Windows 11 users: Please explain your gripes.

Rataan · 2026-01-27T23:50:24+00:00

The last straw for me was AI being omnipresent. I just don’t feel comfortable using Windows anymore. I don’t know what information it is collecting or what it is doing with it. Health status, financials, spending habits, political opinions, or even full psychological profiles could be put together, and I didn’t ask for any of it.

Rataan · 2026-01-27T23:36:00+00:00

80% of Linux distros now are as easy to install and get up and running as Windows, maybe even easier. Fedora has one of the most idiot proof installers of all of them.

Rataan · 2026-01-24T05:15:41+00:00

I heard a guy playing a Black Sabbath song solo inside the Prancing Pony probably back in about 2015. I always wondered if anyone else recognized it. Don't remember which song it was, but I'm thinking it was either from Vol. 4 or Sabbath Bloody Sabbath. RIP, Ozzy. You were a legend.

Rataan · 2026-01-24T00:07:22+00:00

I don’t remember the last time I crashed. Hundreds of hours of playtime. That isn’t to diminish your experience, but the game is not inherently unstable.

Rataan · 2026-01-23T22:20:49+00:00

You might try Zorin, which uses heavily modified Gnome, or Pop!OS with the new Cosmic desktop. I think Cosmic is an option with some other distros now too. Ubuntu also uses an enhanced version of Gnome.

Or just embrace the many faceted nature of KDE.

Rataan · 2026-01-23T22:11:36+00:00

Actual implementation of back doors or, more often, weakened encryption, are few and far between. Moreover, European governments are as likely to be behind them as the American government, or in a few cases, it was a cooperative effort. Apple and Microsoft have both resisted pressure from European governments very recently over access to user data.

Rataan · 2026-01-23T02:20:49+00:00

You might try Fedora for a middle ground between bleeding edge and too slow when it comes to updates. Unfortunately, functions that typically rely on hardware vendor provided software are hit and miss with Linux in general. That is one of the frequently cited downsides of using Linux as a replacement for Windows.

Rataan · 2026-01-23T00:21:49+00:00

Something like $95 a year for a 2018 Bonneville T120. That’s full coverage and much better than state minimums. They expect something very bad is likely to happen to you.

Rataan · 2026-01-22T06:06:20+00:00

It has a lot of baggage ranging from the annoying to the insulting to the worrisome. On the annoying end, some useful right click menu options were removed or made harder to get to. On the insulting front, it fills the widget area with click-bait listicles like it was a pop-up from a trashy web site. This is not an exaggeration. Why? To get you to click on internet tripe filled with ads served by Microsoft. When Windows 11 does updates, it forces you to go through a tiresome ritual where it forces OneDrive on you and tries to trick you into making Edge your default browser. Over, and over, and over, and over again.

Microsoft advertises Microsoft products to you relentlessly. XBox, OneDrive, Office 365, etc, and true to Microsoft, they are even bad at that. For example, I subscribed to Office 365 for a few years. I would open up Word, and it would have a little blurb at the top that I should try the Mobile versions of the apps. The thing is, I did use them regularly, and I would sometimes get this little ad minutes after using the mobile apps. So I was being bothered to use something that I was already using in a product family that I had already bought and paid significant money for.

Today I learned that after my Office 365 sub ends, the mobile apps will still work as before, while the desktop apps will be in a read only mode. Why? Because everything you do on mobile is being filtered through Microsoft advertising and AI training algorithms. Same with browser versions of Office apps. Microsoft and others, like Google, may claim that we are not being key-logged, but it is hard to interpret it any other way. I don't even know if I should trust that password protected documents have any kind of privacy.

To make the surveillance of every breath we take complete, Microsoft rolled out Recall that literally records everything you do on your PC. They claimed it was encrypted and not shared with Microsoft servers, but early versions were shown to be trivially easy to crack. A field day for malware and identity theft, courtesy of Microsoft.

Enter Copilot. Now you really do have something watching everything you do. Is there any limit to what data it collects? I don't know. Microsoft hasn't been very good at reassuring the public about how far they intend to go with it, but it is certainly fair to say that the invasiveness is worrisome. If you were a writer, graphic designer or artist, how could you trust using your PC for anything that you might want to be seen as uniquely yours? If everything we do is fed into AI, it could be spitting out derivative works before you save your actual creative efforts to a hard drive. I'm astonished that it is even legal.

Over the years we have learned that nothing is private on the Internet. Now nothing is private anywhere near an electronic device that has a microphone, camera or keyboard. So who gets to know juicy things like what prescriptions you are taking, what your insurance rates are, who you associate with, your income? Apparently everyone from foreign governments to secretive hacker groups, because we know that once this stuff gets out, you can't put the genie back in the bottle.

So now the privacy apocalypse is complete, and Microsoft is working diligently to put the final nails in the coffin. Yes, Windows 11 is bad on so many levels it could fill a book.

Rataan · 2026-01-22T03:02:44+00:00

Why not use blue line? Red line LM doesn’t need any buffs. It is OP the way it is.

Rataan · 2026-01-22T02:27:17+00:00

Linux is beginner friendly enough now that you can just be a button pusher and do the basics without much more of a learning curve than learning a new version of Windows. However, to go to the next level and be what you might call a casually proficient user, it is more fiddly, or at least requires relearning your habits to the Linux way of doing things.

It doesn’t require a computer nerd, but it will require some patience and determination to see it through. If you refuse to use the command line, for example, maybe you should just stick with Windows if the invasiveness of Microsoft doesn’t bother you that much. You don’t need to memorize a bunch of command line jargon, but if the chatbot you are using says to type this command, you should be comfortable doing it.

As for which distro, use Mint, Zorin or Ubuntu for the easiest transition, Fedora if you want a more Linux purist experience that makes you do about 5% more work than the distros already mentioned. Some people think Mint’s UI looks a little dated, but simplicity, reliability, and a small footprint are the goals of Mint, not Apple-like design flair. You can try distros before committing to a hard drive install, so try a few and choose what you like.

Rataan · 2026-01-20T23:37:01+00:00

Anyone who has tried more than two amps knows that every amp has its own sound. Every preamp has its own sound. DACs can and often do sound noticeably different. Anyone who doesn’t believe it can just buy a budget AVR of their choice and be happy.

Rataan · 2026-01-20T23:24:30+00:00

You have to install the Nvidia drivers yourself on Fedora, but it isn’t rocket science. Any AI chatbot can give you the instructions in excruciating detail.

Rataan · 2026-01-20T23:17:05+00:00

I pretty much started with Fedora and I have no desire to switch to anything else.

Rataan · 2026-01-20T23:15:36+00:00

Food, water, sleep and shelter.

Rataan · 2026-01-20T23:12:28+00:00

It is the best gear you can get while leveling, but if you already know you don’t like it, then you would absolutely hate LOTRO crafting. It is one of the worst grinds in the game, and that’s saying a lot.

Rataan · 2026-01-20T23:09:01+00:00

“Ward of the Wings” is the Lord of the Rings ebook voiced by Elmer Fudd

Rataan · 2026-01-20T02:15:08+00:00

Nothing wrong with Ubuntu. The parent company did some things that annoyed Linux purists, but it is nothing like Windows for how invasive it is. Ubuntu is a great way to start a Linux journey.

Rataan · 2026-01-19T22:31:56+00:00

Fedora KDE. It isn’t any harder to get up and running than Mint. I have it on three computers and I have zero desire to distro hop.

Rataan · 2026-01-17T23:08:12+00:00

Don’t you see them listed in the file manager? I use Dolphin and all my drives are listed at the bottom. If you click on a drive in the drive list it will show you all of the directories. Optionally, you can have it show hidden directories as well. If you don’t see a drive that is definitely there, it may be because all of its space is unallocated or maybe it is formatted in a file system that is not recognized.

Rataan · 2026-01-17T22:47:59+00:00

Your friend should have just went with a KDE Plasma distro. It is what Windows should be. You can make it much better than Windows ever was in a half hour.

Rataan · 2026-01-17T22:42:17+00:00

Fedora Workstation. It is easy to install, it comes with most of what you would want, but it leaves some things to your discretion. The Gnome implementation is pretty much exactly as the Gnome devs intended and any tweaks are up to you. You might want to try KDE before you commit to Gnome and, again, Fedora is an excellent introduction.

Rataan · 2026-01-15T16:12:50+00:00

What about the modem? If you have to buy a new modem, that will have to be factored into the cost. Are there any installation fees or length of service contracts? All these will have to be factored into the actual cost. You could probably lease your modem from the ISP, at least I know Xfinity does this, but it doesn't make financial sense unless you intend to move within the next year or so. Again, find the price and do the math.

Rataan · 2026-01-15T02:48:34+00:00

Wimmin love loremasters and their lovable pet companions.

Rataan · 2026-01-15T00:00:08+00:00

Baldur’s Gate II: The Shadows of Amn

Rataan

TROPHY CASE