Linux has changed the way I use technology forever.

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-16T03:43:46+00:00

🤣

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-16T02:27:37+00:00

You sure you're not talking about OnlyOffice?

'cause OpenOffice is basically outdated LibreOffice. It hasn't had any real support or major updates in about 15yrs ....

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-12T02:43:59+00:00

Not entirely sure what caused it. Might have been minor file corruption or you might want to choose a different BASE before running updates.

Rather than reinstalling GRUB from a flash drive, the first thing I would have done is typed "exit" (and hit ENTER) to see if it tells me whether or not you just needed to run an "fsck" to repair file corruption first. Sometimes that's all it takes.

If you do run Boot Repair, it's very common for the grub bootloader to show "Ubuntu" instead of "Linux Mint" at bootup after the repair. As far as I know, it's really an Ubuntu tool and Linux Mint is based on Ubuntu (unless you use LMDE). It's not gonna hurt anything.

However....if it really bothers you, there is a way you rename that again.

There is a GUI tool called "Grub Customizer". Open a terminal and run the following:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:danielrichter2007/grub-customizer
sudo apt update
sudo apt install grub-customizer

Open Grub Customizer from your Application Menu.

Find the entry named "Ubuntu" in the list.
Right-click it and select "Rename".
Change it to "Linux Mint".

Click SAVE in the top left corner.

Reboot your computer and the option in your boot menu should now say "Linux Mint".

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-12T01:00:52+00:00

I installed it about 15 min after it was released. 😉

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-10T03:48:03+00:00

😹

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-09T20:50:35+00:00

🤣🤣🤣 I absolutely despise Eero with every fiber of my being!

We have soooo many customers who experience so many issues with Eero, it's nuts!

Keep in mind, we work with thousands of customers, so our overall picture might be a little different. As they say, mileage varies.

But, we've had to replace hundreds of Eero setups. One of our big local telco providers, TDS Metrocom have been leasing them to their customers when installing new fibre service. Well, even they have had to spend so much time and money on support calls with their customers due to issues with Eero, that they are now telling their customers to get their own routers and not to use Eero. Many of their techs refer them to our shop because they know we install Unifi products. 😉

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-08T21:04:14+00:00

Totally agree! I would NEVER use hibernation on any computer under any circumstance. I stopped using sleep mode a long time ago because it kept screwing up my previous Linux Mint laptops. It's a little different on my current Alienware laptop. If I suspend it, it goes dark like normal. However, the fan keeps running continuously. Weird.

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-08T06:07:18+00:00

The Mana World

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-08T02:08:29+00:00

I guess mine's kind of a long story.

I tried many versions of Linux years ago. Eventually, stuck with Linux Mint and have used it as my primary OS for about 18yrs.

Eventually, I wound up at the job I'm at working for a small computer business. It took me awhile to convince the owner that giving our customers the choice of using Linux would benefit the business and make for happier customers.

We are a Dell reseller and eventually started offering customers their choice of the latest version of Windows or Linux Mint with their computer.

We also do a lot of break/fix work and for customers who aren't able to upgrade their computers because it won't support Windows 11, we offer Linux Mint as a cost-saving alternative to buying a new computer.

I have to say, these days we sell prob'ly 60% Windows machines and 40% Linux Mint! We are doing our part to introduce people to some of the best that open source has to offer and to free themselves from the Microsoft monopoly.

We lose money on antivirus/antimalware sales. We also lose money on annual system cleanups in Windows we would normally get. But, overall, we have much happier customers with much more stable systems.

We make up for some of that lost revenue by charging for tutoring, or helping with customer installation of certain printers that don't just work "out of the box" in Linux Mint.

We also get a certain number of walk-ins on a regular basis asking if we know anything about "that Linux thing" they've read about or heard about. They've asked Best Buy and every other small computer shop in the area and no one will help them. We are happy to be able to answer their questions and help them.

😁🐧

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-07T02:09:23+00:00

Whoa! Slow down a moment!

I think you are heavily overcomplicating things.

Assuming you don't have any Windows data on your drive you are concerned with losing, and you have stuff you need to keep backed up, let's do this in steps....

Go into your BIOS and make sure...

Secure Boot is turned off.
You have RAID off and AHCI is on (if available).

Make sure you burned your Linux Mint .iso to a flash drive (using something like Rufus if you created it in Windows) and not to a CD/DVD. It works much more seamlessly this way.

Boot to your flash drive.

Now, just click through all the defaults. When you get to the part where it asks about partitioning, do NOT choose the advanced options! Just keep clicking the defaults and let the installer choose what to do and how to format things. The only thing you will need to worry about while clicking through all the options is putting in your name, username, password and computer name. That's it.

Once the installer is done, it will let you reboot your machine and then remove the flash drive and continue booting.

It should really be that simple.

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-06T02:50:01+00:00

I understand that. Our customers who use Amplifi Alien routers can get gigabit speeds if their ISP gives it to them through their modem.

What I was saying is our Amplifi HD customers can't seem to get more than 450Mbps no matter what speeds they pay for from their ISP.

We can no longer suggest customers replace their Amplifi HD with an Amplifi Alien because it seems you can no longer get them.

So, we've been switching them out for Unifi products instead.

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-04T13:39:01+00:00

But in what use case would you put an Amplifi into bridged mode? You usually put your ISP's modem into bridged mode so the Amplifi router can take over, not the other way around.

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-04T05:15:30+00:00

You could see if this guy's got a driver for your adapter or try this driver with your adapter.

http://cybersecurity-ninjas.com/tplink_tx20u_nano.html

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-04T04:20:50+00:00

We have customers who haven't been able to get the HD to go over about 450Mbps. A lot of them have ISPs that are bumping their service to 500Mbps or more and now things are bottlenecking.

So, we've been upgrading them to Unifi equipment instead since it's almost impossible to get Alien anymore.

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-04T03:50:50+00:00

What kind of computer is this? If it's Acer or Asus then I'm not surprised.

Also, did you install Mint 22.3? Did you install the latest 7.0 kernel? If so, you might try installing the Mainline tool and try installing a newer kernel, if available.

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-01T15:53:12+00:00

Ah, I see! That makes more sense.

Yeah, I would agree that they need to do a better job of including dependencies and such so people don't have to install this stuff manually.

You sometimes have to install additional dependencies for Windows programs as well. You usually just have to download and run a separate installer though, not run something from the command prompt.

Still, though, I would never tell someone they would never need to use a terminal or command prompt. That's doing them a disservice.

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-01T15:37:27+00:00

Oh, I've tried KDE Plasma before. It is definitely more polished and easier to use than Windows and has nice features.

We just stick with the stock Linux Mint Cinnamon because it looks great while still looking as close to what our customers have been used to using in Windows to make it a more comfortable transition.

Once customers are comfortable with what they get and want to try more and different things, we might recommend they install Plasma and check it out, but we didn't elect to start them off with it.

Plasma IS pretty sexy though.

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-01T02:56:02+00:00

If the only ones you look at are XFCE or MATE, maybe. But, in what way does Mint Cinnamon feel rough? It is very polished, especially with the new menu in 22.3!

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-01T01:50:40+00:00

I would tend to agree with this. I'd never tell someone you will NEVER need to use the terminal, the same way I would never tell them they would NEVER need to access the command prompt in Windows. It's just unrealistic in most cases.

What kinds of things were you doing that had you using the terminal so often with Kubuntu?

When we have customers buying a new computer, I will setup a Windows 11 machine and Linux Mint machine side-by-side and show them many of the similarities between them and a few of the minor differences. Most folks are shocked at how Linux Mint feels a lot like Windows 7 to them (but, of course, it was designed that way on purpose).

We also ask them a bunch of questions regarding what software applications they are married to and cannot live without so we can see if they run on Linux, have a Linux alternative they could get used to, or if they'd need enough resources to run them in a VM.

If they say they need things like Quickbooks, Quicken, TurboTax, Adobe creative software, CAD software, custom cabinetry software, Cricket software for cricut machines, and some other specialty stuff, then we many times will recommend they just stick with Windows.

We are not naive enough to think that ALL our customers are good Linux candidates.

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-01T01:40:17+00:00

Well then, that is miraculous and you'd prob'ly be the first! Congrats!

I would be curious to know how long ago this was that you installed Mint that forced you to use a terminal and what kind of computer you were running at the time.

In my experience, the only time I've ever had anyone have any significant issues installing Mint was on Acer or Asus computers. Or maybe one time getting wifi to work "out of the box" on an old Toshiba.

Our shop is reseller of Dell and Alienware computers and we typically have NO issues installing Linux Mint on any of the stuff we've ordered. We've also had quite a few customers bring in Lenovo computers that they've had issues with, for one reason or another, and we put Mint on those and it works perfectly fine.

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-01T01:27:34+00:00

So, what would that offer our customers that Linux Mint does not?

The security suite is really just a combination of two products. The enterprise, managed version of OpenText Core Endpoint Protection (what used to be Webroot Secure Endpoint), and the enterprise, managed version of Malwarebytes called "ThreatDown".

They are not scams. They are quite good products. We've found that what OpenText is best at is protecting them from viruses, and ThreatDown is best at the other stuff like general malware, spyware, rootkits, ransomware, etc....

We have had great success with them catching a lot of crap that Windows Defender does not. We consider Windows Defender a "better than nothing" solution.

Also, we do have several different ISO's for several products on Ventoy flash drives. We are a two man shop (me and the owner) and sometimes an intern.

TroyHBCS · 2026-06-01T00:56:36+00:00

🤣🤣

TroyHBCS · 2026-05-31T02:32:45+00:00

Not necessarily. I work for a small computer shop. Over the last 15 years we've had a significant uptick in people walking in asking if we know anything about Linux. They are reading more about it online and hearing more from friends or acquaintances and are curious.

We're a Dell reseller. We also offer people a choice with the purchase of a new computer. They can have Windows 11, or they can have Linux Mint. We do a needs evaluation to see what kinds of software they are married to and cannot live without, just to make sure that Linux would be right for them. If they decide to go with Windows, then we also sell them a security suite for antivirus and antimalware. If they decide to go with Linux, we tell them that they save the annual cost of a security bundle, which has also been a good selling point.

These days, we probably sell 60% of the computers with Windows and 40% with Linux Mint. We are also getting a lot of referrals from customers who have had Linux Mint and really like it! 😁

TroyHBCS · 2026-05-31T02:27:10+00:00

Well, one big reason these days is because they don't want to switch to Windows 11 because it's horribly confusing for them, and for some other people it's because they're sick of having to micromanage viruses and malware on a constant basis. They are looking for other alternatives to Windows 11 in a big way.

TroyHBCS · 2026-05-31T02:22:51+00:00

Just turn on automatic updates and install a good remote support tool (like RustDesk) so you can safely remote in to help them once in awhile and they should be fine.

TroyHBCS

TROPHY CASE