[spectistcles]

I'm with you on this. The bloatware in modern operating systems, even once you take away the PC-vendor garbage, is appalling.

I feel like they could keep things the way they are, and offer an AOSP-like vanilla version for people who generally know what they're doing (Google does a pretty good job with limiting it).

I'd pay hundreds of dollars more for this software option (have previously considered hiring someone to do it in the past on a new PC, but I have had bad experiences with PC repair shops).

I bought my spouse a new PC and literally had to spend HOURS removing software and decoupling McAffee from Windows. An i5-based system was out of the box crippled while it downloaded updates and software from the Windows store that I didn't even want to begin with.

OSX is markedly better, but I don't need siri, icloud, chess, ilife, dvd player, photo booth... the list goes on.

[cpr]

You can turn Siri and iCloud off at first boot-up, and the others are just apps that sit in /Applications and don't really take up much space, and won't bother you if you don't use them.

(The only exception might be Garage Band with its huge sound files, but you can simply find and delete those.)

[wingworks]

When you get a new Windows computer first thing to do is give it clean install using an image direct from MS (remove all the partitions), which gives you a nice clean start. Don't even try to uninstall crap the OEMs have installed, there will always be stuff you've missed.

[thomastjeffery]

What you want is Linux.

OS X is a bloated version of BSD. Why run that when you can use Linux for free? Install the software you use and nothing else. Your package manager will keep all of your software up to date for you. You won't be running an absurd antivirus program an the time...

[spectistcles]

I need to use the Adobe Creative Suite (or a mainstream alternative like Sketch). Literally the only reason I can't switch to linux.

Before anyone even starts — GIMP is not viable in enterprise workflows.

[thomastjeffery]

> Before anyone even starts — GIMP is...

I understand completely. GIMP has never been very good (though quite usable in many cases). GTK (Gimp ToolKit) is a nice library, though. Krita is much better, but is very focused on painting.

At least you can run a real OS whenever you aren't using that specific software. Any reasonable linux distro will use <10gb including all the software you really use, and have a nice automated installer to shrink your windows/mac partition and install in the empty space.

Sure it's not ideal to have to reboot, but with solid state drives, rebooting isn't very much hassle anymore.