I'm going to try to replace windows 10.

[m_cozzy]

Thats it, ive had enough of windows. The latest anniversary edition turns my laptop into a hairdryer & I'm sick of the constant updates & reboots.
I'm not a linux noob. I have worked with it for the past 15 years in server environments, but am at the stage in life now where I dont want to be messing with computers when I get home. I just want them to work.
I am new to the desktop side of it though.
The machine is a clevo p170sm I think, a few years old.
I have reviewed my installed apps & to be honest there is not much on there. I use my chromebook more these days. The only thing I really need is a hypervisor to run my work virtual machine, with passthru for usb headset. I know vmware workstation works under linux, or used to anyway.
So after a few searches I've decided to try mint and elementary linux.
Criteria is reliability, speed & easy of use. I really dont care about endless customization.
Let the trials begin!

EDIT - It didnt work. In fact it was a blessed relieve to get back to windows 10. Great as a server, probably ok as a desktop if it works with your hardware, but it didnt with mine.

 

[m_cozzy]

Using Ubuntu for my work laptop that I use all day every day and then personally at night as well.

It does everything I need it to and if there is anything I need windows for I whip out VirtualBox and use the Windows7 I have installed within that.

Does virtual box do usb passthrough for audio devices? Thats a must have for me, so I can use the headset for skype whilst booted into my work virtual windows7.

I would just get Windows 7

Yes thats an option. I took a disk image of my win7 install before 'upgrading' to windows10. So reverting is possible for sure.

 

[m_cozzy]

Well I tried elementary loki.
My laptop has 2 ssd's, 1 for windows, 1 was for vmware & a spinning 1tb + a 2tb usb disk. It has an intel/nvidia graphics setup, optimus I think its called. I dont use the laptop as a laptop. Its desk based with the screen shut & connected to a mouse, keyboard & 30" dell screen.
The install was a faff. Had to go backwards/forwards a few times to get the next button to highlight. Disk partitioning was a massive pain, had to do it all manually as it wanted to resize my windows partition whereas I wanted to install it on the 2nd free vmware disk.
Once in the desktop looks ok, nothing special though after reading how awesome elementary should look. I've never used a mac, but I gather its mac like.
Didn't notice any obvious issues with hardware, it seemed to be ok in my brief usage.
Now for some software! Couldnt find libreoffice in the app centre, despite searching & there being a dedicated tile for office apps! So onto google, which disappointingly started to make loads of references to command line install, not what I expected seeing how this distro is advertised. Also needed a package to make .deb files work.
I went to add my printer, a brother 3040, scrolled down the huge list of drivers to find the model completely missing. Whoo, I feel like I'm back in 2002. Getting quite frustrated now. No bother, its not a day 1 requirement.
Downloaded vmware workstation. This comes with a .bundle extension. Of couse it didnt work, locking up the window. Again busted out the cli, chmod to make it executable then installed once i had su'ed up. I tried to test a vm but it started grumbling about no 3d acceleration. The guides I found on how to install the nvidia software were to no avail.
I also didnt really like the left x close button, especially when I installed chrome and all the close/max/min buttons were in the usual place, not consistent.
Oh and it wouldnt mount my exfat 2tb drive without another cli install of some package.
At this point after 90 mins or so, I had had enough, this wasn't working for me.

So a quick boot back to windows, redo the usb stick for mint & off we go again. Threw an error about sdb being mounted, but the partitioning worked seanlessly, it allowed me to select the 2nd ssd & just installed. Once booted it automatically found my printer & said it was ready to go, plus the exfat disk had an icon on the desktop & could be accessed! This is looking much better already.
Further testing of mint tomorrow.

 

[m_cozzy]

Well ive given up & gone back to windows.
Mint initially looked good, but I cannot get it to work with my optimus gtx770m / intel graphics. Lots of cinnamon crashes, lots of cli stuff to try & fix it, going round and round in circles looking for a solution.
Other issues were fans running too quickly and usb mouse not waking up from standby.
Yes I didn't give it that much of my time. Yes I'm sure these issues could be fixed with time and googling, but I simply cannot be bothered when windows works out of the box.
Shame, linux seems to have the same sort of issues I faced 16 years ago when I last tried it as a desktop.

EDIT I may persevere more at the weekend.

 

[m_cozzy]

As I dont like failing I tried again last night, this time with ubuntu 16. Problem free install, needed to manually add stuff for exfat & printer. However the printer didnt print, so maybe even though mint did it all automatically, that wouldnt have printed either as I didnt test it. TBH its got me thinking do I really need a big colour brother 3040 laser printer at home? Probably not. I can print from work when I need to, so may well sell this.
Nvidia works! Although maybe more to me adding a ppa repository, it downloaded a new driver and I now get the choice to pick either the intel or the nvidia card & all the menus are populated in the nvidia xserver control panel. The only reason I noticed nvida wasnt running under mint was my paused virtual machines from windows complained about 3d acceleration not being available when trying to resume them under linux. I didnt really think I need 3d for my work vm. I gather I can do something with bumblebee that will perhaps launch the nvida card when I run vmware workstation if I really need to. To be looked into.
Wake from usb keyboard seems to work now. Fans a little noisy still although ultimately I may well replace this gaming laptop with a sff quiet pc anyway.
Unity. Hate it, although maybe getting better after using it all morning I still prefered the mint 18 desktop, and may try it again using what I have learn so far.

 

[m_cozzy]

Ubuntu is too problematic for me, resume from standby crashes occasionally, workspace issues, chrome has launched but I cannot get to it, odd screen res after resume on my mahoosive 30" dell. Plus I cant abide the windows controls being on the wrong side with no way to move them back to the right, thats just arrogant of the developers. Apart from that I was doing ok!
The lack of a decent google drive client is a big issue for me also.
So I wil give mint another bash tonight & if that fails I will try manjaro, I quite liked that during a brief test the other week.

 

[m_cozzy]

No, mint still wont work properly even with the new nvidia drivers, display is all screwed up and cinamon crashes every login.
So for me & my hardware, linux is still not yet viable.
I have no desire to try further distos & will put up with windows 10 again (with metered connection on so it stops updating) Hopefully android x86 on pc's will be a big thing within 5 years so so, now that really would be something!
So ends my experiment to free myself from windows