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For the last ~12 years I've been on OS X. Before that I was primarily Slackware user. I switched to OS X when I started doing a lot of A/V work (at the time working with SDL dependencies was kind of a mess). My Air is dying and I'm considering purchasing one of the newer Skylake-based 4K laptops to run Arch, rather than shell out $3k for a $1200 notebook. (It's a value thing, not a cost thing. I'll happily pay $3k for $3k worth of laptop) I dev primarily in C, JS/Node, Golang, Python, Ruby, and have started working with Elxir and Swift recently (I'm fine using a hosting CI server to build Swift projects). I also do a lot of audio production, consume most of my media through my laptop, and need to be able to interface with CNC/Laser Cutters/3D printers. Has anyone who does some or all of these things switched to a modern release of Linux? If so, what was your experience? |
Audio production is... another matter. Linux certainly has hardware weaknesses, even in areas that have been massively improved (like GPU drivers). I've also done kernel upgrades that randomly broke drivers and had to revert. So honestly the audio/CNC/laser cutter/3D printer thing is much more iffy.
Consuming media through the laptop is another sticking point. I had tons of bizarre issues with Chrome/Firefox and streaming video sites. It was just a mess.
I'd be very wary of Arch, as well. If this is your primary work computer, I strongly suggest a distro with a well-funded corporate backer. Arch is also going to give you cutting-edge updates, but sometimes (theoretically) at the expense of breaking things.
Have you considered a Hackintosh? And what's keeping you off of Windows? Since Vagrant/Docker, developing on Windows doesn't require huge sacrifices, and driver/media support on Windows is better than any other OS.