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Comment by lordfrito | Hacker News Reader

PC gaming is one of the few places left that Windows has any relevance, without that there very few reasons to continue running Windows.

Sales volumes for general purpose PCs (used by people other than gaming and developers) have been declining for years.

If you don't need Windows to game... and you don't need Windows to run office anymore (office 365).. then the only real reason to run windows would be to run VisualStudio and other legacy dev tools?

Linux is looking more and more attractive to the power user base.

I'm a power user that games... so Windows it is. For now. The moment I don't need Windows to game, and Wine can run all my legacy apps, then I'm jumping ship to Linux.

Consumers have moved on and all that's left in terms of volume are businesses that need a stock general purpose desktop -- legacy lives on for a while but not forever.

This might be the beginning of the end for Windows -- I'm speaking in terms of product lifecycle.

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> PC gaming is one of the few places left that Windows has any relevance

While it's true that Windows may face challenges in some areas, claiming it has become irrelevant outside of PC gaming feels like an exaggeration. Here are some recent statistics from Wikipedia [1] to put things into perspective:

Desktop/Laptop operating system browsing statistics

Windows 72.17%

macOS 15.42%

Unknown 6.1%

Linux (excluding ChromeOS) 4.03%

ChromeOS 2.27%

FreeBSD 0.01%

Other 0.01%

Desktop OS market share according to StatCounter as of February 2024. ChromeOS is also based on the Linux kernel.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_operating_syste...

Quite a lot of methodological caveats being noted in that section...a couple of questions I would ask are how much computing is done inside a browser now, making the platform irrelevant, and how much is done on a mobile device rather than a desktop. Anecdotally, I see a lot of them collecting dust in the houses of friends & family, and very little being done outside of Zoom and Chrome.

My firefox sets user agent to windows

I think this is a big leap. Organisations worldwide use Windows. Office 365 is not a good replacement for Office on-device, and I bet it will never be. I'm a big fan of this happening, but I don't think this is the nail in the coffin. It definitely is a nail, and I use Steam on Linux happily, but not the nail.

Agreed... still a pretty big nail. A turning point.

The loss of gaming definitely marks the beginning of the end of Windows as a consumer OS. Windows future might be relegated to a platform to run Microsoft business apps and dev tools.

Considering Windows is the most anti-consumer mainstream OS out there -- if Windows becomes a "business OS" then I wonder what happens to all the telemetry and other anti-consumer stuff they've added over the years?

Seems like a fork in the road for Windows product planning.

I would say - it's still not a loss. Not every game is available on Linux, at all, or if it is it's not very easy for a regular person, or if it is there might still be a better experience on Windows. It's amazing progress, but it's a long way off what you're describing.

The other bit of speculation I've seen for long enough that I can't pin down when it started is if consumer windows is a large enough burden for maintenance, then what potential is there in minimizing that through virtualization, at least for the legacy compatibility. If they're making money through services, do they really care if the underlying OS is full-fat windows, a streamlined windows, or some other OS if they can support external projects doing what they need.

As far as gaming goes, I've wondered for a while how much of a burden it is to maintain directx, along with working with the hardware partners to add/maintain features when they want. With the console side there was some symbiosis, but with their current direction and recent xbox fortunes that also looks like an area they could reduce their ongoing spending to stay relevant.

My mom was on the market for a PC upgrade. I so badly wanted to get her moved to a MacBook Air, but she's forced to use some niche accounting software made by Sage (I think specifically for the Canadian market even?) that only exists on Windows.

These situations are what keep everyone a hostage of Microsoft.

I've got a Windows XP virtual machine on my Linux desktop computer exactly for a similar reason. I start it when needed and close it.

And of course it's not connected to Internet.

I can relate to your pain, in Canada the overwhelming majority of accountants use Sage 50, which has a burgeoning cloud version but still lives as Windows software.

I got an accountant instead of switching away from macOS. Made more sense.

Agreed, and hardware support is another one. For PC hardware (and software as well), the de-facto standard platform is Windows.

The Windows version of Excel has the add-ins necessary to connect to ERP systems and just more connectivity options in general. This alone will prevent most organizations from leaving Windows. Excel for Mac isn't great (find/replace is really annoying) and neither is LibreOffice Calc (formatting norms).

As for gaming, my desktop runs Cosmic OS and I have had no issues thanks to Steam/Proton. The only issues people have for the most part are related to online multiplayer games that require users to install rootkits in order to play.

> Excel for Mac isn't great (find/replace is really annoying)

And it's so slow. Excel is the only sluggish app of my Macbook.

Yes, Numbers opens files much faster. Excel’s find, despite years of complaints, continues to not highlight the background color of what you’re looking for. Makes it tough to find what you need in a dense sea of cells.

> I'm a power user that games... so Windows it is. For now. The moment I don't need Windows to game, and Wine can run all my legacy apps, then I'm jumping ship to Linux.

As a power user that games on Linux, and has been for a decade -- what's stopping you right now? Which apps specifically tie you to Windows?

Great question -- I run Microsoft Money -- it's managed my finances since 1995 -- I've got 30 years of financial transaction history in there I don't want to bail on. Sure it's old but it's always got the job done, I have no complaints other than it can no longer update stock prices from the internet. It's actually my most critical app to me, much more than gaming.

Last time I ran Wine it wasn't up to the task, graphical glitches etc. My financial package is too critical to me to live with downtime. I thought about trying to import to Quicken etc but all of the mainstream financial apps have become online subscription services -- that seems like a downgrade to me. Open to any suggestions here.

So, for the time being I'm still running windows. Until recently it hasn't been much of a problem for me. But with each upgrade Windows is becoming more and more of a thorn in my side. With Windows 11 being force fed to us it seems I'm going to be forced to migrate to Linux this year. Not looking forward to the transition of my daily workflow. I just want to run my apps, not play with a new OS. The pain is real.

Any suggestions on what Linux distro I'll have the easiest time migrating to?

get a cheap laptop, move your windows dependencies onto it, keep it isolated

then your main machine can be moved to Linux

i personally just have an old ssd with windows installed on it just in case, always can boot from it if I need to (just don't like dealing with VMs)

Microsoft Money has basically been discontinued at this point, so there's no real guarantee it's going to keep working on Windows. Meanwhile Wine-HQ lists Microsoft Money Plus Deluxe Sunset as a "Platinum" level supported application, which means it should run essentially perfectly on any current Linux distribution.

Pick the distribution which seems the best fit and try it again. As Money is no longer being updated, support is only going to get better in Wine and worse on Windows from now on.

Even if you don't move to a different OS, since your data and Money are so important and Money is not particularly demanding in terms of hardware, it might still be a good idea to migrate money into a VM with a fully supported OS to insulate it from changes to the underlying OS. That would simplify backups, and guarantee that you can continue to use it essentially indefinitely even if you choose to use an ARM architecture Mac or Chromebook in the future.

Both VMware and VirtualBox are free for noncommercial use, available for all popular platforms, and allow easy snapshots and full backups. If you backup your VM to a cloud service you could lose literally all of your possessions in a disaster and still be in a position to recover everything onto nearly any computer within minutes.

I haven’t tried Wine lately but I will say many applications I’ve used over the years in business environments businesses to some degree depended on for some function did not run in Wine very well and almost always required a Windows machine.

I can think of at least 3 applications in my current environment where Wine almost certainly wouldn’t work and we either get Windows machines or spin up VMs for those applications that aren’t just legacy, they’re in active development.

Some industries build application specifically assuming the client will run them on Windows. The world hasn’t entirely moved to SaaS and until that happens, having local native environments for certain applications will still be needed, albeit for a friction of total use cases across most businesses, but still some fraction will remain for awhile. I look forward to the day that fraction is 0.

As much as I’d love to not just use but daily Linux, unfortunately it’s nowhere close to Windows (and presumably MacOS) in user friendliness. Good design is discoverable. A CLI unless well designed is not, a GUI with only buttons is (as you can keep clicking and navigating).

I’m not saying all this to voice my personal issues with Linux (lots have already spoken about it). I’m saying this because I seriously doubt the general public would be able to use Linux as easily as windows unless they only use chrome all day long (which, to be fair, is a lot of people). When it’s easier to root an android phone than understand which version of files Fedora uses to edit the GRUB menu, it’s disappointing if you were rooting for Fedora, pun partially intended.

> Good design is discoverable.

I would argue that Windows design lineage here has conditioned us to accept what Microsoft gives us. Do you really think Windows has good design? There are three control panels in W11 for god's sake.

I really think what you're getting at here is "familiar design is discoverable" - for a majority of users, the familiarity with Windows design is indeed a major driving factor. It's why Linux is scary, because it's unfamiliar. You can get a lot done on Linux desktop these days via GUI on the major distributions, terminal not required. Much like Windows.

The boot experience is not as polished, and I think the pre-OS environment that Micorsoft has built up around Windows is excellent unlike *nix which is dealing with ramfs and GRUB, etc.

Okay, maybe, but modern Linux doesn't need CLI any more than NT does. Install Ubuntu or Fedora, click the buttons, be happy.

That’s probably fine for someone who either doesn’t need to change settings, or has an “IT guy” who does everything for them. Unfortunately for me I’m the sort of person who likes tweaking and having a nice customized UI and whatnot. On windows you can change so much using GUI tools, or at most using the registry (which itself is a gui app). Linux, unfortunately not so much (many?) dice.

To be clear and give it credit, Linux does allow a decent bit of things through buttons. But hit the slightest snag and it’s CLI time.

If you managed to figure out how to edit the Windows registry, you probably would also be able to figure out how to edit config files on Linux. Navigating to the correct paths can be done in any GUI file explorer and there are plenty of GUI Text editors. Most config files are also much better at self documenting than any part of the Windows registry.

I am not saying that you are wrong for liking what you like – it’s completely fine to be comfortable with the tools you are used to.

I just think it’s not an argument for what type of person would be comfortable with Linux.

I work in an environment all of Linux, macOS, and Windows are used (what ever the user prefers) and the people that „just want their Job done“ need an „IT person“ to figure out any configuration and complication for them independent of the OS used.

People get used to using Windows and think that being used to something is the same as something being intuitive. Years ago (like 20) a previous girlfriend had never really used computers before and ended up adopting one of my old machines using KDE.

After we broke up but remained friends, she complained about her new boyfriend subjecting her to XP and how nothing "worked like it should", needing to scour the web and download shit from random websites for software, every installer needing you to click next a dozen times, borderline malicious shovelware and how hard it was to get Windows to do things sensibly without scouring the web for hacks and having to edit one giant config file with a really overcomplicated editor.

It's hard to tell the difference between bad UI and unfamiliar UI.

I dunno, Linux does what i tell it to do, where as i have to constantly fight Windows for really simple UI things that should be a given.

For example, my windows explorer keeps opening at some where location and shape, no amount of tinkering under the hood has successfully made it open full screen all the time. Ubuntu on the other hand just keeps it at what ever i set it at, because of course it does.

Little things like that are the only reason i switched the linux as a daily driver.

I keep the windows partition active because there is no linux alternative for photoshop and lightroom.

If screwing around with Proton and the different versions of it weren’t a thing, I’d move away from Windows like ten times by now. Well, that, and I’m not entirely sure how supported or unsupported VR (Meta specifically) is on Linux.

Sorry but no,

Linux simply isn't ready. Not now, not ever. The year of the "Linux desktop" is always 10 years from now. This is the way it has been the past decades and this is the way it will be because the process (bazaar) can't produce anything better.

I'm a long time Linux user. Been using Linux since Red Hat 7.2, Red Hat, Slackware, Ubuntu and now ArchLinux. Have tried KDE, Gnome, XFCE, Fluxbox and various window managers and environments and the thing is: Linux is always broken somewhere.

Graphics glitches, audio glitches, kernel hangs, suspend/resume being broken etc. Yeah and you can claim "it's not the developers fault when they have no specs". Maybe, but that's just the blame game and doesn't change the fact that it's barely beyond alpha quality after +30 years in development.

Every upgrade that fixes something breaks something else.

This produces a feedback loop where problems like these keep the (desktop) Linux in the marginal users group which means it isn't really a viable target product for developers (talking about drivers etc) which means that it's in the marginal group.

You really need at minimum a stable driver ecosystem with stable driver ABIs but Linus refuses to have that. I understand his reasoning and the benefits but one must ask, has it succeeded in producing a viable operating system that is robust and that works and can support various devices including proper graphics? Is this really the best strategy?

Building a product is HARD and BORING work that has a long tail. When you're "90% done you still need to take care of the other 90%".

Taking a hobbyist weekend project and turning it into a PRODUCT means spending long boring nights fixing those sharp edges and fixing bugs and looking for issues etc. This is work that very few people do in the open source world (due to lack of skills or motivation or whatever), but without this grind the product isn't a product yet but just an alpha demo.

Just have a look at the Wayland debacle and all the various implementations. Everything is "alpha this" "alpha that".

</rant>

I agree for arbitrary hardware that’s out there, but SteamOS + Steam Deck are well tested and fit together tightly, and they “just work” to a much greater degree than Windows + ${equivalent hardware}.

> Taking a hobbyist weekend project and turning it into a PRODUCT means spending long boring nights fixing those sharp edges and fixing bugs and looking for issues etc. This is work that very few people do in the open source world (due to lack of skills or motivation or whatever), but without this grind the product isn't a product yet but just an alpha demo.

Valve does this work for Steam Deck, and the ripple effect of their product has improved all distros’ ability to run Windows programs. If they continue to gain market share I could see more of their hard work in areas like audio, Bluetooth, or power management trickling down to general desktop Linux too.

They probably won’t contribute much in the way of desktop productivity software, though much of KDE or Gnome’s core apps have been of acceptable quality for years.

But the parent was talking about Linux as a generic platform to drive people's computing needs.

My point is that Valve's work on SteamOS is trickling down to other distros.

I think you're talking about generic Linux distributions without a corporate backed concerted and invested effort into it succeeding.

A Linux based Steam console OS is a very different beast, and it's less about "the year of the Linux desktop", and more about "the year/decade of the Steam based console". And my assumption is that the underlying OS is probably meaningless despite the amount of effort Valve devs have put into Steam OS, Proton, and all the other intermediary pieces. If the Linux desktop gets better in the process it's probably a happy coincidence, but I doubt it very much that is an actual KPI for anyone at Valve.

> You really need at minimum a stable driver ecosystem with stable driver ABIs but Linus refuses to have that. I understand his reasoning and the benefits but one must ask, has it succeeded in producing a viable operating system that is robust and that works and can support various devices including proper graphics? Is this really the best strategy?

No, it clearly doesn't need a stable driver ABI. Yes, it works very well. Even nvidia works these days.

You... understand that Linux hasn't been a "hobbyist weekend project" for like 30 years, right? It's mostly developed by big companies and has been for a long time.

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