I was tired of feeling like I didn't have control over my OS. I felt like it was doing whatever MICROSOFT wanted it to do rather than what I wanted it to do. And with the random slowdowns, etc while working on it, it was like someone else was controlling my computer at times. Seriously, the OS is supposed to be their to respond to me. Why am I waiting for it to finish grinding away on some mysterious task so I can finally get back to running some other program at a reasonable speed?!

Anyways, I install Creative's special software on the now WinXP computer, finally get some mp3 transfer going again, but Creative's software sucks. You can't edit files on the mp3 player like it's an actual drive (like you could if you had Win Media Player 10 installed...argh!). You have to edit id3 tags and such on your computer, then wait another 20 min to transfer your Gigs of mp3 back to the stupid mp3 player. How annoying.

So then I had a big fiasco with WinXP wiping itself out when I tried using Disk Cleanup utility to wipe out the old Win98 install files. (This borked the whole installation and then some...of 8gb I had on my disk, only 250mb was left..I know, because I was dual-booting with Ubuntu and mounted the drive to check.)

So, I ditched Windows permanantly, but I have problems getting the mp3 player to work with Ubuntu because it's an MTP player, not a generic UMS player. So, another annoyance... USB was adopted as a standard, and all OS' picked up on it. But, Microsoft didn't like interoperability, so they dream up some "Plays For Sure" & "MTP" bull and get Creative and other mp3 player makers to buy into it to create a whole line of mp3 players locked into Windows.

Fortunately, Linux folks have made libraries for MTP support. But still, it's just annoying how MS leverages the market in their favor. Because they're an island unto themselves, they can act like nobody else exists in the world. And customers are thought of as nothing more than cattle they want to keep pastured so they can constantly milk them.

Seriously, Microsoft is the play-ground bully that's threatening lunch money from people, and Apple is the play-ground defender trying to protect people from Microsoft, but only if they support Apple. Meanwhile, Linux is the hippie of the group, because it want's to play nice, provide interoperability & protability of devices and software formats, and focus on the user's best interests (because the motivation for profit has been reduced or eliminated).


...and if all that isn't good enough...another reason to not like Windows...at Best Buy, if you try to buy some regular, Joe Average USB extension cable, the box says "Windows Compatible!". It's a freakin' USB cable for crying out loud! That's like selling gas for a car and saying "Honda Compatible!", and charging a buck more because it's "special". Seriously, I think just some good, old-fashioned consumer education would help clear up a lot of the Microsoft annoyance.

Thanks for listening...

[lotacus]

Well, I left Windows because I was bored of it. All the different versions of Windows used to suffice my boredom, however, this time wasn't the case. I tried a few different distro's and there was always something that made me switch back to Windows. One day I decided to give Ubuntu a try. I previously didn't bother with it because it looked like a very boring distro with it's boring looking GUI in it's screenshots. When I got it installed, everything I had worked out of the box, except for the video card. Now, I don't know why this is. I mean the Live CD will install the accelerated drivers, but once I installed it permanatly, accelleration wouldn't be enabled.

The only thing that was next, was to optimize Ubuntu for my liking and along the way, even though it was tedious and frustrating at times, I had fun learning all the basics that Linux users now would probably take for granted. :P Not to mention, every problem I had come across, or every question I had, was found in the forums, or on some Wiki.

Now, because of being hesitant with Linux, I always had a dual boot thing happening with my system. Then one day, I just had enough of Windows. I didn't see the reason why I should have both Windows and Linux on my system if the tasks I did could be done on either operating system. So I got rid of Windows, and for the applications that I needed that wouldn't run on Linux I just used a VM. Though, now I am not dependant on those windows only applications anymore and don't use the VM much. Maybe twice a week for a very short time, say two hours, and only for things that I could live without, but would rather not. LOL.

I think the thing that is keeping me with linux is the fact that I always have something to do. I am always finding problems which need fixing, or things that need to be installed or configured or what not.

It's a lot of fun learning. I just hope I don't get bored with Linux the way I got bored with Windows, else I just may end up with a console system typing dir all the time.

[freebird54]

One cure for boredom - try to figure what *OTHERS* have done to their systems, and help them on here :)

I know what you mean - I wasn't on the computer much for quite a while except for work, as it was uninvolving with Windows - and it was so hard to find out what it was REALLY doing under there when it screwed it. That, and 20 reboots per fix... (after having the OS in ROM for so long :) )

[IHateSnow]

I went to a vista launch party at rochester institute of technology, they gave out 5 free copies of vista out. It was great because of the free pizza, college student + free food = :-)

There is what I called the "after party" at my place which consited of me loading Ubuntu.

I haven't booted windows since. What caused me to leave windows is easy, windows just lacks form and function. I feel less stress with linux. Ubuntu is great. I've been telling all my friends about it.

if you say MS windows, I will say http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gimmick

[punong_bisyonaryo]

I agree that Microsoft is evil, and proved with Vista that it cares more about its corporate backers than the consumer. I wouldn't say they are all evil though, many of the coders are good people just stuck at their jobs, cogs in the machine and not finding offerings for work with google.

Long Live Ubuntu :D.

Remember to convert your friends ^^

Yup, not all, just Bill Gates, and Steve balmer.:)

[old_geekster]

I did not leave Microsoft. I have a dual-boot system. Basically, I am using Feisty as my default OS, however.

The fact that it is a very sophisticated OS that runs more smoothly than Windows is reason enough for me to use it.

OpenOffice Suite is equal to MS Office. In fact, OO will recognize MSO documents and MSO won't recognize OO documents.

My DSL download/upload speeds are better with Feisty. I can't explain it, but I have tested it numerous times, with the same results. Not to mention, Feisty did the setup for my Internet connection without any help from me.

You certainly can't beat the price. If you can get a better product for less money, I don't know what it would be.

I am using the same browser that I have used for years with XP, Firefox. Actually, I am using Swiftfox which is Firefox tweaked to run best with my processor. Popus, what are they. With Swiftfox they are a thing of the past.

Most importantly, I like the fact that I can put it on as many rigs as I like without anybody looking over my shoulder.

Last, I was surfing the web while upgrading from Edgy to Feisty. Try that with Windows!

I could go on and on, but this is boring enough.:wink:

[dfox8895]

All of the above reasons plus linux/BSD/UNIX is the king of network aware computing. I have not had a windows box that could do what linux could do even with alot of expensive software.

[rillip]

For me, I was tired of MS Office. I have an old version, 2003? Maybe older, that I got years ago from work. I had to keep reinstalling Windows (more on that in a bit), and it was really annoying me to have to keep installing MS Office with it's retartedly long key, it has a very long installer, and the programs aren't that good. I remembered OpenOffice,org from a news article similar to the one adamklempner describes, only I think it was Novell? that was doing the suing.

After I liked OO.org so much, I decided to try out Linux. I realized how stupid it was that I just accepted that fact that every year or two my OS became so unstable I had to reinstall. I hated the fact I had to format my drive to install it every time (back in the 98 days -it's a little better now), and then have to reload all my drivers and blah blah.

So I tried Kubuntu from a LiveCD, and was totally hooked. I mean, here I was, running the OS, with software already installed, in full, on my CD?? The windows CD doesn't even have a GUI to install it!! How lame is that? And then when I installed in under forty minutes, and everything was working? No searching for my graphics card cd, no going to another computer to download a ethernet driver because it couldn't install mine, just none of the schenanigans Widows was pulling on me.

I came to realize I accepted a lot of crap from MS because it's just what I was used to, and just wrote it off. Now I realize I really DO have a choice and can say "no, that's not good enough." The only reason I have a dual boot at all is for games, as I am a pc gamer. Everything else I do on Kubuntu.

[Tundro Walker]

At a guess the original poster is from the USA.
Computers are generally cheap relative to average income, and indeed in absolute value cheaper than anywhere in Europe I know.

The situation is different in other countries. Where a new computer costs 2 months wages, it's worth while sticking some extra RAM and a larger hard drive into an old PIII.

But what can you do with a creaking old installation of windows 98? Or if you get a secondhand computer with no windows XP installation disk?

Bootleg versions bring their own problems - ethical ones too - so for many people in less than G7 countries Ubuntu is a natural choice.

I speak Polish and a casual look around the Polish forums shows a different kind of member than around here. More non-techie, a lot more questions on openoffice, more desperation ("I need to have my essay handed up by Friday" kind of thing), and yeah, more noobies to annoy the gurus.

Every country has ethnocentrism, but we Americans are a bit self-centered more than other countries. Heck, we even refer to ourselves as "Americans"...as if we folks in the USA are the only ones living in the "Americas". LOL!

In the US, computers cost about 2 months wages, too. (I'm not trying to demean your statement,...you're probably getting shafted on computer prices...I just wanted to compare and show that we don't have it THAT much better).

Average cost is between $1000 (prebuilt, with integrated parts) to $1500 (self or special built with good hardware). Tack on software (Windows OS, MS Office, games, etc), and let's just round that to an even $2500 spent on a computer and software to use on it. I use that number, because it divides nicely into my $30k/yr take-home...in other words, $2500 is 1 month's wages for me, assuming I don't eat, drink, and be merry (or have a roof over my head) for that whole month. If I actually take cost-of-living into the equation, I have to span that $2500 over a couple months.

However, I'm pretty sure you saying JUST THE COMPUTER costs you 2 mo's wages. That would mean you're paying as much for your computer by itself as I would pay for a new computer AND software (expensive, crappy software...YAY!)

But, neither you nor I are idiots, since we're on the Ubuntu forums. You kept your old PIII and tossed Ubuntu on it. My last computer, an 800mhz that I bought in 2000 (new) just crapped out on me in 2007. My roommate had just spent $2000 on a new computer for himself, so, I just snatched up his old comp (2.6mhz, 512mb ram, Audigy sound card, Nvidia gfx card, 80mb hard drive, nice case, etc) for $500. Given depreciation, perhaps he or I got the short-end of the stick on that that, but the way I see it is I got a new comp for $500, since I turned around and tossed Ubuntu on it, which I've been using cost-free ever since. (And it's kick-started a whole new area of learning for me with Linux!)

Maybe the slogan should be "Ubuntu for Smart Humans"?

[raul_]

I'm installing Ubuntu on a Toshiba Satellite 4100xDVD: 64MB RAM, 400Mhz, 8GB.

I don't need to buy a 1500$ laptop + software to do my programming :)

[teddybairs1]

I made the switch for pretty much all the reasons that have already been listed. I started running linux with a really old distro called Progeny Debian and got my feet wet in that. For me it was kind of fun because it taught me about the command line and several systems where I worked used linux/unix so I wanted to get more familiar with it.

I went and bought a copy of Lindows 4.5 after that and partitioned my Windows box to dual boot. I had tried fedora core 1 and had been impressed, but I wanted to check out Lindows because of it's supposed windows compatibility.

I started using Ubuntu about a year ago, and when we got high speed internet I never really looked back. It does "just work" on my hardware. It's generally rock solid (unless I try and tweak it somehow). The updates are free and cover all of the software on your system, and not just the system software. I don't have to worry about malware anymore, and don't need an anti-virus. I can do things in Ubuntu that just can't be done in windows regarding customizability. And the massive horde of free software which is available in the repositories alone, not to mention the third pary stuff, is a godsend for my pitiful pocketbook.

I'm a gamer too. Which is why I still maintain my windows partition on my laptop, but that's pretty much all I use it for. A lot of games will run under the Wine software anyway. For internet, writing, finances, email, just about everything else, I use ubuntu. I generally play games on it as well.

It takes a little bit of work to get an Ubuntu system up and running fully, it is true, but it's nothing that a newbie who's willing to learn can't do. The Forums are full of people who are passionate about helping you get the most out of your ubuntu experience. I've had better support from the guys here than from any commercial support I've tried for anything else. The postings and help from the other forum members taught me how to get everything running on it.

Give it a try. Download the live installer and see what it does on your system. If you like it, install it.

[gbold]

Playing with computers is a hobby which I enjoy greatly. I started playing with Ubuntu after reading an article on it using the 5.10 (Breezy) as the starting point. Well, it was no Windows for sure and I gave it up for awhile until the 6.10 version came out. But I did learn alot about how to install drivers etc. to get my ATI card to work properly. The 6.10 version's installation was better... Now the 7.04 is out and I have been using it since the alpha came out, running the updates as necessary and I am going to leave it installed on my spare Intel box with a PIII-1.0 GHz processor, 1GB SDRAM, ATI 9550, Zip drive, CDRW, generic sound card, and Seagate 120GB drive. Everything has been working great from the get-go and I only had to tweak the xorg.conf file to get the screen resolutions to work correctly (1280x1024@85Hz). I have a second, smaller hard drive installed and am sharing it with the XP coputers on my home network.

The forums here are great for getting answers, even though your post gets knocked off the first page quickly and I would like to express my gratitude to all who come here and help.

So to answer the question why, I'd say because I don't like the direction MS is heading with their OS. It looks like XP is the last MS product I'll be buying (I play games) but I have been spending more of my computing time doing my digital photography. I have spent alot of $$$ on MS products and the reward is more crap layed down on me by the OS. My PIII would choke on Vista and would probably run XP OK but not spectacularly. I installed the 7.04 alpha on another older Dell box with a Pentium 133 and 256MB of memory, and it did run correctly (albeit slowly) right after the install. Long live Ubuntu.

My next thing to try is to multi-boot the other flavors, ie, Edubuntu, Kubuntu, and Xubuntu on this old box...


Greg

[teddybairs1]

Another thing I'll add, most of us probably weren't "linux geeks" when we started using Ubuntu or linux in general. We just wanted something better. We found it and took the time to learn it better because it offered that to us.

[raul_]

I still think one of the strenghts of Linux in general, is the ability to bring old computers back to life.

[st33med]

I tried to play games on my laptop on XP, but my computer has a sucky Intel Integrated GPU that most games aren't compatible with, or either crash. I heard about Ubuntu before, and I thought "Nah, I'll skip, thanks." But, later on, I was hearing about loads of features on Ubuntu that Windows doesn't have. I decided to dual-boot it.
Had trouble with wireless the first time, reinstalled it, tried a technique again, didn't work. I uninstalled Ubuntu and went back to Windows.
I decided to try it once more with Feisty. And, what do you know, it worked!

Now, I'm going to run wine so I can play a few games.

My few complaints about Ubuntu:

Keyring keeps bothering me for a password every time I start.
There is no music player that can play protected AAC music from my iPod.

[Roger Gundberg]

You might want to try Virtual Box. I am assuming you are using Windows. No partitioning of the HDD is necessary. You may install as many as fifty (<not a typo) OS's. You can take Ubuntu for a spin around the block, and if you don't like it, simply delete it. For Ubuntu folks download and install the tarball (near the bottom of the page) first then download the program.

[DarkED]

Mainly gaming and Zune support.

Gaming, yeah I play lots of PC games. Most of them I just play singleplayer (as is the case with Half-Life 2 and Far Cry) and the reason I can't make a 100% switch to Linux with games like that is because they use breaking-edge technology and heavy DirectX integration that Cedega just can't do. If you don't understand, just try Far Cry - it'll install with some tweaking but you won't get ANY of the nice effects (Pixelshaded water, bumpmaps, real-time shadows, etc.) because they are all DirectX 9.0 effects.

On the other hand, I play the ocassional MMORPG. Most of the free MMO's don't work in Linux, and I'm kinda partial to FlyFF because some friends from college got me into it. You can't even install it in Cedega as far as I know.

Then we've got the Zune. My Zune was practically given to me so it's not that I really 'chose' it over an IPod or a Creative player. I also have a PSP w/ a 4GB memstick, and I use that as a substitute sometimes. If we could get Zune support in Ubuntu I'd boot Ubuntu a lot more.

Right now my boot ratio is about 50% Windows, 50% Ubuntu. I'm a pretty big PC gamer and I don't like consoles (minus Gamecube, gotta get my Resi-Evil on from time to time.) I HATE Windows. I absolutely HATE it. I hate Windows and everything Microsoft stands for except Zune, the DRM doesn't bother me because I don't share songs, the bugs are gone with the latest firmware, and I really like everything else about it. The kicker is that I can play songs NOT bought off an online store and I never have to worry about DRM bugs. But yeah, besides Zune, I hate M$.

So yeah, gaming support would put me at about 90% Ubuntu and the Zune would round off the other 10% and I'd be full-Linux. Also, I use my laptop as an EVDO router for my desktop computer and it runs Ubuntu most of the time. Every now and then I have an issue with sharing the connection in Ubuntu and I have to go back to Windows for a while on the laptop.

[raffytaffy]

viruses. defrags, endless scans, price of software.....and most of all THAT ANNOYING JUMPING PAPERCLIP

[KIAaze]

But you know you can deactivate the annoying jumping paper clip, right? ^^
Windows is all about choice after all...

What's sad is that most people don't know that it's a choice. :(

[yabbies]

It was time for a serious upgrade on my computer. I knew I wanted to build my own unit, while researching hardware I became interested in Linux. I looked at knoppix, SuSe, redhat, and then somehow came across Ubuntu.
I built my unit and fresh installed Ubuntu to give it a whirl. I absolutely hated it in the beginning. It was confusing and I couldn't get anything to work. I left my computer alone for a day, cleared my head. Read the Ubuntu forums for hours. Went to Borders and used my Christmas gift card for an Ubuntu hacks book. 5 months later and I could never imagine, ever going back to M$

I do miss playing Medal of Honor but Cube: Sauerbraten and Action Cube have satisfied me for the moment.

I love being completely in control of my system, and I am not longer petrified of the terminal. Although I still find myself clickity clicking from time to time instead of using line commands out of habit.

[HeyItsMatt]

Having used Vista on my home pc and notebook since early betas, I am all of a sudden curious as to the advantages of putting Ubuntu on my laptop. I am thinking of a dual boot as there are some pc games that I play when I travel, and feel they won't run/work in Ubuntu.

Curious as to what the "type" of person is who moves from windows to say, ubuntu, and why?
I know a lot of windows apps would not work (and I would have to find different / new apps to replace what I use in windows)....but just wondering from those who have used windows in the past, what made you switch over.

The most immediate thing that made me switch over was wanting to try out Linux because I am becoming a bit interested in web development (and computers in general), and I had heard about the whole LAMP server setup being popular. I figured it wouldn't hurt to play with Linux a bit and get the experience of another operating system.

I am actually ambivalent on the open software thing - I like that it's available but I'm fine with proprietary software too if it works. In addition, due to my experience with Ubuntu in the past month, I definitely DON'T think it is a good idea for a casual computer user who isn't interested in or patient enough to make things work that they think should "just work". (Not that those problems are necessarily the fault of Ubuntu or Linux).

That said, after being patient, I find myself wanting to stick with Ubuntu (or some other Linux OS) and avoid Windows. I seriously don't like the increasingly restrictive copyright and DRM stuff that seems to be occurring lately. I don't like that Windows Media Player was babbling about getting DRM licensing for my music a while ago, and when I tried to immediately uninstall it, I found that I was unable to (same goes for IE). I don't like Windows bothering me to download Genuine Advantage so it can root around on my computer, and reading this thread I'm even more suspicious of Vista.

Right now I have 2 computers - my main one dual boots with a 80gig Windows XP partition, 20gig Linux partition, and one has Windows XP. At the moment I no longer use the XP partition, and plan on making it more like 30gig Windows / 70gig Ubuntu. I also plan on removing Windows from my other computer and trying Ubuntu (or some other Linux OS) on that one too.

[hsweet]

here's some;

1. I don't have to enter impossible mixed alpha-numeric codes to install software like e70oq6-8ik9975f4-ccdi1309435.... and so on. I run a computer lab and used to administer the whole school, so that adds up. Multiply that times n computers times m pieces of software.

2. When the software breaks, I don't have to do it again. And endless variations of those hassles. There are still some software packages for Windows that require dongles.

3.. There is no software association to audit/fine me for using open source.

4.. The stuff works

5. My students get experience with another os

6. Don't get me started on DRM

[aysiu]

1. I don't have to enter impossible mixed alpha-numeric codes to install software like e70oq6-8ik9975f4-ccdi1309435.... and so on. I run a computer lab and used to administer the whole school, so that adds up. Multiply that times n computers times m pieces of software.

3.. There is no software association to audit/fine me for using open source.

6. Don't get me started on DRM Those are three big reasons for me. In many ways, I like Windows and Mac OS X, but these three are just too much for me to go back to proprietary.

[sunexplodes]

Oh man, I installed XP on my machine for dual boot purposes, yesterday. And I can't figure out how I went as long as I DID without switching. The install took at least 3x as long as the Ubuntu install, I have to reboot pretty much every time I install anything, and I had to find and download a solid suite of virus and spyware tools.

I couldn't wait to have it configured so I could get back to my Ubuntu partition.

[jrusso2]

I really can't understand why people chose to stay with Windows. Besides the ridiculous costs, constant having to upgrade, virus, malware and having to rebuy new applications.

I don't understand why people put up with DRM and Windows "genuine advantage" and the pain of having to activate when they change anything on their own PC.

Not to mention a company that treats its users like they are criminals.

[tweakedenigma]

I work as a Tech at a retail store and I get asked this question everyday and the 2 simple answers are 1) I don't game so the only advantage that Windows has is gone & 2) I really don't wanna have to deal with the same issues I do at work all day when I get home. I know a lot of Linux and Mac users ( and a few BSD and Solaris ones too) the one thing that seems to be constant is that they are all just looking for a better, Faster & Less annoying way of doing things.

[soulfly7x]

Wow! There are certainly a lot of responses to this. I will share my own experience, but I am sure that it's similar to some of the others posted here (I didn't read them all).

I don't have a lot of money to spend on computers, so I keep 'em as long as I can. I sit here on a computer purchased in 1999 that originally had Win98 installed. I was lucky that it ran on Windows as long as it did, but with only 256 ram and a 30G hard drive, well, I think we all know Windows needs a fresh install from time to time. By this time I was running on an upgrade to XP and the old PC just was barely operational anymore.

I did some research and found that it would cost at least $40 to get a legitimate copy of Win to do a clean install, and I looked around at some of the live CDs for Linux distros. Finally, one day I took a deep breath (after backing up my important files on an eternal drive) and nuked the hard drive. I even did a restart just to see what happens. It said "No operating system found" or something like that.

I popped in the live CD of Ubuntu Edgy and installed. I had to figure some things out, some were even quite the headache, but this 8 year old PC is running better than ever! More than that, I now have a better understanding of how the computer actually works! The forums here are very helpful.

I would love to dump Windows altogether but am not prepared to do so yet until I can stream asf files (I've seen thread after thread on this but it just doesn't work) and get my mp3 player to be recognized (I can't make that work no matter what either)

Get those 2 things worked out and I'm good to go.

As far as gaming, the new games take up 2 or 3 Gigs anymore. No thanks. I feel like that means I need to make too much of a commitment to play one. Get a console.

Furthermore, this new windows WGA update is insulting. They want to verify that the OS that HP installed on my HP notebook, 6 months ago when I bought it, is valid. Bite me! I refuse to install it. I'm sure that means I will stop getting updates altogether soon. I'm also sure I'll decide to live without asf streaming and adding more music to my mp3 player, if need be.

[shadowfx78]

Like just about everyone else here i got sick of all the Windows BS and troubles with virus's and such. As well as the Blue Screen of Death, I too wanted more control over what was being run on my laptop.

Soulfly7x what kind of mp3 player do you have?

[Loki-uk]

I have Vista and Ubuntu and to be honest for what I use it for Vista is the hands down winner but for some reason I reapeatedly find myself tinkering with ubuntu I think that it's the fact that I can that brings me back time and time again. I have to say that I'm one of those annoying windows users that doesn't and hasn't had a constant battle with viruii or malware and I like to mess around with lots of stuff all the time. A properly configured and updated windows box is pretty secure and robust. If you look at the stats of something like steam you can see that 40% of windows xp users are still running SP1 and look around at stats online and you'll see that more aren't running any sp's at all there's the problem for windows users. Critical security updates should be forced after they've been out in the wild for 30 days without any issues that would cut virii and malware right down. I've been running Vista with no AV since launch....... (not recommened). UAC seems to do a pretty good job and Widnows seems very stable (apart from media centre which is a little flakey when creating thumbnails for some reason).

If linux wants one day to oust windows then it's going to have to go through a bigger revolution than it already has to get where it is today.

The terminal whilst powerful has to go or at least not really be used the average user isn't like me and i'm guessing most people here they don't like to compile stuff and hack stuff they just want to use stuff. They want to INSTALL software without compiling it first and play games they can buy in a store and have most things done for them and Linux just isn't there yet. One day it may be but just know it's to complicated for most people. Hopefully distros like Ubuntu will bring about those changes but they will be slow..... What Linux needs is a killer app... A game that isn't on anything else someone needs to pull a community together and develope a kitller fps or rts ENGINE that you can't get anywhere else and then let people use this for COMMERCIAL games projects..... that would start making people look up and listen.

Lol oh well that's not me trying to fly in the face of free software or open source but major game titles sell and with sales comes investment. It's really late and i'm really tired so I think I'll stop waffling now as I fear I'm not making much sense.....

[teddybairs1]

I thought of another good reason. I have a friend who is tinkering now with a Dapper Drake disk I gave him. He's already tried it out live on the system he wants to install it on and everything works fine. But he's so used to having to install drivers for motherboards and every other piece of hardware for the systems he build, I had to sit and explain to him for ten or fifteen minutes on the phone that if it works "live" it'll work installed without any further driver installation.

that's something you can't do with windows, try it before you commit to it. Now I just have to deprogram him from normal windows installations to an Ubuntu installation and we'll be ok...

[Drewski]

Although I have recently installed Linux, I haven't completely switched over to it; my primary computer still runs Windows.

There are several reasons I'm trying Linux again. The main reason would be because I want to learn how a modern operating system works "under-the-hood." I consider myself to be quite a technical person, and as such am interested in all things technical, so I figure that Linux would be a great way for me to expand my technical knowledge base.

I've been toying with the idea of learning Linux for years, and have tried multiple times in the past, but have failed each time. But this time I'm determined to try harder, and FINALLY get the hang of Linux.

I guess for me, part of the appeal is that it's fresh and new, and NOT Windows. :D
Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against Windows in particular, I find it to be quite an apt operating system for what I do (read: Windows 2000 and Windows XP.) Although with the advent of Windows Vista, I feel it's quite ridiculous that I would have to upgrade my whole system JUST TO RUN THE OPERATING SYSTEM, let alone any other programs that will run on it and require extra overhead.

Also, I guess it's bragging rights. I will eventually be able to call myself a True Linux Geek. :D

[punong_bisyonaryo]

(after backing up my important files on an eternal drive)

Not dissing you or anything, but after having gone through a few hard drive crashes, I'd really, really pay good money for an eternal drive.:)

[katch22]

Not dissing you or anything, but after having gone through a few hard drive crashes, I'd really, really pay good money for an eternal drive.:)

LOL! I thought the same thing when I read that post. I wasn't going to say anything because it's obviously just a simple typo, but dang I would give nearly anything for an "eternal drive"!!!! :) :)

As far as why I switched to Linux, my story is not too different from many others. I have been a computer user for a LONG time (think C64 and Apple IIGS) and I have always been fairly happy with windows. However, windows is expensive! (Although I haven't paid for a version of windows since "windows for workgroups 3.1" and I have no moral qualms about pirating software). I guess I just decided that Vista was the last straw, MS is overstepping their bounds in how they treat their customers and the OS itself is certainly none too great. One thing I don't understand is why people seem "scared" of the command prompt. I guess I am used to the command line interface because I used DOS a lot way back when. Plus it is actually better because you know what is happening. Meaning that if you simply click a checkbox in a gui you have no idea what changes it is actually making to what files, whereas when you are using a terminal type command interface you issue every command so you know exactly what is going on. This I love. It is also like an adventure learning something so new and different. I guess you could say I am a windows "power-user" or more like super expert :D , but it took a long time to get that way. And while I do have a little basic knowledge of *nix commands from some programming classes I took back in the 90's, the new distros of Linux are more-or-less completely foreign and awe inspiring and I find the challenge of learning it fun.

[jocheem67]

Ha, that's a good one " an eternal drive" ..

I jst like the philosophy of free and open formats and software. Also the efforts made by all those people that develop for free, just 'cause they like to do so.
Sometimes they create something beautiful ( beryl, avidemux, dvd::rip and hell..even rhythmbox ), sometimes it's just the effort that I appreciate.

I really don't like big companies and their marketing..

ubuntu is a bit of anarchism, and that it's maybe not really mature yet, is not a problem to me...

You know , I 'd like to know more bout the political viewpoints of ubuntu - users, am wondering in which corner the majority feels to be in.
Then again, if it seems that there's a lot of different people into ubuntu, that would be great! Very...uhhhh....democratic....

[ilovebsod]

I like to tinker and Beryl is OMG beautiful.

[soulfly7x]

shadowfx78

Soulfly7x what kind of mp3 player do you have?

Creative Zen 30 GB. It's an old one too. OT, you're not ShadowFox as in the Chronicles of by any chance, are you?

[locke.dragon]

what made me switch over was a horrible experience with viruses. long story short, my computer was hit by a drive-by download and crashed. windoze wouldn't boot. i used ubuntu as a rescue disk. fell in love.

it's a GREAT relief to be away from viruses, and the open-source community is GREAT! i love it! :D

[Zuuswa]

what made me switch over was a horrible experience with viruses. long story short, my computer was hit by a drive-by download and crashed. windoze wouldn't boot. i used ubuntu as a rescue disk. fell in love.

it's a GREAT relief to be away from viruses, and the open-source community is GREAT! i love it! :D

Thats the long-story-short of mine as well. I used Knoppix live cd to rescue my data, but I had trouble validating my windows installation, and I didnt want to pirate a liscence, so since I had used linux a few years ago (Mandrake 5) and at college, I decided to grab the most popular at distrowatch and test it out. I fell in love right away and have stuck to it since.

[madman91]

I choose ubuntu, and linux in general. Because of its openness. There is never a "dont touch" section of your operating system. You know what is going on in your system and you can change it all.

And of course, no viruses, spyware, defragmentation, etc...

I will never use Windows as a primary OS again... Well unless they rewrite it in C and release it in opensource, then maybe... :D

But dont feel pressured to take on linux. If you get it from pressure you will not like it one bit. Thus tainting your image of ubuntu.

Do what you want.

[justin whitaker]

I've already left windows, for good. I prefer the holistic approach of Open Source, even if I can't simply drop proprietary software....I'm attending the church, but not part of the cult. I still want to play major game titles and such, so I muddle through with what Wine/Cedega/Crossover will let me play.

So far, I have World of Warcraft, Counterstrike Source, Guild Wars, Half Life 2, UT2004 running...that's more than enough gaming for me.

Who needs Windows again?

[ZeroWing]

I like linux for it's amazing customization abilities, and it's stability. On Windows, I had to reboot constantly to keep things working. I thought that rebooting one time or more daily was normal. Now that I have linux, I've never had to reboot. My linux has been running for at least a month!

As for customization, on windows you had to download and install a load of programs, reboot for each one, configure it, reboot, select a theme from a slow server, install it, and reboot. Only to find out the theme is just the wrong shade of pink. On top of that, this slows the O.S. down a bit, and makes as unstable as.... something really unstable.

Plus, Beryl is, as some people say, 'teh r0x0rz'.

[shadowfx78]

no im not that shadowfox soulfly7x

hmm about your mp3 player I have a zen v plus and it works fine with amarok

[lamalex]

here is a better question: what would make someone switch from Ubuntu to Windows?

[zach12]

if you use vmware you can run windows xp apps in ubuntu

[SanjoEel]

I am relatively new to the computer world, having bought my first modern PC about 6 years ago, and all I had ever used was a command line only DOS PC as a kid until then. So for the past 6 years it's been all windows for me and I hadn't even heard of Linux. I knew about Macs of course, but was never really interested in them. I didn't know anything about Linux or open source until I saw a video of beryl on youtube. I thought it was really cool so I started leaning about it, then that led me to open source and Linux. I had always preferred Firefox to IE in the past, but I didn't know or understand the open source aspect of it at the time, I just thought it was better than IE. The more I learned about the open source concept and linux the more fascinated I became, and I realized that we were on the verge of a revolution in the way people use software. I wanted to be a part of it! I really think we're witnessing history here.
I had always thought Windows was slow, irritating to use, there was always something not working correctly, it's expensive to keep updated and current, I hated the MANY security flaws inherent in Windows, the authentication and usage limitations are unfair to be polite, and I really became pissed when I started learning about DRM. I just didn't realize there were other options to Windows until I started researching
Linux and trying a few live cds of a few different distros, I installed DSL on and old laptop successfully then I tried openSuse and Ubuntu on my PC. I decided on Edgy and have since upgraded to Feisty. The leaning curve is there but it is not exactly daunting, and I can already sense and understand the things that make Linux better and more efficient and secure. To me it was a no-brainer to make the switch. Ubuntu has been basically painless and easy for me and I am a total computer noob if that says anything about being user friendly, and I can customize things all I want. There's a true sense of computing freedom.
It seems to me that the few obstacles that face Linux as a desktop OS are quickly being overcome, and the potential for desktop Linux to become very widely accepted and implemented is beginning to be seen. Although I am not a gamer per se, I think that game support in Linux will be a major step forward and will be the catalyst for many to make the switch. For me the time was right, I have completely kicked XP off my machine and I have been VERY happy with my decision. I have no need for windows. I see great things down the road and I'm happy to be aboard......:guitar:

[starscalling]

the biggest thing stopping more users than i would like is the lack of ability to run certain windows apps in linux solidly... even though there is large support for many apps, many special purpose apps must be run in windows - like when i'm hacking my cell phone, the few nix tools just dont cut it =/

but most of them that switched / dual booted it was because of degrading performance due to constant infection. for me i'm scared of drm and the microsoft plan for the future... i dont trust them one whit

[carusoswi]

(I have one very old app in particular that I cannot find a comparable replacement for).

Care to share which ap that is?

Just curious.

Caruso

[LookTJ]

1. Windows DRM

2. need to download drivers after fresh install

3. no everlasting support

4. cost of software

5. don't game

[doomster]

Lol my side of story is a bit funny .
after installing ubuntu linux foor the first time, just from curiosity i managed to get along for
about 20 days.When i started missing Windows, i just formated my pc and insterted windows
installation cd on the drive. and BANG ! for no reason, windows wouldnt just install.. i used
more than 6 different win. disks, and my computer simply refused to start up windows after
install.
ive been working on windows PC's for more than 3 years, and didnt manage to install them on
my personal computer for some strange reason. SO i reinstalled Ubuntu, and as "stuck" with
it, i slowly fell in love with it :)
now after using Ubuntu for several mothns on my PC, when i launch Windows PC's at work for
repair, all i see is the misery, and low comfortibility of the "other" OS...

[dvieira]

Im tryng to switch...i think the worse bit are the drivers...

The mouse configuration is awfull...you have to move the arm all the way because ubuntu can only tweak the acceleartion....This as been the major drawback for me...my harm is always in pain

The other side is that apps are less flanboyant...they are capable enough ....it seems linux can skeeze more of your hardware...

[madman91]

OMG.. beryl.. thats why

www.beryl-project.org/features.php

linux is more beautiuful, functional, and free than windows mac and any other os.

Heres link again

www.beryl-project.org/features.php

[Acglaphotis]

I switched because i had a virus on xp ( my first and only one). I got traumatized, lol.

-Acgla

[soulfly7x]

starscalling
the biggest thing stopping more users than i would like is the lack of ability to run certain windows apps in linux solidly.

Actually, I would say it's the terminal. HOWEVER, I now love the terminal. I keep fooling around with different versions and distros, and I just love being able to "sudo apt-get install firefox" instead of going to mozilla.org and finding the download, then running the installer... next... next... continue... next... OK (etc).

I hated the idea of terminal at first, but that was then and this is now. Most of my PCs are old and slow and I'll take a terminal installation over waiting for synaptic to load, and probably freeze any day of the week.

Along the lines of facing unfamiliar programs (I know, you were referring to programs with no equivalent), I think many migrating, or thinking of migrating just don't know how good some of the programs are. K3B, Amarok, and Kaffeine (just to name a few) kick the @#$% out of anything I've ever used in Windows (also one of the reasons I go for Kubuntu over Ubuntu). :cool:

On another note, on some of my computers I dual boot with Win. I booted into one PC the other day. From the time I clicked "restart" to the time Windows was functional it was 8 minutes. ](*,) On Win start up, it tried to check for Win updates, check for AV updates, and run an AV scan all at the same time. I couldn't even open Firefox until it stopped. Restart back into Ubuntu took 2 minutes.

If that ain't an advertisement to leave Windows, I don't know what is.

[Rob Alderson]

What's the big deal about Beryl? I tried it the other day & while it looks nice it really doesn't do anything useful for me.

[raul_]

What's the big deal about Beryl? I tried it the other day & while it looks nice it really doesn't do anything useful for me.

It looks nice

[Rob Alderson]

Nice looking it certainly is but then so is Vista, that's not really a good enough excuse to install it is it?

[raul_]

Nice looking it certainly is but then so is Vista, that's not really a good enough excuse to install it is it?

If you really think Aero is better than Beryl, then what do you want me to tell you? :D I never said Beryl was the reason I installed Ubuntu. When I started using Linux, Beryl didn't exist, and I don't use it in my laptop

[freebird54]

I find some of the features of Beryl quite useful, Best of them are the 'shade' feature (roll up into titlebar) and the scale (?) from the top right corner. The cube is just the most recognizable thing, not the most useful! (though it is neat, and good for organization of multiple work zones).

Actually, it surprised me how useful it was - I was expecting only eye candy...

[brainmaps]

I am a long-time windows XP user (since Nov 2001) and do not experience any of the virus/security issues that ppl commonly associate with windows. For the past week, I have been playing around with the new Ubuntu on a separate laptop. I'll get straight to the point: Windows is still my primary OS for actually getting work done; Ubuntu still has a ways to go, and here's why:

1) Ubuntu still has issues with corrupting external drives so that they can no longer be used by Windows (Note: this is probably due to yanking out external drives without first ejecting them).

2) Ubuntu (using Gnome) does not have sufficient customization. For example, I want my mouse scroll wheel to scroll one page, not n lines, and I can't set it up to do this. Another example, in Nautilus, I don't want rows to have alternating colors, and it seems I can't get rid of the big icons except by hiding toolbars. Another example: I hate the big fat borders and title bars in my apps but there doesn't seem to be a way to slim them down. Another example, even though I've set my computer and display (in Power Management Prefs) to never sleep when inactive, and have turned off my screensaver, after 15 mins, my monitor invariably turns to black like it's entering hibernation mode or something (and everytime it does this, it loses my internet connection). Another thing is that Gconf does not have sufficient customization options. I have a 5-button mouse and can't configure any of it. If there's a way to do it, then it should be made more obvious for noobies. I don't have a problem editing config files to customize things, btw, as long as it's clear what the config settings are. Gconf does not have that many settings to configure, thereby making customization problematic.

3) Ubuntu does not read encrypted DVD's. I have read through the threads here and have followed the steps, and still can't read encrypted DVD's. This should not be brain surgery to watch a simple DVD.

4) Limited apps. There are not always replacements for windows apps, and wine doesn't always work, which means that some apps must be used on Windows. For example, Document Express for converting PDF's to DJVU format.

Now onto Ubuntu's pluses:

1) Availability of some surprising good apps, and they're all for free. I was surprised by many of the networking programs, geometry visualization and drawing programs, and even chess, and all for free. It's wonderful!

2) Huge selection of free apps. This is related to 1) above. The Synaptic Package Manager is great.

3) In Nautilus, you can expand folders in a tree-like fashion in both the left and right panels. This is something that Windows lacks. There are dual-pane explorers for windows, but this is not the same thing.

So there you have it: my impressions, being a long-time XP user, of 1 week of testing out the new Ubuntu. I am very excited about Ubuntu, and believe at some point I will use it as my primary OS, particularly in light of the fact that, IMO, Vista is a huge step in the wrong direction (I do not believe you require a super computer to run an OS, but Vista pretty much requires this) and incurs a huge performance disadvantage over XP. However, while I will continue to test Ubuntu on my second laptop, I will use XP as my primary OS for getting work done until I feel Ubuntu has overcome some of the shortcomings I listed above.

[raul_]

I find some of the features of Beryl quite useful, Best of them are the 'shade' feature (roll up into titlebar) and the scale (?) from the top right corner. The cube is just the most recognizable thing, not the most useful! (though it is neat, and good for organization of multiple work zones).

Actually, it surprised me how useful it was - I was expecting only eye candy...

I, for example, don't use a taskbar because of the scale feature. I don't have any bars whatsoever in my desktop :) i don't use maximized windows and whnever i need something i just slam my pointer against the right corner

[Zero Prime]

I switched because I was tired of how slow Windows was becoming. It didn't matter how well I kept it up, how many times I cleaned out all the spyware, or how many times I cleaned the reg it still ran slow. Ubuntu was like a dream come true. It had a learning curve, but so did Windows the first time I used it. Ubuntu does everything I want it to do and more. With Beryl added it even has better effects than Vista (IMO). Some of those effects are even very useful.

[gary0]

I started using Linux in January this year after a spell in hospital with pneumonia. I needed something to do whilst recovering. So i slung together a computer out of some old bits I had (233 PII, 256 Mb ram, 20 Gb hdd, 8 Mb matrox video card). I, for some reason had a couple of distros I had downloaded some time ago but never used - Debian and Fedora core 3. I opted for the Fedora distro. It went on nicely with no problems, although the partitioning had me a bit confused at first. :confused:
I liked that I could choose what apps to install, and that I could get more from the net if needed. "This is good" thinks I, "apps for free - yay!" Whilst trawling the net I came across Ubuntu, liked what I read about it, so downloaded the iso and burned a copy. I installed it and it just worked. Found all the hardware and I didn't have to do a thing to make it work. The very ethos of open source and linux appealed to me. I am a programmer by profession (ASP, .Net, VB) and I like to give my help and advice for free, not to mention several apps and websites I have built for the amateur radio community (they thrive on getting things done for little or no cost - aerials, radios etc), so this Linux thing really appealed to me. I now use Linux for just about everything other than programming, and to this end have XP Pro and Linux set up as a dual boot system. The only time I boot XP is to program (I am in the middle of a large project for a client in the UK). My wife has a wedding photography business and now uses Linux for all her work. It just fits our lifestyle, no restrictions on what we can run, do, or use our computers for. No more hard earned cash swelling M$ coffers. No having to upgrade or patch every couple of weeks, no viruses, no adware, spyware, trojans, bots and all the other rubbish that goes with windoze. It is incredibly stable, runs much faster, uses less resources, and at last I can call my computer my own. I can take the software apart and not get my **** sued, I can copy it, give it away, adjust it and tinker with it. I've been in computers for years - since the Commodore Pet in the late 70's, and have always enjoyed tinkering with them. Windoze wouldn't really let me do that, I feel I have come home and am right in my comfort zone with Linux.

Anyway, it's late and I could probably have articulated myself better if I weren't tired. But That's linux for you, you just have to keep coming back for more!

[GrueTamer]

I personally switched from Windows to Linux mostly because I was interested. I like knowing how stuff works, and Windows didn't give me much of an opportunity to learn. Windows has a dysfunctional "shell" (if you can call it that) and a few administrator apps, such as a primitive partitioner, but that's it. With Linux, I can do just about anything. I'm free. Freedom is something I value highly, and only Linux provides. When I started using Linux, I got convinced to try Gentoo, and while I wouldn't do it again, I learned a lot about the terminal and Linux in general.

But eventually, I wanted something easier than Gentoo. Setting up the system was way too time consuming, and portage was too slow when I wanted to get big things like desktop environments, especially if I wanted KDE. The first thing I thought of was Debian, as I didn't think that Ubuntu would please me. Well, Debian was a little...problematic. It took a lot of configuration to get things to work the way I wanted them to, but I didn't know there was better, so I just lived with it. It wasn't until later on, when Debian started to become an annoyance, that I decided to try Ubuntu. That was a bit after 6.10 was released. I thought it was pretty cool, but I went on to something else because...looking back, I think I just wanted to do something hard so I could be considered a hacker. It was a bad decision.

I went back to Gentoo-based OS's with Sabayon, but portage reared it's ugly head again, and I left it. For the next few months, I just didn't use linux at all except on my older computer, where I put Damn Small Linux. Well, it stunk, so I didn't use that for linux at all for awhile.

But later, I saw that Debian had a new release. Thinking that it would be better than the testing version I had used earlier, I got it quickly. However, the same faults remained. I did manage to get a little farther into Debian and solved some of the problems, but it just wasn't the same. So I just downloaded Ubuntu and installed it right away.

Now, I'm extremely pleased with what I'm using. Ubuntu 7.04 is one of the most polished Linux distros I've ever tried, and even if it's not as 'hacker' or 'l33t' as something like gentoo or linux from scratch, but does it really matter what we look like? Ubuntu is Linux just like anything else Linux is Linux. The Zenwalk I use on my bad computer now is Linux. Even if I go to a different distro eventually, I'm still using Linux, and I'm still happy to help people out here.

Sorry that was so long, I had a lot to say :) Linux is better than Windows simply because it's made better. Instead of an OS that doesn't trust you and has DRM, which is probably the worst thing ever created, I get rock solid stability, a lot of programs to use, and I don't have to drain my wallet. All because I spent half an hour downloading and burning a disk image, and then half an hour installing. Who knows, maybe one day Linux will be on more home computers than Windows.

Note: I don't think Windows is a bad OS, I just think it has some kinks to iron out.

[soulfly7x]

brainmaps said:

3) Ubuntu does not read encrypted DVD's. I have read through the threads here and have followed the steps, and still can't read encrypted DVD's. This should not be brain surgery to watch a simple DVD.

I can agree that it should be more obvious as to how to add dvd functionality, but it shouldn't be too hard once you find the info. In Feisty all you have to do is add the medibuntu repository (http://ubuntuguide.org/wiki/Ubuntu_Feisty#How_to_add_extra_repositories) and then update. That's it. (if these instructions aren't clear enough, let me know what needs clarifying. I've only been using Linux for a few weeks myself, so I know it can be frustrating sometimes understanding instructions).

I did a clean install of Kubuntu Feisty, added the repository, updated, popped in a DVD and it asked if I wanted to play it with Kaffeine or rip it with K3B. I played it and it looked great!

[koconnor100]

Having used Vista on my home pc and notebook since early betas, I am all of a sudden curious as to the advantages of putting Ubuntu on my laptop. I am thinking of a dual boot as there are some pc games that I play when I travel, and feel they won't run/work in Ubuntu.

Curious as to what the "type" of person is who moves from windows to say, ubuntu, and why?
I know a lot of windows apps would not work (and I would have to find different / new apps to replace what I use in windows)....but just wondering from those who have used windows in the past, what made you switch over.


I'm a computer techie. It looks cool on my resume to say "I built my own computer from scratch ! "

Not permitted to do that with windows. From WinXP it's locked to the hardware, and a seperate copy of XP is 400 dollars, 200 for Vista , and good old dell , who bundles xp with their computers , only has to pay $50 . In effect , Windows has given the computer hobbiest the bums rush right out the door.

Linux of any stripe , not even Ubuntu , is ready for the main stream, and perhaps never will be. But for us techies it is suitable bragging rights to say "I set up an FTP server in Linux" , or "I run Linux at home" or some such , because it *IS* a difficult thing to do , even with the puportedly easy Ubuntu editions.

You don't see me messing around with drivers and having screen resolution problems on my xp box do you ? But I do on Ubuntu , and I will keep on working on it until it's fixed, because it is bragging rights.

Linux is far more stable than windows, my ubuntu box has been up for as long as 14 days before I did something stupid to crash it. And it is immune to virus's due to it's security structure, a structure that has caused me no end of headaches for other reasons , but hey , immunity is where you find it.

and it does not suffer from the "conquer the world" syndrome windows has whereby half the patches / upgrades , etc are to keep you on windows and deliberately sabatage the competition. I was so ticked when I wrote a program in what I thought was java (it was actually called J++) and it wouldn't run on netscape , but it ran perfectly on IE , and it turned out it wasn't netscapes issue the compiler worked hand in hand with IE to deliberately sabatage netscape and then blame it for it's woes ....

in short I'd been sold a bill of goods, a proprietory compiler when I thought I was buying a standard run on anything compiler ....

Let bill gates burn you a time or two , and you start looking for alternatives too.

[Atmosphere]

Having used Vista on my home pc and notebook since early betas, I am all of a sudden curious as to the advantages of putting Ubuntu on my laptop. I am thinking of a dual boot as there are some pc games that I play when I travel, and feel they won't run/work in Ubuntu.

Curious as to what the "type" of person is who moves from windows to say, ubuntu, and why?
I know a lot of windows apps would not work (and I would have to find different / new apps to replace what I use in windows)....but just wondering from those who have used windows in the past, what made you switch over.

i've been meaning to try linux for about 10 years now and with things getting so easy with distro's like ubuntu and fedora and many more coupled with me being extremely bored and having a spare (relatively fast box), why the hell not i say!

I've used it for just under a week and damn i got so many questions and a few problems but i'm just sitting tight and reading as many posts as possible to learn as much as possible. It's a learning experience that i actually enjoy (hard to come by hehehe)

[z0phi3l]

Having used Vista on my home pc and notebook since early betas, I am all of a sudden curious as to the advantages of putting Ubuntu on my laptop. I am thinking of a dual boot as there are some pc games that I play when I travel, and feel they won't run/work in Ubuntu.

Curious as to what the "type" of person is who moves from windows to say, ubuntu, and why?
I know a lot of windows apps would not work (and I would have to find different / new apps to replace what I use in windows)....but just wondering from those who have used windows in the past, what made you switch over.

Here's why I JUST installed UBUNTU on my system: I am completely fed up with MS and all the BS they insist on making the user go through.

I can get any *dows only game running on Linux so why not just use the better OS?

[brainmaps]

brainmaps said:



I can agree that it should be more obvious as to how to add dvd functionality, but it shouldn't be too hard once you find the info. In Feisty all you have to do is add the medibuntu repository (http://ubuntuguide.org/wiki/Ubuntu_Feisty#How_to_add_extra_repositories) and then update. That's it. (if these instructions aren't clear enough, let me know what needs clarifying. I've only been using Linux for a few weeks myself, so I know it can be frustrating sometimes understanding instructions).

I did a clean install of Kubuntu Feisty, added the repository, updated, popped in a DVD and it asked if I wanted to play it with Kaffeine or rip it with K3B. I played it and it looked great!

Holy crap! That is so cool! I wish I knew about adding extra repositories and getting access to additional software and libraries sooner. Yes, Medibuntu fixed the problem. Thanks!

[soulfly7x]

brainmapsI wish I knew about adding extra repositories and getting access to additional software and libraries sooner. Yes, Medibuntu fixed the problem. Thanks!

I'm glad that worked for you. You're very welcome. I do still have to agree with your previous point that it should be made more obvious to people just doing a first ever install, but it's not so hard once you know what to do, is it? I started with Ubuntu Edgy, then dual boot Ubuntu Edgy and Kubuntu Edgy. Then upgrades to Feisty. Now I have a clean install of Kubuntu Feisty and 2 dual boots of Kubuntu Feisty and XP.

One day I plan to stop installing the OSes and use them for a period of time.

To clarify, I'm not reinstalling because there's a problem. I just want to see how I like them and the Live CD is limited in that regard.

[baekeland]

I moved over to Unix because OS/2 Warp went under. (-: However, whatever my operating system I like to believe I have a certain anonimity -- like living in Manhattan offers. I just do not trust MicroSloth at all anymore. With each new OS offered by Microsoft it became more and more apparent that I was no longer able to fork out a couple of hundred bucks for a product and do as I wished with it, i.e., lend it to a friend, put it on my other computers, et cetera. Microsoft has made me very paranoid lately as has Bush and his cronnies. I just don't trust Microsoft and I really have absolutly no way to validate exactly what it is I am updating into my machine. I need to put a new WinBlows Security Update in my computer ... just what is this security update? YOU REALLY JUST DON'T KNOW and it comes down to a matter of faith. My faith in MicroSloth became paranoia quickly.
Oh, and bye-the-by, When living in Seattle for 3 years I worked at Microsoft ... I doubt the practices have changed they surely have become MORE RUTHLESS and I did not think that was possible. Hence, my adversion to Windows.

[Kevanx]

It was a number of reasons for me.

1) Sick of windows' BS. XP was a wicked good operating system (after about six months of patches were applied), but it was still SO heavy, and the final straw was having to spend hours trying to fix a home network when the only change was an upgrade in McAfee, but removing it didn't help any. I was also sick of removing gigabytes of hotfixes on a regular basis, and realized there would have to be something better.

2) A friend showed me ubuntu. Using it helped a lot to be less intimidated by it.

3) The whole concept of open-source fascinates me. I want to be a part of it, and I firmly believe that bringing Linux of any build to the masses will ignite an important step in sharing and equality to the social consciousness - particularly in an era where agencies like the recording industry, or even genetic industrialist Monsanto - are rabidly clinging to capitalistic doctrine. Linux shatters those notions and rules, and Ubuntu seems to embrace the idea most completely for me.
To shorten and revise that idea: the fact that linux can exist and grow in a western world doesn't make sense to me, in a very very exciting way.

[orb9220]

Simply

[juxtaposed]

1. Cost.
Vista Costs $200-$400 depending on which edition you buy.

Just to play the devils advocate here, most people don't buy it. It's preinstalled for most people.

MS Office is also a separate purchase altogether.

Ah, the old assumption that if you use windows you will be dead set on buying all software made by microsoft, especially Microsoft Office.

If you can get a better product for less money, I don't know what it would be.

That would be if someone paid you money to use something :P

Average cost is between $1000 (prebuilt, with integrated parts) to $1500 (self or special built with good hardware). Tack on software (Windows OS, MS Office, games, etc), and let's just round that to an even $2500 spent on a computer and software to use on it.

I don't think software would take 1000$-1500$.

If someone is paying that much for a computer (or building their own) they have some knowledge, and they probably already have games and software (whether obtained legally or illegally).

I just don't like people inflating the cost of windows. The biggest thing, in my opinion, is the simple fact that windows costs money. It's more symbolic.

Critical security updates should be forced after they've been out in the wild for 30 days without any issues that would cut virii and malware right down.

Even more corporate control?

Pah, no :P

SP1 beats SP2 easily, anyway.

If linux wants one day to oust windows then it's going to have to go through a bigger revolution than it already has to get where it is today.

Linux isn't going to beat windows in a revolution. It's not going to be some day that it just happens (unless microsoft pulls an enron or something). If it happens, it will be slow and take awhile. After all, it's taken linux awhile to get to where it is today.

What Linux needs is a killer app...

That would certainly help.

3) Ubuntu does not read encrypted DVD's. I have read through the threads here and have followed the steps, and still can't read encrypted DVD's. This should not be brain surgery to watch a simple DVD.

I don't know about encrypted, as all my DVDs have been decrypted before burning them, but I thought it was just a simple apt-get of something called libdvdcss3 or something to watch any DVD.

Why do I use linux?

Not because the price, as I have no problems with not so legal aquisitions of software. I just didn't like the way windows did things - everywhere its "copyright 200x microsoft" or some EULA. I don't want some authoritarian fascist corporation telling me what I can and can't do in regards to anything.

I use linux because I feel it just plain works better. It's an alternative to what all the sheep (in the Orwellian/Pink Floyd - Animals sense of the word) use because they are told to by their corporate overlords.

[JerseyShoreComputer]

There are 2 things keeping me from making a full switch-

1. Better wireless connectivity
2. Working external VGA Out on the laptop

Once those issues are resolved, I may do the full switch. For now, my time is split with Vista.

[Lucifiel]

Still reading through this entire thread but I got tired one day of trying to maintain a clean and working version of Windows. Although WindowsXP had lasted around 1 yr and 8 months, it meant a lot of housekeeping tasks like reinstalling programs once every few months, running tons of anti-spyware tools, etc.

Furthermore, since I work on some software project, I got tired of constantly informing everyone that WindowsXP had some viruses again. Yeah on Windows XP, it's possible to not contract any viruses by staying off plenty of websites but sometimes, it's inevitable. After all, even some viruses slip through the net of the best AV software you have.

Anyways, for gaming, we have Cedenga. Not bad but I'd love to be able to run Dos games as well. There's Dosbox, I know, but many Dos games still don't work in Dosbox(with D-fend installed).

[native]

Having used Vista on my home pc and notebook since early betas, I am all of a sudden curious as to the advantages of putting Ubuntu on my laptop. I am thinking of a dual boot as there are some pc games that I play when I travel, and feel they won't run/work in Ubuntu.

Curious as to what the "type" of person is who moves from windows to say, ubuntu, and why?
I know a lot of windows apps would not work (and I would have to find different / new apps to replace what I use in windows)....but just wondering from those who have used windows in the past, what made you switch over.

ONE REASON WAS COST$ . IF YOU DON'T MIND PAYING THROUGH THE NOSE FOR YOUR PROGRAMS AND GAMES, THERE IS NO REASON OTHER THAN FREEDOM OF CHOICE WITHOUT RESTRICTIONS. WHEN I GOT NOTICE FROM MICROSOFT THAT THEY WERE GOING TO SHUT MY MACHINE DOWN IN FIFTEEN MINUTES BECAUSE I CHANGED MY SLAVE HARD DRIVE FOR ANOTHER DRIVE CONVINCED ME THAT WAS TOO MUCH CONTROL BY MICROSOFT. THE MACHINE DID SHUT DOWN AND I HAD TO CALL MICROSOFT FOR A CODE NUMBER WITH ABOUT 25 NUMBERS TO ACTIVATE MY MACHINE. I COULD GO ON AND ON WITH OTHER RESTRICTIONS AS TO HOW I CAN USE THEIR SOFTWARE.

[DeadSuperHero]

Where to begin...
I've been using a PC since I was three. Those were the bad old days of 3.1.
When I was 11, I got my very own computer,with XP. It was fairly solid...at first. My computer got lots of viruses, and my comp had to be rebuilt several times.
Last year, I got fed up and tried Ubuntu. It's awesome. My comp needs a bit of tweaking (wireless and nVidia stuff)
Now I'm 16. And I know more about computers than anyone at school.
Being the class clown, the jock, the punk, AND the geek totally rocks.

[nanotube]

i like the philosophy of free software (free as in freedom, but free as in beer helps, too). i don't like windows WGA, and the increasing push for DRM. linux is more configurable, i get better productivity out of gnome than windows.

plus, i got tired of being everyone's go-to guy for windows problems. so now, i can just say "dude, i haven't used windows in a while, i don't really know what's up with your pc." :)

[crimesaucer]

I'll post a second time...

A simple answer is this:

If you can install ubuntu for free onto your computer, as a dual booted partition, then why wouldn't you compare the two (ubuntu and Windows), and use the better OS for whatever you need to do.

I had originally thought that I would use my Windows Xp (which was fully customized and optimized with a clean registry and no viruses) at least half of the the time, but in reality, I only log into Windows about twice a month, and run away from it as fast as I can.

On Windows I mostly used Freeware and beta software off of Filehippo or Softpedia, so when I first tried xubuntu, I found the similar programs in ubuntu, much better or at least the same.


Try it....it'll make you feel good good good good good....(echo effect of peer pressure)

[surfjdh]

I have a simple answer to this, Stability. If say, you run xp, and have an 80 gib hd, with 70 gigs of crap on it, youre glomped as far as boot time, program launch time, program stability, and file searches are concerned. With Ubuntu, you are no longer limited to the parameters of what windows thinks is right for your computer, its ALL up to you.

[surfjdh]

P.S. I did some work with betas of vista and even the full release and its just a pretty rendition of xp, with even less utility and capability(ie: modification of the core values)

[dreamsayer]

There are 2 things keeping me from making a full switch-

1. Better wireless connectivity
2. Working external VGA Out on the laptop

Once those issues are resolved, I may do the full switch. For now, my time is split with Vista.

For me:

1. Working Media Center
2. Better game support

[teddybairs1]

native - Microsoft Windows really did that to you? All you did is swap a drive and they shut down your system in fifteen minutes? Jiminy Christmas, Dude! They don't even need to send the men in black pounding on your door!

God Bless Ubuntu and Linux in general!

[Hmarroqu]

windoze borked itself, plus to much crap out there in that place called the internet i feel is a hassle to gaurd myself from.

ubuntu is free, have found all equivalents to the apps i need, more reliable, more customizable, plus 3d desktop rools

[FlyingPenguin542]

Why I switched? hmmm.

- security issues. All the antispyware/adware/virus+firewall software was sucking the LIFE outta my system.
- forever having to clean up after my own OS
- spending WAY too much time RUNNING said antispyware/adware/virus software, defragging, jumping through hoops to optimize anything.
- having to jump through hoops and find hacks to remove stupid things like NetMeeting, Outlook (i used thunderbird), Office costing like $600,
- those "genuine windows checks" BUGGED ME.
- things NEVER REALLY UNINSTALLING. unless you trolled through the registry for hours w/ a fine-tooth comb.
- i'm addicted to customization. It makes me feel all fuzzy inside when i know that MY computer doesn't look OR act like everyone elses.
- D. R. M. Burn it, shove a stake in its heat, and call it a freakin shishkabob
- authority makes my brain twitch and rebel ;)
- the idea of free software, freedom, and open code w/ people working together appeals to me.
- Micro$oft has questionable business ethics and has forgotten how to serve their consumers. Instead they treat them like cattle.
- I wanted to learn something new

- if you want PURE honesty- if i could, i would buy an Apple. I'm a pre-graphic design major. Thankfully, the base classes are traditional-media art, so i have time to save up for one. If I could, I would run Linux for everything, but the fact remains: it doesnt natively support industry-standard graphics programs, aka photoshop and adobe in general. Not the open-source movements fault, just the software companies. and the only way to get them to make software NATIVE is to make the potential market grow.

that being said, for normal everyday stuff- Linux (and Ubuntu) is the way to go. No questions asked. Security, reliability, great support, fast, and MUCH more lightweight IMO.

ISSUES
- wireless cards are... well, annoying. i've got a Broadcom one and still havent managed to get it to work. i'm thinking about buying a new one, cuz I'm due anyways. it was having issues under windows, and the linux change just accentuates em. (anyone have good suggestions for a new card? one that'll work well w/ ubuntu?)
- as i said above, native support for adobe suite and other such things is def. needed. there are many ppl i know that WOULD switch, but can't because of that. but that will come with time
- 64-bit ubuntu can be a little tricky because 64-bit processors are newish and such. If you have one, be sure to look into the issues and how to get around them, decide if you wanna take that on or just stick w/ normal 32bit

However, those are minor issues. Ubuntu was incredibly easy to install, and using packages is awesome. The terminal (apt-get in particular, and dpkg -i) sounds scary, but its not- and having that direct control is kind of addicting. Things get done a LOT faster than when you're working w/ a GUI.

I'll stop talking now. If you;ve gotten this far, thanks for reading.

-Drea

[neufelry]

there were a myriad of reasons before i started. Price, exploration, etc. Now that I've made the move i will be staying because of many more things: Community, repositories, powe.

[lazyart]

For me it was a curiousity that just grew and grew. I still have my Windows boxes (actually I run a 2003 server and 4 XP clients for the wife and kids) and occasionally have to log into my other box for something, but it's rare. I really have a lot of fun with Ubuntu... it just does more and more than I thought it would (I think I kept my expectations low and therefore have allowed myself to be amazed) and it's really not that hard-- just understand that the terminal is your friend. Even MS has realized this and is beefing up their commandline tools in the next Server release, but I digress... The licensing for Vista is not the reason I made the move, but it's a good reason to not venture back to Windows.

I just put Feisty on a spare machine (2 Ghz P4, 512 RAM) and it's amazing. The install is just so freakin' quick compared to an XP setup (I've yet to install Vista but I can't image it's faster) that it's almost unreal. And OMG, Beryl!

I surf, and email and run the Open Office apps. I really don't need a whole lot of processing power anyway. I'm a certified IT pro and spend all day in Windows. I come home and relax in Ubuntu. It's a beautiful thing.

[raymac46]

I have two aging Dell Dimension 4100 desktops that were running Windows Me. When support ended for that O/S I upgraded one of them to XP. I didn't want to pay for another XP license so I got a free Breezy CD from a local computer shop.
I've since learned about downloads and ISO burning, so my second old desktop now runs Feisty and connects via a wireless PCI card.
I found an even older Pentium II laptop at a recycling depot - beautiful shape but struggling to run Windows 95.
I installed a lightweight Linux distro on it so now I have 3 antiques - one XP and two Linux systems.
The laptop is now even wireless - amazing when you think that it originally connected to the net with a 56K modem.
I don't know how I'd have resurrected the two old PCs without Linux. XP was too expensive and the old laptop would have had trouble even running it. :-P

[tbrminsanity]

I started my full conversion to Ubuntu through school. I needed a fast OS that I could do simple word processing on, and it had to support all the common file types out there (doc, corel, LaTeX, etc). I started with Xubuntu. I quickly became impressed by the extra things my crappy laptop (compaq armada 1750) could do with Xubuntu that it would die doing with Windows. I then took the plunge to Ubuntu and it still surprises me every day. I now find that I don't use Windows anymore. Even my wife (a proud windows users since the DOS days) has taken the plunge over to Ubuntu. And with WINE I can run all my Windows programs that I can't live without (WOW, Civ 4, Sims 2, Nero, and quicktime).

[BobSongs]

Aww, let me take a crack at this. Okay, let's review the question: "What would cause one to leave Windows for Ubuntu?"

Now to answer it and then add some comments.

First I want to say that I don't have the time to review every posted comment. I figure the person who posted this question (you know who you are) is interested in finding answers. So, here's mine.

Attacks
I agree with some of the posts I have read so far: rootkits, spyware, malware, popups, trojans, 114,000 viruses, and the general crud (I've heard it called "cruft") that lines the hard drive and eventually causes 2.5 minute boot up times and extremely slow responses. This sort of thing might push some people to move away from Windows. But in most cases they just bring their PCs in to be "fixed". And they're right back where they started.

Overspending
Price is a consideration as well. Some are looking at the pricing situation and are quite unimpressed with the idea of paying for Vista in order to get less than what XP offered along with a slower system. But most people just end up inheriting Vista because it's sprayed on to the new PC's hard drive.

Freedom
DRM issues, software activation, all that stuff. Yeah. Some folks will switch because of these reasons. But I find that only people who actually think and learn are concerned about these issues.

But these are not major problems with your rank-and-file PC user. You know who I'm talking about: the dude that clicks the red X in an embedded web page ad because he thinks he's closing a box, loads the link it represents and has no clue how he got to this page. The one who thinks DRM is a medical practitioner.

Many PCs sit in people's homes today because they think they need one. My neighbor has been using his XP box for a couple of years. Had a problem he asked me to look at. My first thought? What antivirus is he running? What anti-spyware has he got installed? Answer? None. This is the type of user that will merrily carry on buying Vista because... it's... well... isn't everyone using Windows? Linux is at best "compatible with nothing" and at worst: unheard of.

Though my interest in Linux dates back a few years this is what made me switch from Windows to Linux.

The Switch
Some Linux user friends of mine were always pushing me to switch. When I offered resistance they soon switched strategies. They suggested I at least try OpenSource software for Windows: OpenOffice instead of MS Office, Apache instead of IIS, GIMP instead of Photoshop, Inkscape instead of CorelDRAW, and so on. I got constant suggestions for replacement software. Eventually I was running Windows and Open Source software almost exclusively.

Then I gave Breezy Badger a try on my kids PC. I noticed I was spending more time on that box than my XP machine. Soon my XP machine was a dual boot with more and more time spent in Ubuntu.

Today XP is still there. But I've been contemplating a full elimination. After a bit of a clean up I honestly don't have any reason to keep it around. And that frees up a few more Gb for Linux use.

Remember: Microsoft believes in Winning Against Linux the Smart Way (http://www.jejik.com/sander/temp/linuxpersonas.swf) (note their own word "Against"). Our influence on others has to have some level of strategy too.

[Dougie187]

For me:

1. Working Media Center
2. Better game support

Those are some good points, I believe there are some linux alternatives for Media Centers. Also there is plenty of game support for windows games with linux. You can look into Crossover office, wine, and Cedega. All of those allow you to install windows programs into linux and run them.

[croxi]

getting away from MSWin was the best thing for me simply because I didn't like how they were continually trying to control every aspect of the OS and that wasn't good enough for me. It made me think that they only act like that because they're scared of something, and it dawned on me, they're scared about the fact that so many people, who they rely upon to provide them with revenue, are disillusioned with MSWin and want something different, something that isn't just designed to make us pay through the nose for things, when there are so many alternatives out there that are surprisingly free to use and are good programs on the whole.
I read somewhere that people in power only lose their control of something when they squeeze too hard and the control that they rely upon starts to slip away and they end up losing altogether, and that is what I see the Empire of Evil, which is Microsoft, doing in the end.

They know that they are running an unstable, exposed, corrupt OS and they are so blind that they won't accept that they need to change to keep ahead of the rest of the business community. Ok, MS is the most lucrative business venture in history but how long will it last if so many people are willing to take the plunge, walk away from the clutches of MS and try something that is far more inviting (because its free)

Ok, I'm spent...

[shadowfx78]

I too left windows due to the control issues as well as the spyware n virus bologna and of course the infamous BSOD. I too love the freedom that linux namely kubuntu gives me. I learn new things every day about the operation of my computer. when i first started using linux i did a dual boot with xp and like many others here i found myself hardly ever logging into xp only to play a game here n there. I finally made the decision to go full linxu and havent looked back since. Im going to ponder to my college to see how much they spend in a year on windows and see if they will give linux namely ubuntu or such a try. I have always used firefox, thunderbird and many other freeware programs on windows and still use the same thing on linux as well as the awesome OpenOffice which puts M$ office to shame.

[nuser101]

Well, it wasn't a virus or malware that caused me to switch. It was the pain of re-installation of Windows after two disk crashes in four years. XP Pro, even with SP2 installed, always assumes the re-installer is trying to pirate a copy of Windoze. Even with ASR recovery disks in hand, the recovery failed, because my new hard drive was 320 G instead of 250. Try booting to ASR several times and watch it reformat a large drive to a smaller size for reasons that are beyond me. It takes days to recovery, even when you have all of your files backed up. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Even worse, one of my recoveries was to a USB drive. Big mistake, because rebooting to an ASR remaps the drives. You guessed it, "You do not have access to ASR on this drive." I've been down that road for the last time.

Crash Ubuntu, and you're running again within two hours. Screw DRM, and the operating systems that consider DRM to be more important than the end user experience.

Having said that, I had made a similar decision a couple of years ago, but the Linux drive experience was too painful, and I lived with the Redmond devil until now. Feisty seems to have gotten it right. I'll be using both systems until I'm more comfortable with package dependencies. After that I won't give Windows the boot, I'll just make sure I don't boot it!

[Ripfox]

I use linux because it's low-fat and it tastes good with toast.

[Brian Levy]

For me it is natural as I started in computers with a Tandy II with TRSDOS and moved to a 16 and Xenix, a derivative of UNIX made for smaller computers. When MSDOS was released I looked at it, shrugged my shoulders wondering why the fuss and stayed with Xenix. I moved to an Intel based machine and SCO Xenix and then SCO UNIX when SCO was really a software company. At the time their wordprocess (Lyrix) apps was far better than either Wordperfect or Wordstar. They sold Multiplan that could integrate with Lyrix and there was a seamless port of the Precedent Legal System. There was nothing like Precedent for DOS for some time until Precedent finally released. I had to program a menu system for the staff using shell and used BSD accounting. When Windows 3.0 came out, I looked at it, shook my head and held pat. When Windows 3.1 came out, looked at it, shook my head and held pat. When I decided to get a bankruptcy program, I found they were only available in DOS so added VIP/IX to my Xenix and kept on chugging. Added a modem for Westlaw, added terminals in about 15 minutes while DOS users could not get Westlaw except by leasing expensive West terminals and even had internal e-mail.

I did finally move to Windows when SCO abandoned its core business and the web and browsers appeared and the need for networking disappeared when I retired. I remember reading about Linux in the old days and wondered why anyone would go to all that trouble when Xenix and UNIX was there. At the time, it seemed the only thing holding these systems back was shrink wrapped applications. This was the secret to the success of DOS systems and not the system itself.

From time to time I've downloaded Linux and tried OS/2 Warp. OS/2 was interesting and could have been a Windows successor had resources been really dedicated to developing it. Linux seemed interesting but I saw not particular reason to move to it from Windows. Also, Windows was required to run my current business software. It seemed Linux for me now was better suited to a nonbusiness environment and with each update seemed to come closer to loading and working with my hardware. With Ubunto, it all has seemed to come together hardware wise with my laptop and worked without having to fuss around downloading files to get things to work. It even worked out of the box with the wireless card and picked up missing codecs for mp3 and video playback. I use OpenOffice at work and Firefox so working with Linux with these apps presents no problems. Previously I reinstalled Windows on the laptop but now will leave Ubunto on it. The next project will be to see if it will install on my home desktop. If it does, I may leave it there also.

The only problem I now have is that I am using a MS 5.0 based PPC and there seems to be nothing in Linux as an alternative to ActiveSync.

So where early on Xenix and UNIX was my main system and business OS, now Linix will be my nonbusiness OS and where Windows was my personal OS at home, Linux will be my personal OS at home.

If the Wine project ever gets working this can change.

[mlentink]

The only problem I now have is that I am using a MS 5.0 based PPC and there seems to be nothing in Linux as an alternative to ActiveSync.


You may want to read The Holy Grail (http://engtech.wordpress.com/2006/08/11/the-holy-grail-of-synchronization-how-to-synchronize-microsoft-outlook-multiple-locations-google-calendar-gmail-ipod-and-mobile-phone-with-funambol-scheduleworld/)...

[mlentink]

For me?

After last month's 'feature upgrades', when I logged into the NT-domain at work, all of a sudden it told me my perfectly legal copy of Office 2003 was 'not installed for the current user', even though it was installed for all users on my notebook. Just one annoyance of the many. Every month I cross my fingers for the monthly day-of-doom, when Microsoft sends out it's latest batch of patches. My system may get more secure, but it ain gettin' more stable...
And that's all within one version of the OS.
Now with Ubuntu, I upgraded from Dapper to Edgy to Feisty without a single problem.

Next issue: speed and system resources. I am self-employed and do not want to invest in more potent hardware all the time. I typing this on a 1,2 Ghz Compaq Evo with 512 MB of RAM (yeah, I know, no Beryl). But in my experience itś just as fast as my wife's 2.7GHz WinXP box with a Gig of memory.

So. Ubuntu saves me money. And anguish.
It's better for my heart. It's what the doctor ordered.

[Brightbelt]

I thought I'd respond to this thread becasue I'm actually in the first cusp of curiosity right now. I just recently for the first time installed Ubuntu. I'm fairly good with software and a lot of computer stuff, but I'm a real newbie to Linux and a non-techie/non-coder at heart.

I just set up a dual boot with Vista/Ubuntu on an older Gateway Pent 4 laptop which I no longer use. It was just pure curiosity and to see if I could do it since I'm not a Techie. I actually love Vista. Well there is a love/hate thing there too. I did have problems with Vista at first and had to get a different brand graphics card, but once I did that, Vista ran just fine.

I was very surprised that the Ubuntu install went flawlessly - no video card problems or anything. I had some very good assistance from the forums. I am also surprised at how lean Ubuntu is, yet it also comes with OpenOffice and other applications...pretty powerful for free software.

I am also surprised how hard it is to get some things working, like wireless. I've tried Network Manager and other Wi-Fi software included with Ubuntu to install. I also tried installing Wicd and it won't install, even though I correctly uninstalled Network Manager first.

I've looked into drivers and posted about this as well... I can't get my DVD-rw mounted because I don't know how. I posted on that and got no response.

Not to be offensive here, but I do have some, well ...concerns... Seeing all the posts here and elsewhere makes me wonder how Linux users can claim that all this is more operational and easier to get going than Windows.

I've spent more time trying to find the right Linux wireless driver than it takes for me to find and install all of my windows drivers.

I do give credit that a fellow Linux User suggested I switch from WEP wireless protection to WPA. Windows had all this new protection and connection going in a snap, while with Linux,....well still looking for drivers and/or for the right wireless program. (In case anyone can help, I have a Broadcom 802.11g wireless with an Intel(R) Pro/1000CTconnection. I already tried the e1000-7.5.5 driver)

I guess my point is, that Linux does take a lot of dedication. It's not for the timid. And I feel after getting a taste of Ubuntu and trouble-shooting therein that there is really just as much hype on both sides - Linux and Windows.

I'll continue with this Linux project and just take it slowly I guess and see where all this goes. I do thank those who offer assistance,

Frank

[MOS95B]

Having used Vista on my home pc and notebook since early betas, I am all of a sudden curious as to the advantages of putting Ubuntu on my laptop. I am thinking of a dual boot as there are some pc games that I play when I travel, and feel they won't run/work in Ubuntu.

Curious as to what the "type" of person is who moves from windows to say, ubuntu, and why?
I know a lot of windows apps would not work (and I would have to find different / new apps to replace what I use in windows)....but just wondering from those who have used windows in the past, what made you switch over.

Honsestly, may main reason for switching was simple. For the fun of it. Nothing better to do. Bored.

Granted, it runs better than XP did on my old laptop. I like free. I like tinkering with my computer.

But, I am not an Anti_MS Zealot. They do some marginal, if not flat out evil, stuff to maintain their "superiority". They are way too expensive and restrictive lately. But, I didn't leave Windows because it was Windows. I left Windows because I was bored with it. I had done everything with the appearance, tweaking, and whatnot that I felt safe doing. I had tried Ubuntu before (the release prior to Feisty), and some folks in another forum I frequent got to talking about the new release and the deal with Dell. So, I figured "What the heck. I don't play games on this machine. I already verified it knows all the hardware on my laptop last time. I have another machine to run WinXP on. Let's play...."

Not nearly as morally or technically satisfaying as most of these good folks' reasoning, but it's the truth.

[mjbeam]

A few years ago I was working on a fairly complex Excel workbook with a lot of macros. I had been working on it for several days, saving my work every hour or so with new version numbers. Eventually I closed the file and later in the day decided to open it up and make a few minor cosmetic changes. The file wouldn't open. It had somehow become corrupt.

No problem I thought. I have dozens of previous versions saved. I'll just open a slightly older version. Hmm, the previous version is corrupt too. So was the next one, and the next and the next. I had to go back a few days before I found one that wasn't corrupt. How could this be? Well, it turns out that you can save a corrupt Excel file and get no error. The only way to know that it's corrupt is to close it and try to reopen it. I had been unknowingly saving and updating a corrupt workbook for several days.

I checked around the web and found companies that said they could recover my file for me for about $300. Nice. Microsoft's craptastic programming had enabled an entire industry to spring up and take advantage of those of us foolish enough to trust our data to Redmond. I really wanted to get my data and code back though so after a little more research I found that the latest version of Excel was supposed to be able to recover corrupt files. I bought it for about $100 and was able to recover the file.

This never version of Excel was advertised as being more robust. I didn't find it to be any more robust. If anything it was less stable. It would randomly crash a few times a day. But, it did automatically save your file every few minutes. I decided that I could no longer trust my data and personal information to a multi-billion dollar company, whose software (that runs on their own operating system) crashes so much that they have to autosave your files every few minutes to mitigate the damage. How pathetic is that?

I still have to use Windows at work and I do have Vista on my new Gateway Tablet PC that I use for school (until I can find something that I can replace it with) but I only use it when I have no other option. It's just not ready for the desktop.


-Mike

[jefuchs]

I haven't read all the posts here, but I'll give my answer, which is likely repeat info of other posts.

When I boot to Windows (which I can still do), I have to wait for all sorts of ancillary programs to load. I have anti-virus software, and anti-spyware stuff, and Windows Automatic Updates reminders bouncing all over the place. Despite this protection, I still have popups from malware that I can't get rid of. Never happens in Linux!

Windows has made billions producing an inferior product, while Linux hands out a better one for free. Look at the layers of labor that goes into Windows. First, there's an industry that creates the OS and applications, this spawned a second, underground industry whose job is to exploit the holes left by the first industry. Then a third industry evolved to defeat the attempts of the second ones, none of which would be needed if the first guys had done a good job to start with. (They also guard their code like rabid dogs, which prevents others from finding fixes as in an open-source-type model)

MS releases generation after generation of Windows, with full knowledge of vast security problems, but never goes back to the drawing board to make a truly secure product. At this point, they have to take into consideration how many jobs would be lost if they made a better product. Those anti-virus companies have payrolls too, you know. The guys at Norton, Ad-Aware, etc. would lose their jobs if MS made a secure OS. (Sleep well, guys. MS has no plans to cut into your territory). Meanwhile I'm browsing the web all I want, even Russian websites, without worries.

With all of these problems, they STILL have the nerve to demand a high price for their OS. And, of course, the applications are often expensive. Linux, OTOH, is free, as are its applications.

Another issue. New Windows versions demand more and more advanced hardware. Sure, you could run Win 3.x on your old computer, but they don't distribute it anymore, and there are no apps available for it. I'm not sure my old PC can even run Vista. Ubuntu works great. Why spend hundreds of dollars for new hardware, just so I can run the new expensive software, and still have problems?

[starcraft.man]

Just a question but ummm, shouldn't this dicussion topic be in the cafe/backyard/os talk? I mean I thought the beginner section was for getting people started... just saying, don't bite my head off please >.>

[readitsideways]

... windows

[dptxp]

microsoft.

Xp is gone and I am too poor to have the hardware for Vista.

I do not like bloated software either.

And I want to learn Linux, program in it.

It is open source.

[silent1643]

i left windows mainly because i wanted something new..i am one of those guys who loves testing out new software, web applications, and the like. So for me installing linux ubuntu was a learning experience.. and just so happens that i like it so much that i dont use windows anymore. Plus you feel less limited or connected to linux than windows. You dont have constant reminders to register a program poping up or unwanted services starting up or running in the background.

like others have said, if your an big time video gamer, i would do a dual boot xp and linux and save xp for your most liked games.

[Chilli Bob]

I just got sick of Windows.

I got sick of meaningless error messages that give no advice on how to solve the problem. Or if it does take you to a Microsoft page, the solution provided either doesn't work, or is compleately the wrong link, or as is happening more and more lately, takes you to a dead link. I hate the way that it tells me I have to download service pack two, but before I can I have to prove who I am via genuine advantage, only to spend 40 mins downloading SP2, to get a "Error: Service Pack 2 did not install" box. That's it. No explanation. No advice on what do do to fix it. I'm sick of endless "Error: The local device name is already in use. The link has not been repaired" messages. I'm sick of other people in the office filling their computers with spyware and asking me to fix it because clicking on the Ad-aware button is too complicated.

And that's just the XP system at work. I was using 98 at home. Top of my hate list for that is.....
- Cant detect new usb hardware, even with install disks.
- Can't detect old usb stuff it used to detect with no problem before.
- Defrager dosn't defrag.
- Disk clean-up doesn't clean disk
- You have to re-boot to clear the print queue
- installing or uninstalling software leaves a trail of unwanted dll all over the drive.
and many more.

I have had none of these problems with Ubuntu.

But what turned me off windows more than anything else is the belief that most people have that if the want to use a computer, they MUST give Microsoft money for the privilege. Well, I owe microsoft nothing, so they get diddly.

(Sorrry about the bad spelling, but I am SERIOUSLY sleep deprived at the moment.)

[punkybouy]

Over the last dozen years I have occasionally tried Linux, starting with Red Hat 4.2 or something like that. I have also used FreeBSD and even a Mac. Over these years I would occasionally try Linux and usually I would find that it was almost there and continue with Windows. About a year ago I stumbled on Ubuntu and installed 5. something and then 6.06 LTS on some old equipment. I was stunned by how much Linux had improved since my previous try. It recognized my RAID SCSI card right off the bat, no need to slip stream drivers. Sound card, on board LAN were all there. I hesitated to switch from Windows as I could not find a good substitute for my home finance package. GNU cash was ok but a little clunky. I decided to use Moneydance and after a week or so of getting that configured I now am off Windows for good. Oh yeah, I now have three home PC's running Ubuntu PLUS one Dell laptop. Kudos to those who have helped to make this distro a first class desktop OS.

[st33med]

Hey I just read through the EULA (Very boring) and found this:

USE WITH VIRTUALIZATION TECHNOLOGIES. You may not use the software installed on the
licensed device within a virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware system.


Uh-oh.:shock: :-&

Did I mention that this was on all but Windows Vista Ultimate and XP??? WTF???

[blackspyder]

Why make the Switch?

1) Your tried of being Bill Gates Pawn
2) You like to be limited only by your skills and imagination on what you can and cannot do with your PC or OS
3)Windows XP takes up your entire HDD leaving only enough space for one measly jpg. (as was my case)

[Duffadash]

Hey I just read through the EULA (Very boring) and found this:

USE WITH VIRTUALIZATION TECHNOLOGIES. You may not use the software installed on the
licensed device within a virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware system.


Uh-oh.:shock: :-&

Did I mention that this was on all but Windows Vista Ultimate and XP??? WTF???

I remember reading through Windows Genuine Advantage's EULA and stopping at this part:
i. Computer Information. The software uses Internet protocols, which sends to Microsoft computer information, such as your Windows XP product key, PC manufacturer, operating system version, Windows XP product ID, PC BIOS information, user locale setting, and language version of Windows XP
ii. Use of Information. We may use the computer information to improve our software and services. We may also share it with others, such as hardware and software vendors. They may use the information to improve how their products run with Microsoft software.
So they're basically stating they're selling information about you to other sources? And not just whether ou've got a genuine version of windows... I mean, why do they wanna know about your BIOS?

[starcraft.man]

I remember reading through Windows Genuine Advantage's EULA and stopping at this part:

So they're basically stating they're selling information about you to other sources? And not just whether ou've got a genuine version of windows... I mean, why do they wanna know about your BIOS?

HA! If you think thats bad, just take a guess how much more Google knows about your personal life just from knowing your IP and what you "google" for :p And they don't even give you a EULA :p

[chili555]

We may use the computer information to improve our software and services.Heh! Do you have popularity-contest installed? Know what it does? Tried to remove it?

Nevertheless, I would never go back to Windows.

[Duffadash]

HA! If you think thats bad, just take a guess how much more Google knows about your personal life just from knowing your IP and what you "google" for :p And they don't even give you a EULA :p

The difference being that Google haven't turned completely assholes yet. For now, they care about their users. It might be naive, but I like to see google like some sorta ally...

Heh! Do you have popularity-contest installed? Know what it does? Tried to remove it?

Nevertheless, I would never go back to Windows.

Yes, it's supposedly installed, no, it's not activated, yes, I just researched it and in all honesty. As long as I trust those who receive the information I don't really give a crud. I do this with the Ubuntu developers, I do not do this with the MS developers. This may sound lame, but I'm not going to trust a company that've coded so bad, AND have screwed me over so many times in the past as much as a community that are equally interested in making the OS as comfortable as possible.

[Billy_McBong]

when i started getting the BSOD for no reason i said screw this in switching to Linux

[spur]

All my windows experience taught me is windows crashes, gets virii and spyware. It also requires constant attention to keep running. I have used Suse and Kubuntu now fro a couple of years and find the freedom from maintenance chores invigorating.
As xp will expire now vista is out and vista costs way too much I will not bother.
The only thing I keep an xp machine for is my dvd creation hobby and when mysoftware for that gets old I will I hope be able to do that with linux too.
I use an xbox for games as it is better than xp or linux for that.
If you can't get windows for free legally why would you get it? Not usability as that is the biggest myth of all.
My opinion is windows is for people who like constantly fiddling with things to keep a system working properly. If you don't Ubuntu/ kubuntu is for you.

[jerrylamos]

1. Ubuntu works (mostly, granted I like using pre-Alpha, Alpha and Beta versions....)
2. Want help? Want advice? Want to know what people are doing? I haven't seen any Windows anything that approaches Ubuntu forums.
3. Attitude - Windows owns XP, Vista, Microsoft Office, ... and they will let you use it if you buy a copy for each computer you run on - and adhere to their rules.
4. Ubuntu? Have a friend who'd like to try? Make him a copy! Contrast that with #3 above.

Cheers, Jerry

[DUDE_2000]

I switched mainly out of curiosity, but also something that would allow my 4 year old computer to run the internet faster, but that needs to be set up.

I still use windows to play games, and (currently) to watch .avi videos

[jaywee]

mostly I think is safety!!so many virus in xp!!

[xthund3rh3adx]

because windows sucks! Ubuntu long live!

[Cappy]

I moved to Ubuntu because I can see the source of everything I do. Sometimes I just like to see how something works. WINE/Cedega takes care of all my gaming needs so I don't have Windows installed anymore.

[Acksys]

why?

Because it's there.

[st33med]

Man, I wonder at times whether M$ will erase my Linux partition one night w/out me knowing at all. I have a dual-boot, and I think someday, they will pull off something that stupid to eliminate competition, and they'll say, "Oh, it was a virus that could fry your computer, send information out to the Internet, and read your mind!!1!!". I then would go up to court, sue M$ so badly that they ended up living in cottages.:twisted:

But what will happen to the non-evil Xbox?:(

[benditlikebecker13]

I made the switch this weekend. I did it mainly to get more life out of a 3 year old computer. So far I am thrilled I did it. I had a lot of problems while trying to install with a dual boot, didn't feel like researching and had all my impotant files backed up. So I just said eff it and reformatted my HD with Unbuntu only.

It is so much faster on my PC than XP was its just silly. Something like reparing a game I downloaded from newsgroups took 5 to 10 minutes on XP and takes literally 1 to 2 minutes in Linux. Granted, not everything worked out of the Box (getting MP3 and overall sound was a bit difficult) but with some quick searching on the net or this forum and you can fix damn near any problem ASAP.

DO IT!

[deadguy87]

Having used Vista on my home pc and notebook since early betas, I am all of a sudden curious as to the advantages of putting Ubuntu on my laptop. I am thinking of a dual boot as there are some pc games that I play when I travel, and feel they won't run/work in Ubuntu.

Curious as to what the "type" of person is who moves from windows to say, ubuntu, and why?
I know a lot of windows apps would not work (and I would have to find different / new apps to replace what I use in windows)....but just wondering from those who have used windows in the past, what made you switch over.

I have had a little more then taste of Vista. I would say benefits of using Ubuntu or any of the official derivatives is that it's faster, unless you have hardware issues, which with a new laptop you may have. Very customizable, compareded to any windows version, Windows just can't compare. But I do find myself sitting in windows XP being that they are about matched and on my laptop I have to choose between sound or internet when I boot into Ubuntu.

[ugm6hr]

My new Acer Aspire 5051AWXMi comes with Vista Home and only 512MB RAM, which is absolutley unusable. Have ordered some extra RAM, to allow Vista use (I need Microsoft to sync properly with my Windows Mobile PDA), but having gotten everything on the laptop to work with Xubuntu (apart from the ENE memory stick reader), I think I'll be staying in Linux for most of my work. The fact that I have instant free access to every program I could ever want is also a bonus.

[adwatkin19]

I hated using windows since forever, and it has only been recently i have had the availabilty of equipment and the time to get the whole linux thing together to give it a try. i spent some time getting used to the interface and left my system as a dual boot just incase things went bad. I quickly found that ubuntu surpassed my experiences of windows in every way, it works OUT OF THE BOX, no need to mess with drivers and the like, well at least not for me. i can mount NTFS drives and read/write with them, i have access to all of my companies network, the software is free and more often than not, better than the equiv in windows.

Then on top of this there is ability to customise ANYTHING to what ever you want.

You also have an awesome and massive support community, the windows support community seemed lax, and not very effective.

I find linux suits my needs far better than windows, and can eaily and quickly provide me with the tools to do anything i need. I only have to get my Windows Mobile 5 device to sync with my ubuntu box and im golden.

hope this helps

Adwatkin19

[nvteighen]

Mainly, the reason that Windows seems to have a countdown to crash. I've noticed that all my Windows systems begin to behaive strangely in 5-6 months of regular and end crashing one year later. This means, no Windows survives longer than one and a half year... Only with a bit of luck and serious mantainance, I had been able to make a Windows install work properly for 2 years.

Excluding my favorite Windows version (3.11), WinXP SP2 has been stable... compared with its predecesor... WinME

[SomethingCronic]

Ubuntu has become my primary OS since January, but I've been playing around with it since dapper. I was orginally using Xp and moved onto Vista when I got the chance - but was hugely dissapointed in it. (has anyone looked at the service list in Vista? All those DRM protected content services and such using MY hardware to work for corporations rather than me! And as for WoW experiance, how shameful that my computer runs slower when using Aero yet Beryl is 100x better with no lag).

Anyway, The I wanted to learn more and keep my interest in computers fresh - Linux does this for me. At the start it's annoying not being able to find the program you need, but it's about changing old habits - I now find it just as easy to find what I want on Ubuntu as I have done on Windows all these years.

I rip my DVD collection and CDs to my NAS box, If I'd registered the software to do this on Windows I would be skint, as it is, I get these products free and I beleive better than on a Vista based system.

Another reason for the switch was using Cisco VPN. The client didn't work for Vista but did for Ubuntu - after than I had no reason to stick with Windows except... The odd computer game. Currently Vista has a 60GB partition reserved for games that I occasionally boot into. It's annoying, but maybe if the PS3 goes well I might get one (PC for Work, Console for Games) - I can install ubuntu on that too. :)

Only by using Ubuntu for some time have I come to appreciate how poor Vista is.

Mike

[misfitpierce]

cause winblows errr windows is just not a good OS... your killing your ram as it is just to run antivirus, antispyware, firewall.... so on.... not worth the hardware or time

[brim4brim]

I'm duel booting and with the latest release of Ubuntu, it has become my main OS. In previous releases I used to install it, play with it then leave it.

I have XP Pro on my laptop and got sick of all the annoying things in windows like having to upgrade everything manually, an inconsistent user interface, bad networking support. About the only thing I use windows for now is HL2 which I could probably get going under WINE if I really wanted to.

I've found the latest version of Ubuntu easier to use than any other OS I've used before (OSX/Windows/etc.. going back to DOS). I'm not a Terminal junkie and am firmly of the opinion that there should be GUI options to edit almost everything and that you should just be able to double click something to install it if you run into it online. Ubuntu now has all these features and more.

Having used previous versions of Ubuntu there are times when you expect hassle doing something but with 7.04, I've not had any problems whatsoever. Everything is easy to do and just works.

[jerryz]

I got tired of the blue screen of death most every day. I use RedHat as my dev platforn at work so the change seemed to be a natural progression.

[nanotube]

I'm duel booting and with the latest release of Ubuntu, it has become my main OS.

duel booting? is that like, you let the OS's fight it out for who's going to be booted at any given time? that would be cool, OS fight! :lolflag:

[tyboon]

In one Word...... FREEDOM ......

You really get rid of all kinds of software that just keep piling up to your hard disk.....
Ububtu is a really powerfull software for all kind of users....giving many possibilities and in combination with the forum the know how in using all sort of stuff...

But.... the most important.... i really hate the idea how MS is manipulating users around the world forcing them to upgrade hardware..software...asking them to spend a good deal of money for a product that is clearly overrated .....

I installed ubuntu cause i was curius and really i havent regret it so far....In the contrary i actually feel like i left from a room and i stepped into the world....

[nuser101]

Trying to recover from a windows disk crash, even if you have an ASR set in hand. If you've changed ANYTHING about your hardware configuration (eg. number of drives, drive size, additional peripheral, ANYTHING), lots of luck to you. I went through two disk crashes in the 7 years since I first started fooling around with Linux. The last of these was last month, and I then left the "I, am the God of OS, the only true God of OS, whilst you are a thief and thou shalt not have multiple installs" mentality of Windows behind me.

[beanco]

I was fed up with being forced to use MS since that is what everybody else round here uses.


I tried the ubuntulive cd and fell in love with the look and feel... I have problems, since I am still new to this whole linux ting but I am loving. I really like the help availble on these forums!!!!

Never had such luck on any Ms stuff...


Robi

ps. price... well I have never met anybody in hungary that has paid for MS stuff... I get it free as a university teacher but most ppl just get a disk from a friend and install it or, hav eit installed by some one with the patience to install xp or vista....

[astromech]

Stability,Cost ,Security .Microsoft thinks it owns everyone's computer.Well it dosen't own mine! And it works better because of it! With windows the maintenance was endless! I had to defrag twice a week.The real seller was how well my computer worked ! I had tried others but right away (even though the live cd is slower than installed ) I was impressed at how everything worked.Personally i think Windows is a gaming OS.Linux for everything else ...and games too!!!

[krazyenglishman]

It's Safe, It's Secure and when using it youfeel you are doing your part for a community who not only appreciates your input and usage, But you're sticking one to the man lol

I've been a dos/windows user all my life, Recently i did a standard restart with my XP based system and it would no longer boot. i reinstalled XP to a second drive and that wouldn't see the original drive at all.

I booted with ubuntu live cd and it not only saw it, but i could transfer from it too. It saved months of work and alot of time for me.

I decided to install it to a fresh drive and i've had no problems with it since, no slowdown effects ( unlike xp )
everything is quick, updates dont force you to restart or even to look at there annoying popups.

Also you dont have the activation problems with linux. i've reinstalled my xp 9 times in a year period, I have one more left before i have to call ms for a new code.

so when i'm asked " why are you using ubuntu? " i say ... Freedom

[PuppyFromHell]

The first time I actually realized what Linux was was during a C++ programming course I took last semester. The real reason I actually installed it was laziness. I had an old Dell that had somehow accumulated 153 infections of all sorts, and had rendered it almost unusable. I figured, hey let's bring this computer back to life. Eventually I went to a friend and asked him about it, he pointed me to a couple sites and gave me a 6.06 liveCD. I tried it out and was amazed by the features it had to offer. I've never really liked the startbar and have preferred the Mac OSX style bar at the top and dock at the bottom, but I didn't want to shell out $1000 dollars for their single-button notebooks (although the magnetic latches are really sweet :D.) So I backed up all the data remotely using another dell and installed Ubuntu. I went with the manual partitioning because I wanted to be completely sure of what I was doing, however it turned a twenty-minute installation into an hour long one because I had no idea what I needed to do, and spent a lot of time researching how to partition the drive correctly. To make a long story short I loved it, especially being able to customize everything and the ease of installing software. At first I was scared of the terminal because of some bad experiences with cmd but after a while I fell completely in love with it. Now I can't imagine life without it. I currently have 7 or 8 DE/WM on there including e17, fluxbox, metisse, and looking glass but fluxbox is definately my favorite. I use fluxbox the most because it's so much fun to customize and after you get used to the text files is incredibly easy to customize. Instead of searching for the file in Thunar (which btw is far superior to Nautilus) and opening it with gedit all I have to do is hit F6 to open a terminal and type "nano .fluxbox/'whatever'" and make the changes. Now I have Ubuntu on my Inspiron notebook and am still a dedicated fluxbox user (although I'm trying to figure out how I installed e17 before and am stuck doing it from http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=97199&highlight=E17+cvs.) I also love the fact that if I crash Ubuntu I know it's something that I did and not something hidden or mysterious. The only Windows horror story I have is when XP BSoD'd on my CE-IV mp3 player and completely fried it. I'm also still trying to get my mom to use firefox or Opera (<--my preferred) instead of IE6. Anyways I'm seriously hoping that FOSS and Linux catch on to more people soon.

I also love the support on these forums, I can get answers to everything I need here amazingly fast.

[Sspankyy]

What would cause me to fully switch? Lets see...

First off... I'll let you know that even though I've been poking around Ubuntu for about a Year, (off and on), I still consider myself Kinda new.

I'd fully switch for a little more compatibility.... Hardware and software. I say that, and must also point out that there are some things that I can ONLY do with Ubuntu... <like recover files from "corrupted" drives> (even when the computer store guys say "impossible")

There are a lot of things that WINE just can't do, at least not for me... (yet...) Most games that I like, and that Damned CD that AT&T gave me for when my Internet connection goes Wicky-Wacky... <mostly useless, but sometimes works>

There are a couple hardware issues also... I had to replace the Wireless card in my laptop, because It wasn't supported by linux.. ( It could be made to work... by someone more experienced... <I even posted about it>) But, that being said, When I switched cards, I noticed that I could see Networks MUCH farther away from the source... I had found a better card! Without being forced to, I'd never have upgraded to this WONDERFUL card!

I'm still poking away, learning what I can in my spare time... I will NEVER willingly go to Vista, so that is not a concern... I'm here to stay... I'm devoted to doing what I can to free myself from the grip of Microsoft...

In the end, I must say... Give Me Knowledge, and Time... I will Fully convert... I'm on my way..


Scott



Dell Inspiron B130 1.5Ghz 768MB RAM Feisty/XP
Dell <mobo> L@66r 1.1Ghz 256MB RAM Feisty/XP/98

[jorluiseptor]

Very interesting observation about other users in Europe.

[Kubunteando]

For me the key is security.

I don't dare anymore to use my Internet Banking service with Windows.
With Linux I feel safe, although I also have an anti-virus for Linux plus a firewall.

When I start Windows I unplug the network and I shutdown the wireless card.

An even so, sometimes... ;-)

[misfitpierce]

Theres too many reasons to list :)

[mcduck]

I never liked Windows. I was quite happy with DOS, but Windows never worked the way I wanted and I had to spend lots of time configuring it and replacing different components with better ones, tweaking the user interface and so on. Actually I have replaced the windows UI with some better shell in every Windows version I used. And still I wasn't satisfied. And I was always missing the command line.

Also keeping windows safe and secure took a lot of work.

Linux works more like I like my computer to work. And now I can focus on what I actually want to do with my computer instead of spending all that time just to keep the machine working..

Of course I also like the FOSS ideology more than the corporate-centric way you have to live with if you use Windows and commercial software.

[SPRL]

I bought a used computer from a company and the windows license ran out.(annoying bubbles and no updates) I wasn't going to pay big bucks for Win XP on a 4 year old computer. I was also spending the first 10 to 15 min running scans and cleaning the reg.and de-fraging when it was running (very annoying).

Then I found Ubuntu... I like it and my computer runs great. The only thing I have to complain about is I miss Photoshop CS (I use my Mother in-laws computer for that) and my Cannon all in one is a paperweight.

[LeleJones]

My reasons are purely economics. I have an old machine and do not want to buy a new one soon. Linux is perfect for me because I can use it without upgrade the system (what windows ever need).

I have heard about Linux a few years ago and tried to run it on my machine but, unfortunately, my ADSL USB modem did not work. Ubuntu was the only distro that show me how to set it up and now its working perfectly.

:guitar:

[Ptero-4]

I just just tired of all the crap M$ was doing with their customers and the XP activation was the final straw for me, I just got myself a Mac and gave Billy the finger, then from there going to linux was pretty simple since I wasn't in the rush of leaving windoze b/c I was already away from it.

[buntunub]

Sorry, but are we caring about enticing people to switch from using Windows? Didnt know we were supposed to care about that heheh. Personally, I could give a rats ****. If they want to stay a mindless M$ thrall, then let them! Makes no difference to anyone here that im aware of... What, are we going to get a brownie point for bringing someone in off Windows or something?!

[medley]

Sorry, but are we caring about enticing people to switch from using Windows? Didnt know we were supposed to care about that heheh. Personally, I could give a rats ****. If they want to stay a mindless M$ thrall, then let them! Makes no difference to anyone here that im aware of... What, are we going to get a brownie point for bringing someone in off Windows or something?!

Hey, sorry buddy, but the gentleman asked an honest question. Grow up. What we SHOULD care about is that he is asking the same question(s) you and I were asking at some time in the past. You're coming across as some spoiled brat who joined a special club when you were 12 and then don't want to let anyone else in so you can continue to feel special.

People like you should keep your mouths shut. You have nothing to offer to the community.

[wolfen69]

Sorry, but are we caring about enticing people to switch from using Windows? Didnt know we were supposed to care about that heheh. Personally, I could give a rats ****. If they want to stay a mindless M$ thrall, then let them! Makes no difference to anyone here that im aware of... What, are we going to get a brownie point for bringing someone in off Windows or something?!

no, we don't get brownie points, but i do get a sense of satisfaction knowing that ive helped someone in seeing that there is an alternative to windows.

[esc1]

So many reasons, just a few of mine...

spy-ware (3rd party and MS), having to be connected to net for codecs, how bloated window installs become, ubuntu is more customizable, everything you do in windows you can do for free with ubuntu

[fumduck]

I switched to ubuntu because of ease and security. My wife and I share the same comp Can't tell you the many times I had to reload windows because of dumb viruses, crashes... because I would get calls at work.. "i did something bad".. I am dualbooting now, and the internet surfing is on Linux, she needs to do office/movie on windows.(until she learns). but I don't get crash calls.. I don't want to be the I.T. person for my household.. I want it to work.. If I have to read and learn, but as long as things don't fall apart over a phone call I am happy.

[vexorian]

windows.

[RevThain]

Are you kidding me? I think the question is, Who would keep windows over Ubuntu! lol:lolflag:

[HermanAB]

The only people I ever managed to convince to switch to Linux (or Mac) did so to get away from the Windows virus and crapware problems.

Most people however, are perfectly happy managing their viruses and crapware on Windows and are very adept at it. They simply don't believe that it is better on the far side of the hill.

[robtg]

The day I have to upgrade to Vista or its successor, I'll leave Windows and hope for the best with Linux. Until then, I "mess around" with Ubuntu on my spare laptop but I don't feel I can abandon XP just yet.

If Intuit would publish Quicken for Linux it would make me more serious about Linux

[asmoore82]

The day I have to upgrade to Vista or its successor, I'll leave Windows and hope for the best with Linux. Until then, I "mess around" with Ubuntu on my spare laptop but I don't feel I can abandon XP just yet.

If Intuit would publish Quicken for Linux it would make me more serious about Linux

http://www.gnucash.org/ ~ available in apt/Synaptic

[HermanAB]

Hmm, Quicken runs on Wine. I have been running Quickbooks on Wine since 2002. Another option is VMware or Virtualbox and run Windows in a Window.

[Permanent Beginner]

If you like puzzles and games, and like fooling around with options, and have either a paranormal connection with computers or a lot of time on your hands, you'd like Linux.

If you need your pc to work for you instead of you working for it, you'd be happier with Windows.

Windows is fat and comes from an obnoxious family but Linux will get mad at you and she won't tell you why.

PB

[vexorian]

haha, yeah right.



Windows: - Look, I will just freeze during my loading image, this could be because you just installed AVG, you left a CD in the drive or I just don't like some new driver you installed, take a guess of what's happening.

Windows: - Look, I just made you unable to change your wallpaper, this is probably because you got malware, please reformat your drive and uninstall me.

Windows: - Thanks for installing me, now I can't detect ANY of your hardware besides some basic screen support at lowest resolution possible, your mouse and your keyboard, please waste your whole afternoon installing drivers.

Windows: - Thanks for manually installing your drivers, now I am totally useless without any software, please spend other 5 hours installing useful software.

Windows: - Errr, don't DARE to use the web before installing firewall, antivirus, and antispyware, please use an extra hour installing those.

Windows: - Sorry, but protection comes with a cost, now I'll be 3 times slower!

Windows: - You have installed an antivirus, but I don't support it, so I will keep complaining about how you did not install an antivirus!

Windows: - I am not allowing you to change the wallpaper, this is probably because you got malware, please reformat your drive and reinstall me. And no, it is not my fault that even the most modern shields do not protect you against all the things that can do evil things to me...

--

Ubuntu: - order the CD and install me.
Ubuntu: - Look, I have detected all your hardware.
Ubuntu: - You can now use OpenOffice, TheGimp, browse the web, etc. Enjoy your computer!.

--
In my own experience windows involves much more tweaking and configuring time than ubuntu.



...
But hell, seriously, if you want your computer to work for you, you'd Linux much better, it has some things that seriously improve your efficiency, unlike windows and the totally single threaded interface that won't help you for any serious thing.

[schaefscha]

It's for free... as are about 99% of all the software applications.
It's easy to install/ uninstall software (no software leftovers in an almost unaccessible Registry).
No viruses and similar threats.
You can modify the software to absolutely fit your needs.
Runs fast even on older processors.
Has great and FREE support.
The users community is really helpful to answer to newbies questions.
And is just beautiful!!!

I've switched about 3 years ago (after even trying MacOsX ). And as a biomedical scientist I was able to find all the data analysis software I needed for my experiments for free. If I was using Windows/Mac I'd be spending thousands of dollars a year to pay for software licenses, and would get lousy support and bug-filled software. It also motivated me to create my own algorithms to speed-up my data analysis.

And if you like gaming there are still a lot of Linux based games, and a lot of applications to allow you to run your windows games.

Just dare to make the move... you'll see there will be no going back.
And about using Windows Vista... why pay for a Linux imitations when you can get the real stuff for free????

[Wiebelhaus]

I've been professionally supporting , repairing , fighting with windows platform for about 5 years A ruff estimate would be about 2500 - 3000 Windows Computers fixed in any of those years.

I Vehemently despise windows , Spewing stomach acids , cursing , attempting to kill it on a daily basis , Once someone sets up a linux box and gets everything worked out in that few hour span of life.... It just freaking works man and that's all anyone wants.

[xpod]

Now,one year on i know now why i stay with Ubuntu but all of those great reasons where really neither here nor there to me during those first days and weeks i dont think.

I mean, i did`nt even have the slightest idea what this new thing was that i`d stumbled across in reality.
Other than occasionally seeing the term "Linux" here & there during my 4 previous months using Windows i did`nt actually have any prior knowlage or pre-conceived ideas about Linux/ubuntu one way or another.

As a father(pops) the only reason i even sat down at a computer last year was to hopefully learn enough to keep a house full of kids & their eventual machines all in good order, one year on with Ubuntu i think it`s most certainly job done.

I just seemed like a good idea at the time.....now i know it was a good idea:)

[atomkarinca]

my reason for switching to ubuntu was pirated software. i was using so much that if i had to pay for each one of them it would cost me an easy 20.000 bucks (including windows itself).

then i stumbled upon ubuntu (dapper drake). i loved it, i mean literally loved it. not just i don't use pirated software anymore, i even contribute. i never doubted it a second.

people brag about how they have to switch their softwares if they use linux but linux community has better programs then that are for windows. and you don't have to pay a dime. i play my favorite games using wine. i don't have to format my harddrive every now and then. i don't have to worry about any malware. i don't have to save my driver cd's anymore. if i lose my ubuntu cd, then i just download the iso or use one of my shipped cd's.

now i distribute my shipped cd's to my friends now and i believe more people will start to use it with vista being on the market.

[jgitz]

At the risk of being burned to a crisp by the inevitable flaming...

Why do we use Windows on the desktop instead of Linux? Here are some of the reasons:

1. No one at the school was ever able to get wireless to work with 7.04. We tried all the tricks and suggestions here but nothing worked. The campus is fully wireless, Ubuntu just can't work here. Windows detects wireless networks automatically and will even connect to them if you want it to. This is 2007 guys, there is no reason to have wireless be such a chore!

2. We do lots of equations on PowerPoints and Word files (science and engineering). Open Office has an equation editor that is one of the worst I have ever seen. Even worse than that, it can't convert MS files that have equations or some symbols. PowerPoints are even worse as the layout goes nuts. No one here has the time to redo everything. No other Linux office software I have seen comes close to OO so we would be dead in the water.

3. Although SciLab does an excellent job, LoggerPro, MathCad, and Inventor don't work at all. The emulators work, sometimes, but too slowly to keep up with our sensors. Inventor never loads at all (a horrible hog in all cases but still...) In other words, software is still a problem.

4. Many drivers don't exist unless you are willing to use them illegally. Try playing a commercial DVD. Forget about it. Yep, its proprietary but DVDs are used all the time in our conceptual science classes.

5. We have never had a virus or spyware infection since the old days of Windows 98. This is a non-issue that is always overblown. MacOS now has an increasing amount of worms and attacks. How far behind is Ubuntu if its popularity increases? Simple software solves the problem. MS is the #1 OS, it will have the #1 number of attempted attacks.

6. We never have the crashes, fatal bugs, or BSOD that so many people here claim to have. Our Windows versions, XP and now Vista, work fine. Of course, we don't go in to "tweak" the system (usually by people who don't have a clue) as these computers are meant to be used, not played with like toys.

7. There is always a strong feeling of "I hate Microsoft" on this forum. Much of it is irrational. Most of the time it really boils down to envy: "I'm smarter than Bill, why does he have all the money?"

Ubuntu has made Linux much more accessible and usable than any other version I have ever used. But it still needs major work with drivers and many bread-and-butter applications other than the basics. There are very good reasons for some users to choose Windows over Ubuntu that have nothing to do with being dupes, jerks, or uninformed. The same goes for those who choose Ubuntu.

[wolfen69]

no maintainance!

[Permanent Beginner]

"But hell, seriously, if you want your computer to work for you, you'd Linux much better, it has some things that seriously improve your efficiency, unlike windows and the totally single threaded interface that won't help you for any serious thing."

If all you're going to do is the stuff on the default applications list, I'll bet it's a snap.

I've been trying to make every successive part of Ubuntu work for a couple of weeks now, and I must be stupid or something because Windows works fine for me and Ubuntu has been a problem at every step. There is no single comprehensive linear instruction manual that I am aware of. It won't see my standard display without repeated reboots. There is no display reference in the device manager, and everything else on the list is "unknown". I'm still trying to find out how to talk it into installing a couple of expanded tarballs. I even had to go into a forum to find out how to turn it off (didn't notice the red button because who ever looks there?) Install instructions assume college-degree fluency and don't bother to give syntaxes. I enter a password and it asks for it back under a different label so I don't know what it's asking for. Application sites offer the program downloads but don't mention dependencies, which nobody coming in knows about anyway. Or if they do, the site doesn't link to them. And on and on.

This Linux thing is at least partly like the Harley thing: " I bought this so I'm cooler than you", but I admit that I like the idea of the Linux framework and I'm kind of enjoying the search for answers just like you. Except there are too many searches and too few answers and scattered documentation and too frequent little walls to protect the in group from the out group.

I expect nothing but insults here but I know where it's coming from, so go ahead.

If anyone is a little more constructive-minded, and can direct me to good tutorials (not written by and for people who already know how to do this), that would be very nice. I need to bulk up on video knowledge, installing tarballs and packages, and dependencies.

Insert insults now.

PB

[por100pre1]

Insert insults now.

PB

):P Glad to see you are still around! It's sad to have seen you having so much trouble (I been witness of many of them), but I applaud your determination =D> . I don't know of any tutorials in english (other than the tutorials in the forums) but I'm sure others will post some. Again, glad to see you are still around! :)

[JewelledDragon13]

For me, the switch came when the motherboard in my dell, Dellorean, died. I discovered that for Dell to replace it, I would first have to spend hours on the phone and pay them $30 just to tell me what the problem was (which I already knew). So instead, I decided to pull out the parts that were still good (and not proprietary) and make a new machine. Thus was Dionysus born.

First problem: apparently pulling a formatted hard drive out of one computer and plugging it into a new computer is a Bad Idea. Installation wasn't working, so I asked a computery friend and he used an Ubuntu install CD to repartition and fix the problem. Shiny.

Second problem: with so much new hardware, my legal Dell copy of Windows wouldn't install without a new CD key. OK, get a new key. Simple enough, right? They must have a website where you can just input your old key and get a new one, or a phone line specifically for that purpose?
Noooo. Of course not. I got bounced back and forth between Windows and Dell tech support for infuriating hours before finally using one of my precious 2 free calls to Windows tech support to get my new key.

All of this was more than enough to convince me to try Ubuntu. I downloaded a copy, burned it to CD, and installed. Easy as pie.

I eventually did get my key and currently have a dual boot, but I use ubuntu almost exclusively. Mostly XP is for testing things that aren't working in Ubuntu.

But I must say, given all my frustrations with Windows, my choice of Ubuntu is mostly a principled stand. I haven't had to spend hours on the phone with people in India to get them to tell me things I already know, but I have poured countless hours into installing things and making things work in Ubuntu which would work immediately in XP (ie, Nvidia drivers, MP3 players).

[HermanAB]

"If anyone is a little more constructive-minded, and can direct me to good tutorials"

First of all, welcome to Ubuntu!

While I use Ubuntu on some systems, it is not really the easiest Linux around - Mandriva still carries that crown (Barely! Ubuntu is catching up). When you have trouble installing, it pays to shop around and try out all the other distributions that you can find, since they all have different installation wizards and some will identify your hardware better than others, so please go ahead and try Mandriva, Fedora and Suse, to name a few big ones. Underneath the glitz they are all quite the same, only the wizards differ - after all, they are all Linux, but it is the configuration wizards that set them apart.

Here are some guides:
http://aeronetworks.ca/linuxhowtos.html
http://tldp.org

Cheers,

Herman

[hessiess]

why did i switch to linux? simple!

windows took 10 munites to boot
laptop isent tecnicly mine
school has the windows disk
blender runs faster on linux
i have no windows programs that i cannot do without:)

[vexorian]

2. We do lots of equations on PowerPoints and Word files (science and engineering). Open Office has an equation editor that is one of the worst I have ever seenThis is ridiculous, openoffice is much more powerful at typing equations than Office's silly equation editor, in fact that's one of the reasons I use openoffice over msoffice

Even worse than that, it can't convert MS files that have equations or some symbols
Why on earth did you think that if YOU choose to save in a totally nonstandard file format it is supposed to be openable by everyone? If you want portable files YOU save them in ISO standards, like ODF, you can't really expect the world to read your files if you keep saving them in unsupported formats.



4. Many drivers don't exist unless you are willing to use them illegally. Try playing a commercial DVD. Forget about it. Yep, its proprietary but DVDs are used all the time in our conceptual science classes.
Yeah call codecs drivers, it is not a problem with my operating system, it is a problem with your silly country.

5. We have never had a virus or spyware infection since the old days of Windows 98. This is a non-issue that is always overblown. MacOS now has an increasing amount of worms and attacks.
Yeah right, "windows doesn't have viruses after iwndows 98 and mac os now has plenty of worms", this is the most unrealistic statement I have ever read. Thanks.

How far behind is Ubuntu if its popularity increases? Simple software solves the problem. MS is the #1 OS, it will have the #1 number of attempted attack
That's a nice myth, but being nice doesn't stop it from being a myth, it is not popularity what makes windows insecure, and patch-like solutions like antiviruses won't solve anything (heck I know they don't since I had 3 malware infestations on totally monitored machines) Apache is way more popular than ISS yet ISS is the one that gets attacked the most...

6. We never have the crashes, fatal bugs, or BSOD that so many people here claim to have.Since you mentioned that you used windows 98, I'll have to guess you are lying, since BSODs were heck frequent back then.


Our Windows versions, XP and now Vista, work fine. Of course, we don't go in to "tweak" the system (usually by people who don't have a clue) as these computers are meant to be used, not played with like toys.
Yeah sure it sounds like a good point but:
- There are operating systems out there that can be customized as toys yet they don't end in a crash slaughter.
- There are windows copies out there that do crash without any tweaking.




7. There is always a strong feeling of "I hate Microsoft" on this forum. Much of it is irrational. Most of the time it really boils down to envy: "I'm smarter than Bill, why does he have all the money?"


Did you forget you were listing the reasons you didn't switch to Linux, how is "Linux users are envy of MS" a "reason not to switch to Linux" it sounds more like a flame to me.

I don't fear MS, But I don't trust them and I would challenge anyone who tells me that it would be irrational from my part not to trust them since they do have a huge history of doing vicious things (I hope no one challenges this either)

I am fine with MS as long as they stop trying to embrace, extend and extinguish competition, unfortunately they are still dong that.

[ertrules22]

Well, the number one reason that I chose Ubuntu (and or FreeBSD) is because of a few words: "Open Source" and "Free". Another reason is with the software/ports/packages: "Open Source" and "Free". I also like the community help, security, speed, and just overall ease of use and rarity of error messages. I love using Ubuntu and it has everything that I need (with the exception of a DVD player, which I am working on obtaining a library, but I think I got it fixed now!):lolflag: Still, Free and Open source are a big catch for a lot of people. :)

[southernman]

This Linux thing is at least partly like the Harley thing: " I bought this so I'm cooler than you"
I think that's a problem of interpretation. Most bikers I know (white and blue collar) will tell you when asked
Why do you ride a Harley? - If I had to explain it, you wouldn't understand. That's not the approach most Linux users
I know, take.

My bad, hit the submit button to early! I was going to say...

There are a number of reasons I made the switch, but I am not going to list the major reason as I don't want to
get into this whole MS sucks thing! I don't really feel that way deep down, but there are a lot of things I highly
disagree with from the Redmond camp!

The sole reason I switched (it gets really complicated, you've been warned), it was just time to make a change.
That's it in a nutshell... time for a change! Will I go back to using MS products? Not on my personal systems... !
I still have to work with MS related products, because of this nagging part time hobby of mine... repairing computers
for friends and associates! Business is still good, but it isn't what I want to do full time! ;)

Has using Ubuntu been a breeze? For the most part it has. I don't use Beryl, don't need wireless (atm at least)
and everything has worked right out of the box for me. Maybe I am lucky in that regard, but so are 1000's of others.
You see a lot of post on the forum, but those post are only from those having trouble. If people were to post every time
things just work... Ubuntu-Geek would have to out up donation links all over the boards to pay for the added servers
and bandwidth... of fill every forum with advertisements.

Linux isn't for everyone... just as Windows isn't the be-all of end-all. Linux is only free in a monetary sense. It isn't free
in the sense that some (if not most) have to be diligent in reading butt loads of documentation to be able to use it with any
comfort.

It's good that your being persistent in your quest here. It shows signs of someone that will someday use Linux for a
majority of their computing task. That day may not be today, tomorrow, or even next year... but the curiosity is at least
there enough that it will come, albeit at your own pace.

At any rate... best of luck on your journey.

[tdrusk]

I like Ubuntu because it is basically virus free and it doesn't get bloated like MS. Sure MS could be cleaned up every week, or you could just use Ubuntu. I also like how everything is free.

[DoricMan]

I am gradually ignoring requests to update XP 3rd party programs, that make life more secure in XP. Replacing, for example, Malware libraries, with free ones, Ad-Aware is such an example.
Not a week goes by when I have an email suggesting I should update one of my XP utilities , and pay for the pleasure.
Next, here in the UK we have U S Dollar prices converted to UK Pounds without any heed of the Dollar Pound parity, and of course VAT at 17.5%, is added on top.
Over the years I have grown discontented with the number of 3rd party addons needed to make Windows more secure, and have it running as it should have done, in the first place.
I am now a dual-boot Feisty and XP user, and XP is only used when something requires it.
I now have a strategy to rid myself of XP, in that I am exploring equivalent replacements, in Ubuntu. My Ubuntu experience has been very productive and, for me, and now lets me, at last, dispose of MS Windows for good.

[Depressed Man]

I am gradually ignoring requests to update XP 3rd party programs, that make life more secure in XP. Replacing, for example, Malware libraries, with free ones, Ad-Aware is such an example.
Not a week goes by when I have an email suggesting I should update one of my XP utilities , and pay for the pleasure.
Next, here in the UK we have U S Dollar prices converted to UK Pounds without any heed of the Dollar Pound parity, and of course VAT at 17.5%, is added on top.
Over the years I have grown discontented with the number of 3rd party addons needed to make Windows more secure, and have it running as it should have done, in the first place.
I am now a dual-boot Feisty and XP user, and XP is only used when something requires it.
I now have a strategy to rid myself of XP, in that I am exploring equivalent replacements, in Ubuntu. My Ubuntu experience has been very productive and, for me, and now lets me, at last, dispose of MS Windows for good.

To be fair, 3rd party add-ons (or rather software) isn't necessary to keep Windows secure. I've ran XP and Vista without a firewall, antivirus, or anti-spyware for months without getting infecting. And this includes using the usual channels (torrenting, some P2P, etc..). The only main difference I made was I don't use Internet Explorer. I use Firefox and Opera instead of IE (which probably causes the most security vulnerabilities in Windows.. well XP at least). And how did I know I didn't have anything? I later installed Nod32, and an anti-spyware (I forgot to do it earlier) and it found nothing.

Though again to be fair, Windows probably wouldn't have as high an infection rate if it weren't for the users not being "internet smart".

[atomkarinca]

To be fair, 3rd party add-ons (or rather software) isn't necessary to keep Windows secure. I've ran XP and Vista without a firewall, antivirus, or anti-spyware for months without getting infecting. And this includes using the usual channels (torrenting, some P2P, etc..). The only main difference I made was I don't use Internet Explorer. I use Firefox and Opera instead of IE (which probably causes the most security vulnerabilities in Windows.. well XP at least). And how did I know I didn't have anything? I later installed Nod32, and an anti-spyware (I forgot to do it earlier) and it found nothing.

Though again to be fair, Windows probably wouldn't have as high an infection rate if it weren't for the users not being "internet smart".

i second that. i used win2003 for a whole year without any av or firewall and i never got a single problem, about malwares. but it didn't stop the os from slowing down. after the end of the year, it took about 15 minutes to get to the desktop and even in the start, the system was using 200mb ram.

i don't think windows sucks but i definitely think ubuntu rocks.

[Depressed Man]

Yeah I never understood that myself. How just using Windows over time makes it slower. I even tried to run a tight ship (making sure no programs added to startup, I cleaned up the registry and even did constant defrags) and it still slowed down.

[asmoore82]

To be fair, 3rd party add-ons (or rather software) isn't necessary to keep Windows secure. I've ran XP and Vista without a firewall, antivirus, or anti-spyware for months without getting infecting. And this includes using the usual channels (torrenting, some P2P, etc..). The only main difference I made was I don't use Internet Explorer. I use Firefox and Opera instead of IE (which probably causes the most security vulnerabilities in Windows.. well XP at least). And how did I know I didn't have anything? I later installed Nod32, and an anti-spyware (I forgot to do it earlier) and it found nothing.

Though again to be fair, Windows probably wouldn't have as high an infection rate if it weren't for the users not being "internet smart".

:lolflag:

[philinux]

Well I'm still on Millenium and an old Pentium III. 320 meg memory.

Helped my girlfriends lad pruchase a laptop, and it came with Vista. Brand new laptop, slow vista. not impressed with it at all.

Now I'm in the market for a new pc. So a friend kindly gives me a 120gig HD so I stick Ubuntu on it to try. Had already played with live cd.

So now after 3 weeks when I buy a new pc, well base unit, later this year guess what. Linux is going straight on it and no windows at all. Ubuntu is that good!

[southernman]

@ DepressedMan and anyone else lurking out there...

It's really hard when a customer says, I don't know how I got that virus, not to fall out of their chair laughing.

Ya wanna tell them, well... "here's your sign." Of course, not until the check clears! ;)

[glosman15]

I left because I was bored with windows and I had learned everything there was to learn about the OS. Linux appealed to me since it had a learning curve and was a lot more customizable and also since vista is really crappy right now. After using Debian and Ubuntu for about 1 month I decided to keep Ubuntu for good since it does everything windows could do and is completely free.