Hacker News Reader

Comment by crispinb | Hacker News Reader

> I'm essentially trapped on OSX, and have been for a decade

Me too until this May, when it was past time for my aging MB Pro to retire. I really couldn't justify a new one given I don't even like them any more (the Touchbar was the coup de grace).

Hence a Dell XPS 15, running Windows 10. I won't pretend the latter is anywhere near as good as OSX (less stable, less consistent UI, generally lower quality apps), but it does manage all the hardware well & gets the job done. WSL makes it livable-with.

I'd prefer linux though for its window manager choices, single-rooted filesystem, lack of nags & faster file io (among other things).

> I'd love to see real competition in the OS space for people who need both a decent app ecosystem and open source developer tools.

Quite.

View on HN

>I'd prefer linux though for its window manager choices, single-rooted filesystem, lack of nags & faster file io (among other things).

Why not install Linux, and run Windows under a VM?

Or if locked to the Windows install, run Linux under a VM?

I've never seriously considered working primarily in a VM. For performance reasons, I suppose, but given how far the VM scene has come, that may well be an out of date prejudice. Maybe Linux under Windows (it would have to be that way round) would work. Worth considering, yes.

You'll get snapshots with VM. That's awesome. While you could setup them with Linux (not easy, AFAIK, but doable with some tinkering), for Windows it's a game changer. You could install anything and just roll back. Don't like that Windows update? Roll back.

Are you saying Linux won't work out-of-the-box on an XPS 15? Because Dell literally sells those pre-loaded with Ubuntu, even saves you $100.

I don't think there's a developer edition of the 9570 model (there's no linux driver for the fingerprint scanner for example), and in any case we rarely get the Dell developer editions here in Australia.

I am certainly saying that a fresh install of Ubuntu (and a reasonable attempt to get over the initial issues eg. using a respin available on github) has too many problems for me to either live with or spend time investigating. Others may have more tolerance for fiddling around with OSs, but I've done my dash with that kind of stuff.

I think it's a bit contradictory to choose an insecure OS because a more secure one doesn't support a nice-to-have piece of security hardware. That aside, I'd be interested in the specifics of the "too many problems" that you anticipate on supported hardware (which includes most configurations of the XPS and Precision).

> I think it's a bit contradictory to choose an insecure OS because a more secure one doesn't support a nice-to-have piece of security hardware.

Maybe. But that has nothing to do with what I wrote.

> I'd be interested in the specifics

Would you? Or would you like to gather factoids in pursuit of your belief that everyone must make the choices you make?

> that you anticipate on supported hardware

Not "anticipate". Experienced, after installation (more than once). It was more trouble than it was worth to me.

> on supported hardware

As I say, I don't think there's a developer edition of the 9570. There isn't an extant linux driver for the fingerprint scanner, which surely there would be if Dell preinstalled linux on this model.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com