Comment by verisimilidude | Hacker News Reader

Comment by verisimilidude | Hacker News Reader

Last week I bought a new computer. And for the first time since 2002, it wasn't a Mac. I wanted a Mac Mini, but that's a tough buy when you can get something much smaller, more flexible, and more powerful in the PC realm. I wound up buying an Intel NUC and slapping Ubuntu Gnome on it.

Most surprisingly, Gnome 3 does not feel like a compromised choice in comparison to OS X. It's not a seamless experience by any means. That said, I'm really digging some of the UI choices they've made. It's a UX that's committed to a vision of how the user should interact with the computer.

I remember a time when the Mac also felt like a strongly opinionated experience, designed by and for humans. It no longer feels so. It feels aimless and stagnant, even regressive in some ways. It feels designed by committee rather than vision or voice. The changes do not seem to serve any higher purpose than making the UI look cool in screenshots. I miss the high-contrast controls, readable fonts, always-visible functionality, personable quirks, etc.

I still use a Mac all day at work, and I still respect it as a good tool for getting shit done, but I really wonder about the point of it. If I can pick up a free alternative like Ubuntu Gnome and actually feel happy and productive quickly, what's left to recommend the Mac? If Apple doesn't care any more, why should I?

(Alright, now y'all can light me up.)

I chuckled at your parting "y'all can light me up," but if Gnome on an Intel NUC meets your needs, you are indeed a happy man. (NUCs are on Newegg for around $386 right now.)

Here's what is most commonly mentioned that Linux "can't do". Maybe some things on this list haven't bitten you yet, but it's worth reviewing:

• Fewer games. It's not as bad as comparing Linux to Windows, but even Mac has games that don't have a Linux port. Wine is pretty impressive these days -- if you are willing to mess with the command line and config files and searching random internet posts for how to get the game to work.

• "Professional" software. Microsoft, Adobe, nVidia and Autodesk all openly refuse to support Linux. Whatever their reasons, it means that Linux users must do the format conversion to something that does run on Linux. Arguably that's a good thing because proprietary data formats mean archived data can't be opened in a decade, but day to day it's super painful.

• Driver issues #1: plugging random things in via USB. Linux has impressive driver support for things that are well understood. But the lesser well-standardized hardware (printers, scanners, wifi dongles, ...) may not work. Know before you buy. Windows again has it best, but knowing if it runs on Mac is usually printed on the packaging. (And Linux is not.)

• Driver issues #2: Actually Linux wins out if you're willing to wait a few years because Linux will gain driver support for quirky fringe hardware over time. macOS actually DROPS support for things over time.

• Driver issues #3: Very new hardware like VR headsets are going to be an adventure in cobbling together new kernels, the latest software versions built from source or downloaded from an unstable branch, ... [1]. Or, sometimes the answer is: nope, never going to get Linux support.

[1] https://www.gamingonlinux.com/articles/first-steps-with-open...

I agree entirely with everything on this list. Thankfully, there is a modern solution!

Buy the PC of your dreams, install Windows 10 on it, then install VMWare Workstation. Put the linux distro of your choice in vmware, enjoy! Everything will just work, consistently, elegantly, and without hassle.

Play your games with Steam in Windows of course, and thanks to Windows handling all the drivers, you can enjoy issue-less plug-and-play with USB and everything else. Merely install the apps that only work in Windows.... in Windows, and keep the rest of the dev-work in the linux VM.

The only caveat I can think of, is that you don't get 2d GPU hardware acceleration, vmware will accelerate 3d, but not 2d for say, compiz. I usually turn off these random 2D type effects so I don't notice that. Virtualbox is an option of course, but it still doesn't feel solid enough to me. At some point Hyper-V will have enough GPU acceleration with vmconnect that Windows 10 Pro + Hyper-V will be plenty (I know it has RemoteX acceleration now, but afaik that's only for Windows Server...).

I've loved this solution so much, I actually copied my VM over to my Retina MacBook Pro so I can use the linux VM for development work on the go. OSX handles ensuring the wifi always works, and the VM sees it as a reliable hardwired connection, no issues.

After 15 years of being a hardcore OSX/Apple user(fanboi), I cannot be more happy with the past 18 months since switching to this configuration. Cheaper than the Apple ecosystem, and waaaay faster hardware.

Exactly my situation. I've been a 24x7 Linux/BSD desktop user since the Slackware 3.3 days but got too tired with all the issues.

I started dual booting an year ago and a few months ago switched for good.

Now I'm using Win10 and VMware Workstation 12.1 and some Fedora/CentOS VMs. 3D acceleration screams and my desktop just works.

Workload involves working with Linux servers all day, developing inside the VMs, etc. Everything else I do natively on Windows.

I wish it had turned out differently over these 10+ years (with a pure OSS desktop) but that's where I find myself today.

Another alternative to windlep's great post is simply installing both Windows and Linux, and booting in to Windows whenever you need to do some AutoCAD or Photoshop.

Or the inverse: virtualizing Windows on Linux. I used to do this for a while with a dedicated GPU, and, besides some minor glitches with audio which I didn’t get to solve, it worked very, very well.

(Why? Because I wanted to play some Windows-only games without having to reboot. Drivers were not a problem thanks to USB attaching in libvirt. That’s how I got to play Elite: Dangerous “in” Linux.)

> • Driver issues #1: plugging random things in via USB. Linux has impressive driver support for things that are well understood. But the lesser well-standardized hardware (printers, scanners, WiFi dongles, ...) may not work. Know before you buy. Windows again has it best, but knowing if it runs on Mac is usually printed on the packaging. (And Linux is not.)

A printer and a WiFi dongle work out of the box, probably because they aren't the newest technology.

> And Linux is not.

My WiFi dongle advertised Linux support—and it's just the cheapest thing I found.

I think anything older than a couple of years is generally well supported.

YMMV.

Writing this from a 2010 MBP. When I bought it PC laptops were just horrible beyond belief. Full of stickers and adware, creaky plastics, horrible touchpads and keyboards, etc.

To this day it has worked perfect. Battery still has 89% capacity and with a SSD upgrade and adblock it's as fast as I need it. OS X works and looks about the same. Meanwhile I've seen lots of Acers die and Windows being the fiasco it is.

So in my mind Apple and OS X has been a really reliable work horse that I don't need to fuss with.

In my mind Apple does great hardware, but that only matters for mobile. I would've gotten a MBP if I hadn't wanted a stylus. If you're doing a desktop with OS X, you overpay and have no flexibility compared to what you'd get with Windows.

I confess that I've seldom had the Windows stability issues that people always mention, so I don't see that as a big deal.

You can easily install OS X on NUC (works flawlessly) as well if you need it, so it's a great choice for a normal PC these days.

I bought an Intel NUC for a home media box. Was also looking at the Mac Mini, as the low end one would have been fine, but i couldn't get past the fact that it has a slow spinning disc. In the end, I got an SSD for the NUC and have been loving it.

I'm really hoping that Apple moves away from spinning disks all across the Mac mini lineup.

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