Basically Microsoft presents this "incredible" product, and then says in the same breath: "Oops, not for your current setup. Maybe you should consider buying a new PC?"
Not OP, but just to serve as another data point: mostly just exhaustion. I am a full-time software developer, so I just really don't want to deal with configurations and set up complex systems at home. That's why I haven't gotten into any smart-home stuff, either - I just don't have the bandwidth to deal with the issues that come along with the space.
Not sure how long ago you tried installing linux, but it has come a long way such that there are distros out there that are basically plug-and-play installable now. I installed Linux Mint on an old laptop and just went through the gui installer like you would on a Windows installation, and it was up and running. Didnāt need to open the terminal even once.
I drove Linux Mint for a bit when I was trying to quit Windows. The only thing that made me go back was that, while I could install Steam, the game I was playing at the time (Destiny 2) wasnāt compatible with Linux ā as in, I couldnāt even launch it. So Iād switch back and forth for a bit; Windows for gaming, Linux for everything else. But at the end of the day, I donāt want to have that extra layer of complexity in my life. I ended up just sticking with Windows. I will probably give Linux Mint or another distro a shot in the future, but for now Iām only on Windows.
I donāt have a huge game library so my experience is limited, but Iāve had no issues gaming on Mint. Some of my regularly played games include Deep Rock Galactic, Risk of Rain 2, Lethal Company, Astroneer, Elite Dangerous, and Sea of Thieves.
I bought an ancient PC game I used to play as a kid called Summoner, and even that started right up.
Wild, I'm not a developer but I do some very basic coding. Linux out of the box has it all pretty much lol. If it doesn't, the package manager has it easily. Windows is such a hassle with environment variables and downloading different tools like compilers and IDEs and shit.
I answered a bit further down a bit lengthier. Hope that's OK. š
To be clear, I enjoy my Linux environment. But could I leave Linux on my parents' devices who recently bought a new printer and use a facial recognition camera? I'd be worried...
Not OP, but it's still lack of hardware support for me. I tried to daily Linux on my laptop and gave up in frustration after several months because a few key pieces of hardware are not supported and seemingly never will be.
Going to guess his pain points are the fingerprint reader and possibly wifi/blutooth chipset. There are some of those supported but that's still the spottiest in terms of driver support under Linux. Maybe also webcam but generally those work fine these days.
Not OP but personally, I've always had an impossible time trying to get drivers to work for my GPU to do more than just render 2D stuff like the desktop and basic web browsing.
UI/UX mostly. Yeah you can do a lot of things, but the experience doing it isn't as easy. Ex: gimp. Which has gotten a lot of hate here recently (and deservedly so)
The only reason I don't use Linux all the time are video games - which are getting better, and streaming because DRM doesn't support it and I can tell the difference between 720p and 4k. Otherwise it's my main OS.
Video games are nearly perfect today. The only ones that don't work are the ones where the publishers have gone out of their way to exclude it by enforcing their anticheat nonsense.
Tried setting it up once on an old pc to have it as a kinda streaming thingy behind the tv. Never finished the project. First I was overloaded with options. Which Linux version, picked Ubuntu because why not? Did the download and could not find a USB stick at home that's bigger than 2gb. Tried installing on a hard drive in my pc didn't work. Gave up after that.
Programs are working better on Linux these days, but I use both the Adobe Suite as well as AutoCAD regularly, neither of which are supported by Linux. Otherwise I'd switch.
Okay i been this with a lot
Linux does not work if you are trying to use it at even likely advance stage
I can't find where exe is
I can't put that exe in start-up of system (tried it on zorin and pop os )
Wine won't open lot of programs
Libre office has came long way but make a doc in libre office and tried to open in word later it's a mess and can't work that for CV
Excel is THE tool to be used in many cases, can't be used powerfully in Linux.
There is need to use terminal multiple times for lot of things
Linux is NOT useful, windows might be forcing but it's a ripe operating system. Across all Linux distors even the shell is not same.
I'm going to answer your points below. Not because I want to tell you to move to Linux, but because the information you state is incorrect. Linux is not for everybody. It works for millions of people and it works for me, but that doesn't mean it will be what you're looking for.
In order:
There are no .exe files. Neither are there any on MacOS, iOS, Android, or anything else that isn't Windows/DOS. To start software requires that it's on the search path in exactly the same way that Windows requires. You can see what that is with the command: echo $PATH. Most Linux distributions have a graphical user interface which features icons and menus, but if you don't want that, you don't need to install it.
You absolutely can, but it doesn't work the same way as Windows, because it's not Windows. You can for example login to Linux because the login manager started at system startup. You see a desktop after logging in because there's a startup system for your account. The printer works because the software driving the print queue is started.
Wine is a tool. It's not a replacement for Windows. It's not intended to be. It's intended to help users and developers make Windows software work better on Linux.
LibreOffice is one of many office suites. I have been using it as my productivity software for 25 years in my company and I'm not at all disappointed to have escaped the Microsoft Clippy, Ribbons, Office365 abominations.
I have used Libre Calc for most of my numerical analysis processes. I used real tools like R and gnuplot when I was analyzing terabytes of data.
The terminal is a tool. I use it daily. At any time there's a dozen of them open. Not everyone needs a terminal, but there are plenty of things that you can only do in a terminal. A random example, list all the files in your account, group them by extension, then add up how much space each extension takes. In case you're wondering:
Linux is not Windows. It never was and it never will be, neither is any other operating system. The community around Linux is helpful, the ecosystem is vibrant and it's free. If you want to pay for support, you can. If you don't, there's plenty of opportunity to do your own thing.
If you want it to be like Windows, you're going to be very disappointed.
You answered all of them , but they are tangent to what point ibam trying to make.
As a SIMPLE TON OR A NEWBIE YSING LINUX ,this is all I can't and won't be doing , using windows is not disappointing because SIMPLY it works , like number 6 first part is easy no . The second part WHY WOULD I DO IT ?
FOR 5th you have to use R and gnu plot because libre office is well SHIT at at those , where as excel can do it natively.
Wine does not make it better except for few program to be used in Linux, the tool intended to it's work is HALF baked.
Please try to do 1 and 2 in zorin and Pop is and see how far it takes to complete the process , If you want I can put I stopwatche and tell you time it took to do it in windows.
Not to mention use of HDD , in windows i attach it and VOILA! Its the one I use it ACROSS ANY AND ALL APPS not a single mount -a-B--Ć« stuff I have to do .