[t0astbread]

That's what I'm saying, not every operating system is Windows. But what are you trying to do? For Windows-only video games multi-boot is good enough. I guess you won't be switching between gaming and doing something else fast enough that the reboots would get annoying. And for a lot of Windows games Wine and now Valve's Proton are also viable. For Windows-specific development you could also use a VM with shared folders.

[genocidicbunny]

Sure, for your average HN user, that is viable.

Most people aren't your average HN user. Most people wouldn't be able to really figure out dual-boot, much less shared folders, Wine and Valve's Proton. It's still just too complicated compared to Windows. For these people, any use of Windows-only software makes the decision for them. They will use Windows because its easier and it 'just works' as far as they're concerned.

[sergeykish]

I agree with statement though not because of the arguments.

Dual-boot is scary — it can ruin the only computer user has — but live USB is super simple. Shared folders? Put shared data on FAT USB. Start with browser, that's 99% usage. Windows-only software? There would never be 100% parity. Same story opposite way - a lot of programming languages do not work that well on Windows.

Windows is easier because it is familiar, it has a lot of quirks

* why do I need disks? I'd better put everything in personal folder

* right click on desktop to setup display?

* "my computer" on the desktop of my computer?

* File > Exit?

Most of the Windows users would not switch to Linux even if it was as polished as Mac. We know because they don't switch to Mac.

[em-bee]

multi boot is absolutely not good enough. i do multiple things in paralell and switch back and forth frequently. the problem is not only the switching but that a reboot causes me to loose state. i have to close all editors of my work in progress, reposition windows and whatnot. each reboot would cost a few minutes of work.

on one laptop i managed to get hibernation to work such that i could hibernate one OS while i woke up the other. this way i could switch back and forth between linux and windows without loosing state. but it was still annoying that my linux system was not accessible when i needed it. like to check email or respond to messages while the game is running.

[t0astbread]

I mean If you say so, sure. I'm not forcing you to do anything. In my experience when moving away from Windows it has been fine though, I'd just install what I wanted to do while playing games on Windows as well (such as a web browser, chat software, etc.)

[em-bee]

casual browsing, sure, but email, no way.

i try to keep personal data away from windows as much as i can. i use windows only for things that don't work any other way. the only exception is games,some games run on linux or wine too, but all of them run on windows, so i currently have all games on windows just to have them all in one place and keep games away from where i do real work.

apart from that i treat the windows laptop as a replaceable dumb terminal that i don't care about if it gets destroyed or hacked. anything important is on a trusted device running linux.

also, having linux around is what makes using windows bearable. the most important window is the ssh/mosh terminal to my linux machine. the less i have to interact with windows, the better.

finally i switched from dos to linux before win95 came out and i haven't used windows for more than a decade until tax and banking software forced me to. then i added games because the device was already there.