Before you say anything—Linux is great. I’ve been writing Linux advocacy pieces for more than a decade. Desktop Linux has come along by leaps and bounds, and has yet to reach its full potential. However, for those who have never used Linux in any of its flavors, there are still reasons to think twice before diving in.
If you need to use specific software that doesn’t have a native Linux version, then that’s a pretty good reason not to use Linux. After all, in the end what really matters are the software apps we need.
That being said, there are plenty of ways to get Windows software (for example) running on Linux. The number-one stop for this is WINE which is short for WINE Is Not an Emulator. Oh those open source goofs with their recursive acronyms!
If your preferred applications have favorable reviews on platforms like WINE, then it might work out well. It’s worth giving it a shot personally, though I suggest trying Linux on a Virtual Machine to test software compatibility. Apart from WINE, another method to operate non-Linux applications involves using virtual machines in some scenarios.
If you’re into PC gaming, Linux might not entirely align with your needs just yet. Although Linux has made significant strides in running many Windows games seamlessly using projects like Proton, and dedicated systems such as SteamOS are optimized for these solutions, full compatibility and optimal performances are still more reliable on Windows. The games on Linux run over a compatibility layer which doesn’t yet match Windows performance. So for avid PC gamers, while Linux is promising and improving, it might be preferable to wait if you require guaranteed compatibility for all your games.
When you first install your Linux distribution of choice, you may find that some things just don’t work out of the box. The common culprits are Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and GPU acceleration features. Finding and installing drivers for Linux is easier than ever, of course, and a lot of hardware will just work out of the box, but in a Windows-focused world, you can expect to spend some time getting more obscure hardware to play nice, or at all.
If you run into issues with Windows or macOS, you have a customer support line you can call or email, which for many people is absolutely necessary outside our relatively small computer geek bubble. Linux, as an open-source operating system, has no central support channel. So you’ll have to visit forums or other user-supported resources to get the help you need.
That’s not to say that you can’t get dedicated Linux support! There’s an entire industry built around supporting Linux, such as Red Hat Enterprise or Ubuntu Pro, but these are generally aimed at enterprise customers, and not regular desktop users. So, whether you can switch to Linux would depend on whether the type of support you need is available or not.
I can already hear the comment section gearing up for this one, but let’s face facts—compared to Windows or macOS the chances that a Linux user will have to dip into the Terminal or spend time doing technical stuff that the average person just doesn’t want to deal with is far higher. Windows and macOS do a more aggressive job of hiding the nuts and bolts from their users, and it’s both a strength and a weakness of Linux in general that the inner workings are more exposed.
Remember that most people use computers as a means to an end—solving a problem or getting something done. The actual computer isn’t all that interesting to them. Linux is often like the weekend project car a lot of people have. Tinkering with it is sort of the point, but what most people want is a minivan that won’t break down even if you forget to change the oil on time. Desktop Linux for regular day-to-day users isn’t quite there yet.
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