Analysts have warned Windows 10 end of life plans could spark a global torrent of e-waste, with millions of devices expected to be scrapped in the coming years.
Research from Canalys shows that up to 240 million PCs globally could be terminated as a result of the shift over to Windows 11, raising critical questions about device refreshes and the responsibility of vendors to extend life cycles.
People are mad at MS for being MS. MS isn’t great, Windows is flawed, and there should be better alternatives. People would be quick to move to Linux if it worked for them. Most desktops now are for gaming. Most gamers have Nvidia. Linux famously has issues with Nvidia because 90% of the distros out there decided to jump on to Wayland before it was even half done. If that’s the state of Linux where my 8-year-old Windows 10 machine still gets updates regularly and runs fine. Windows 10 will actively prevent you from trying to upgrade and bricking your system whereas Linux is absolutely like “Go ahead, hope you read all the patch notes for the 1000s different updates you are about to get!” Most people will go with Windows because Linux doesn’t work for them.
Overall Linux has the power to be good, it just doesn’t have the community will power to do so.
Both Intel and AMD GPUs work fine on Linux. Both work fine with Wayland.
Wayland has been around for over a decade and has been in a usable state for the last 3 or so years.
Attributing the fact that Nvidia stuff still barely works to the fact that some distros have made Wayland the default is just stupid wrong.
Besides, Nvidia experience isn’t/wasn’t the smoothest even on Xorg. Linux desktop is simply not a priority for Nvidia.
k, so for the least used hardware, linux works fine. Good to know.
Eh, no, KDE last year just barely started working with Wayland.
The popular distros are what counts. Debian, Ubuntu, and Fedora. Just because you have some minor 0.00001% usage distro that still defaults to X11 doesn’t really matter.
Worked well enough for me to run into the dozen of other issues that Linux has. While I am sure you will just blow it off as not the true fault of Linux, the result is the same. I like most people want a usable environment. Linux doesn’t provide that out of the box. You can argue excuses for it all day but the end of it is, it’s not going to be a useful OS until it works out of the box with things like wacom tablets (which are broken with nvidia drivers), xbox controllers (which are just broken unless you do research and install the correct driver), and tons of incompatible software (which I am sure you can blame the developers for.) The end result is the same though, you don’t have a working environment.
Yeah, basically. Which raises a question: how companies with much smaller market share can justify providing support, but Nvidia, a company that dominates the GPU market, can’t?
Debian supports several DEs with only Gnome defaulting to Wayland. Everything else uses X11 by default.
Some other popular distros that ship with Gnome or KDE still default to X11 too. Pop!_OS, for example. Zorin. SteamOS too, technically. EndeavorOS and Manjaro are similar to Debian, since they support several DEs.
Either way, none of those are Wayland exclusive and changing to X11 takes exactly 2 clicks on the login screen. Which isn’t necessary for anyone using AMD or Intel, and wouldn’t be necessary for Nvidia users, if Nvidia actually bothered to support their hardware properly. But I digress.
Oh, it’s no way perfect. Never claimed it is.
This both depends on the disto you use and on what you consider a “usable environment”.
If you extensively use Office 365, OneDrive, need ActiveDirectory, have portable storage encrypted with BitLocker, etc. then, sure, you won’t have a good experience with any distro out there. Or even if you don’t, but you grab a geek oriented distro (e.g. Arch or Gentoo) or a barebones one (e.g. Debian) you, again, won’t have the best experience.
A lot of people, however, don’t really do a whole lot on their devices. The most widely used OS in the world, at this point in time, is Android, of all things.
If all you need to do is use the web and, maybe, edit some documents or pictures now and then, Linux is perfectly capable of that.
Real life example: I’ve switched my parents onto Linux. They’re very much not computer savvy and Gnome with it’s minimalistic mobile device-like UI and very visual app-store-like program manager is significantly easier for them to grasp. The number of issues they ask me to deal with has dropped by… A lot. Actually, every single issue this year was the printer failing to connect to the Wifi, so, I don’t suppose that counts as a technical issue with the computer, does it?
I use Gnome (Wayland) with an AMD GPU. My tablet is plug and play… Unlike on Windows. Go figure.
I feel like it’s the opposite as Nvidia provides a lot of Linux support by providing an open source kernel module (https://github.com/NVIDIA/open-gpu-kernel-modules) while AMD gets proprietary blobs into the Linux kernel ( https://trisquel.info/en/wiki/configure-2d-and-3d-graphics-acceleration). How come Linux is supporting AMD more than Nvidia currently?
You’re linking a post… From 2010. AMD replaced radeon with their open source drivers (AMDgpu) in 2015. That’s what pretty much any AMD GPU that came out in the last 10 years uses now.
Furthermore, the AMDgpu drivers are in-tree drivers, and AMD actively collaborate with the kernel maintainers and developers of other graphics related projects.
As for Nvidia: their kernel modules are better than nothing, but they don’t contain a whole lot in terms of actual implementation. If before we had a solid black box, now, with those modules, we know that this black box has around 900 holes and what comes in and out of those.
Furthermore, if you look at the page you’ve linked, you’ll see that “the GitHub repository will function mostly as a snapshot of each driver release”. While the possibility of contributing is mentioned… Well, it’s Nvidia. It took them several years to finally give up trying to force EGLStreams and implement GBM, which was already adopted as the de-facto standard by literally everybody else.
The modules are not useless. Nvidia tend to not publish any documentation whatsoever, so it’s probably better than nothing and probably of some use for the nouveau driver developers… But it’s not like Nvidea came out and offered to work on nouveau to make up to par and comparable to their proprietary drivers.
Nvidia on wayland really isn’t that bad nowadays. Hell I would say that it’s pretty good even
With a 1080 it hard locks on start up. With a 3080, same results, with my 1660, same results. Tested with Fedora 38.
maybe try Nobara or PopOS that provide support for nvidia ootb
I’ll check again but I believe as I was testing out Linux distros to put on my kid’s laptop just 2 weeks ago, I tested PopOS and it somehow failed. I think it failed to boot entirely because some service not launching. I’d need to double-check that though. Overall I had about 6 distros to go through and moved on. I’ve stayed away from Nobara because it doesn’t seem like a well-trodden path.
I’ve looked at jumping back into FreeBSD or perhaps going to Gentoo but frankly, that’s more if I was going to turn my whole computer into a hobby project and I have other hobbies I want to use my computer for.
“most” desktops are used in business and other organizations, not by gamers, and it is these customers and their systems that will be the bulk of the e-waste generated by the forced-obsolescence of their hardware due to 10’s EOL and 11’s ‘new’ requirements.
At least one computer in every US household (these stats show 2 but let’s just keep it one https://www.statista.com/statistics/1107206/average-number-of-connected-devices-us-house/ since it is an average). It’s hard to say that desktops are mostly used in business since there are only 754,633 office workers in the US (https://www.zippia.com/office-worker-jobs/demographics/) and 131.43 million households. ( https://www.statista.com/statistics/183635/number-of-households-in-the-us/ )
Also, many people used Windows XP after its EoL, so much so that they increased it. It’s likely going to be the case here. Windows 10 EoL doesn’t mean the end of use. People seriously, care little about security. They don’t care about having the latest updates. They care about using a functioning computer.
Did you actually think about this for a second? Do you really think only 0.2% of the American population or 0.4% of American workers are working in the office? This should be a lesson on not to pick the first Google result.
I did not think about it because this whole conversation is useless to me.
Linux is only a problem for folks used to someone else. Also, the article is about ewaste. Meaning, these machines are going to be trashed unless someone puts linux on them. So I’d say your diatribe of misinformation was misplaced.
I assume you mean for folks used to something else and if that’s what you mean, no, it’s not. People want to play minecraft, fortnite, and use office without problems. Hell, right now with how the Nvidia/Wayland situation is, I can’t even launch the fedora 36 live cd to install it without it crashing on my 3080, amd ryzen 9.
No, it doesn’t, It means they’ll be using Windows 10 without patching. At the EoL, Windows 10 doesn’t uninstall itself.
At EoL, corporate security tells the IT department to uninstall it.
Windows works great because MS tapes it back together slightly faster than it falls apart.
When EoL hits, those devices are either trashed, firewalled into oblivion, or assimilated into the kube.
In that case, big corporations are already on Windows 11 and have thrown away any Windows 10 computer that couldn’t upgrade. Most of those machines go home with people though.
if this was true then Windows XP and 7 wouldn’t have lasted as long as they did.
I know someone who only just switched from XP to 10. They literally did it yesterday, after battling with 10 for a couple of months - eventually they relented and replaced the components that were simply too old to work with 10. They only upgraded they reached a point where too much of the software they relied upon ceased being compatible with XP. Technically their 15 year old graphics card is now unnecessary landfill, since it was working and my friend didn’t want to stop using it - but I’m not sure I’d say a graphics card that has been in continuous use for so long could really be considered “wasted” even if it was still functional at the time of disposal.
Seems to me that the problem of working computers (and individual components) going to waste while still being usable, due to changes in software requiring changes in OS is not new. The only way to prevent it would be to ban all further development of both hardware and software, so that hardware never becomes out of date.
You say that, but just like with XP, Microsoft announced a paid subscription to Windows 10 security updates for up to 3 years after the EOL date. There are probably a good number of companies who haven’t switched yet or will not be able to switch easily.
Sure I feel like the difference there is large corporations vs companies. I worked with a company that used Windows 98 in 2010. Probably used it until they shut down in 2019. That one computer probably lasted the lifetime of the company.
So those who can’t switch, won’t, and that’s fine, it’s still a usable computer without putting Linux on it. Those who can put Windows 11 on their computers will. Those who can afford new computers will upgrade. It’s not like these computers weren’t going to get replaced at one point anyway. Like this article points out, it “could” prompt a torrent of e-waste but realistically, it probably will produce the same amount of e-waste as we always have but now be under a different lens.
Yes being pedantic is easy. Did you have a point? What does nvidia’s failings have to do with anything? Pull that garbage out, drop in linux mint and donate it to a poor kid that needs it for school.
minecraft works without problems on linux and there is, libre office, only office and hell even google docs on linux. and fortnite is one of the few games that don’t work on linux because of the anti cheat that normally supports linux but doesn’t spesifically on fortnite because epic hates linux
Bedrock edition.
Sure a bunch of software suites that have their own problems or google docs which to say “even it runs on Linux” is extremely silly. Anything that runs chrome runs google docs.
Most games don’t run on Linux, and even with Proton, a lot of games do not work well. A few of them are Castle Crashers, Never Alone, A Hat In Time, and a lot of older Unity games. They are all marked as “working” but in practice, they don’t.
things that are marked as working do work, sounds like user error… I won’t continue trying to talk you out of the microsoft ecosystem but alternatives are there, and they’re viable
That’s the exact sort of bullshit community pushback I am talking about. That shit right there is why Linux is being held back. Frankly, if your OS could be held wrong by someone who writes in C++ and has 8 years experience using your OS, then your OS is fundamentally flawed.
For some specific workflows, sure. If you only need a browser or have locked down hardware like Android/ChromeOS/SteamOS SURE! If you want to use a computer like a productive device you can do anything on, likely not going to work with Linux. You can believe all you want that the only reason Linux doesn’t have a larger foothold in gaming is Windows comes pre-installed but the truth is that Linux usage dropped from in 2014 compared to 2020. Linux in 2014 was 1.1% and in 2020 it was .91. The major rise recently of Linux on Steam was because of the steam decks. So yes, Linux is great when everything is locked down and a large company with direction is supporting it. Otherwise, on desktop, it’s not for most people.
this doesn’t have anything to do with C++ it is easy to run games om linux you are just unwilling to learn, also Linux is the opposite of locked down the hell are you talking about
You’ve missed my points entirely, the only thing I can suggest is reread what I wrote.
I have to agree with this. I tried Linux a couple of months ago, and ran into those issues with Nvidia. My computer was reasonably stable in the desktop environment using a particular version of the drivers, so as long as I was happy to never update the drivers and never do anything but email, web browsing, and word processing, Linux would have been fine. If I wanted to play any games or do any digital art or anything else that required my graphics card, it was either unstable or running barely faster than continental drift, depending on which set of drivers I was using.
Like, I do think Linux is pretty cool, but it very much feels like a project for people who have the time and money to continuously tinker with their computer to get it working exactly as they want. It’s not there yet on the “it just works no matter what you do” front, which is what the vast majority of computer users need from their operating system. Windows, for all its many faults, is broadly stable and can largely be ignored once it’s installed - although I do think it benefits from a reformat every 12-18 months.
And if your machine was to be tossed in the trash otherwise, how well do the proprietary drivers operate in the dump?
I might as well have tossed my computer in the trash if I’d kept Linux on it, since I couldn’t actually do anything with it.
compare this to your previous statement :
Can it do all these totally normal and useful things or is it trash because you can not do anything with it? What nebulous “stuff I need my computer to do” is linux not stable enough for?
I don’t need a server, nor an office desktop. I need something that can play games and do digital art, both of which Linux is not stable enough for, which I stated in my initial post. A computer that crashes every couple of minutes while gaming or doing digital art is not useful for me. Chucking my perfectly good Nvidia graphics card in the bin so I can buy something else that is more compatible with Linux is wasteful. And since starting my degree, I have also determined that about 50% of the software I need to use for group project modules doesn’t work on Linux and doesn’t have appropriate open source alternatives that wouldn’t cause compatibility issues when the files are sent on to other team mates - we’ve all got to be using the same version of the same software.
So yeah, Linux in its present state doesn’t suit my needs.
The real ewaste problem here is not people like me that keep using components until they die from wear and tear, and replace only broken components not entire computers. I’m quite happy to keep using Windows 10 as long as it is compatible with my hardware and software, regardless of whether Microsoft are still supporting it. The problem is the people who throw out perfectly usable computers because the OS is no longer supported.
It is perfect for a poor person that just needs internet and email. But yup, because it didn’t meet your use case it is trash. That there is some thinkin’.
Uh, that’s not what I said at all. I never once said Linux is trash. Pretty sure one of my posts said it’s cool, actuakly. It just wasn’t suitable for me. When it was put to me that the options are Linux or throw the computer away due to Windows 10 being end of life, then in that instance (which is not reality), then my computer might as well go in the bin precisely because Linux’s inability to run a stable environment with my use case would, in effect, render my computer into a brick anyway.
Fans of Linux seem to think it’s suitable for every use case, for every user, and this is simply not the case. The overlap of people that have no specialised needs for their computer (for which gaming, frankly, is one) and also have the knowledge to run Linux without any problems (since they won’t be able to fix it when - not if - they get some kind of error) and the knowledge to know which hardware is compatible and which isn’t (since the wrong component also renders Linux unstable) is actually very small.
a lot of your contributions to this section of the thread are very needlessly antagonistic. please chill a bit.
I don’t get this argument because EoL doesn’t mean they can’t keep windows 10 on it.
I think you’re massively over-generalizing here to make Linux look like an unstable mess. Rolling release distros are the ones that want you to read the patch notes. Arch is the poster child for those. Stable distros like Mint and Ubuntu and elementaryOS don’t brick your system with every update. They hold back updates and stick with older kernels to ensure stability. Linux is, already, very good. It sounds like you haven’t used it for any length of time. Valve’s work on Proton has made Linux gaming viable for a whole lot of people, but the majority of computer users don’t play intense video games. They want web browsing, email, office software, that kind of thing. Linux does those just great on almost any device all the way down to Raspberry Pi boards.
I used Linux as a daily driver for 5 years and was a FreeBSD porter for 2 years after that. I’ve been using Linux every year to pop in and see the issues and their current state. In this year alone, I’ve seen issues with Fedora, Linux Mint, and Manjaro. Hell, even right now the Fedora Live installer won’t launch on my desktop. It hard freezes before it can even get the installer up.
Have you considered that you might have Bad Vibes? Maybe the installer is afraid.
If the installer is that easily scared off then it doesn’t deserve to be an installer. I treat the Windows installer far worse.
In seriousness, I have used Mint as a daily driver for probably 7 years now and I have found only the MATE and xfce flavors to be properly reliable and stable. Cinnamon, no matter how many times and on what hardware I’ve tried it, has a lovely habit of crashing and freezing at random times. For normal desktop tasks, Linux Mint xfce has been more reliable than any Windows I’ve ever used.
I used to use XFCE religiously and since I’ve been popping my head back into Linux after moving to Windows, I have noticed I’ve been on Gnome and KDE far more. my XFCE days felt far more stable. That said, I don’t think the DE is solely to blame.
things have generally been going good in this section of the thread, but just a general reminder to all participants that thoughtful comments with some time put into them (as a few of the replies to this comment have been) are going to lead to more constructive discourse than quick, impulsive ones. you’re also definitely not obliged to respond to everything you disagree with or anyone who replies to you, so keep that in mind
Wait, I’m allowed to dis Wayland here!?
Barely, I’m getting a bunch of Linux nerd flak due to a reasonable opinion I made as a top-level comment. So much for Be Nice.
That is because your statement is not particularly reasonable or rooted in reality.
If you want to dis linux that is fine, go right ahead. I crap on Mac all the time and hate MS with a burning passion. I still use them, which I suppose is why I hate them. I frequently hate linux too, that is just the nature of being in IT.
“It’s not reasonable or rooted in reality” - Yet multiple people saying “Oh, yeah I agree!” Instead of just insultingly saying it’s not reasonable or rooted in reality, assume good faith like you are supposed to as a beehawer. Explain your position, stop throwing shade on a valid opinion without any substance.
And multiple people are disagreeing so that claim means nothing. The real issue is that your top level comment reads like it was written in the 1990s when entering the wrong monitor refresh settings could set it on fire. Other parts dont make any sense :
Your next sentence :
"“Go ahead, hope you read all the patch notes for the 1000s different updates you are about to get!”
Is clear hyperbole. If you run a modern desktop focused distro like Mint then you click upgrade and let it do its business. Or dont, you dont have to.
I get it, you had some bad experience with linux and were frustrated by some driver issues that were a PITA to remedy so you gave up. Totally valid, but not a failing of linux as a whole. Windows comes pre-installed so you do not have to deal with all those driver issues because someone else already did that work before you ever press the on button.
So in the past, I used Linux as a daily driver for over 5 years. I was a Freebsd Ports Porter for a few years, and am now a C++ programmer on games in which I release Linux builds for. I’m not unfamiliar with making Linux work. It’s not just drivers but a whole set of issues in which I had to drop Linux for Windows.
Also, the 1000s of different updates aren’t hyperbole. I’ve absolutely had that on Manjaro. On Linux Mint I have updates almost daily but it’s typically only a handful of things.
I maintain a Linux server at work which has our ERP on it (I wouldn’t say I’m great at it but know the basics). I use Linux at home for a few projects and things like routers, etc. My daily PC at home is Windows. I like Linux but the issues I’ve had in the past, while they can be resolved, generally take up more time that I’m willing to put in. I don’t want a hobby just to keep my PC working.
Because you were not just looking at the web and email, the issues are not relevant. Most folks are not setting up a load balancer or adding an extra NIC. Your protestations are invalid anyway as the article is about ewaste, and not personal choice given all options. These devices are what they are. So given the circumstances, it is put linux on them or they are trash.
(or they can keep Windows 10 on it and just got get patches like many did with Windows XP)
M$ isn’t going that route this time.
That’s absolutely the case and it reminds me that Linux is a hobby OS for trinkering. Not a production OS for people who want to get stuff done. From 2008 to 2014 I used Linux as my daily driver. After that, I switched to Linux every year to see if it got better and it never truly has. This year I finally nuked my Linux hard drive and put NTFS on it as a 4th SSD for Windows to use. Linux might be ready one day but it will be because of a proprietary company gave it direction, motive, and industry connections to solve the problems with it.
He proclaimed while on his linux device running ios or android.
So you agree that desktop Linux is shit since we have good examples of a Unix based OS that is usable for the general public and has no trouble gaining marketshare?
Linux runs those. you are bitching about the UI.
It is so obivious that you have never used linux… or you have only tried vanilla arch or something
I’ve used it since about 2007. I’ve used Ubuntu, Fedora, Linux Mint, Manjaro, and Arch, Was a FreeBSD porter for a few years, and have a lot of experience releasing games for Linux, Mac, and consoles. It’s clear you have no clue about me and are mindlessly defending an OS you are overly obsessed with. Don’t worry, I was there a few years ago. There is help out there.
what ticked me off was "Go ahead, hope you read all the patch notes for the 1000s different updates you are about to get!” since that is relavant for only arch and some of its deriatives. It sounded like someone who has heard/read others talk about linux but never used it themselves hence my assumption. I am sorry that you had such a negative experience beforehand but I swear its much more stable nowadays. My obssession for linux comes from the free software movement and it’s alignment with my personal values, so I tend to take some linux related criticsm personally I guess. 😅 Anyway have a nice day
Sure, it was a bit hyperbole but I’ve certainly seen that exact thing on Arch/Manjaro, one of the more popular distros. I’ve also seen a handful of updates on Fedora and Ubuntu just fully brick the system. My whole point with that was that Windows checks its updates against far more configurations than a single Linux distro ever could. One of the most common things I’ve seen Linux do on multiple distros is update the Linux kernel without waiting for all my installed kernel modules to be updated to work with that version. In a lot of cases, this has left my computer unbootable until I rescued it either changing grub or using another live CD.
Manjaro spesifically is the arch deriative that is bound to break no one reccomends it nowadays. And Ubuntu and fedora aren’t distros that tend to break really, Linux doesn’t auto update either. if you are installing custom kernel modules it is your responsibility to check if they’re updated not before you update your system as long as that stuff doesn’t come with the distro (than it’s the distro maintainers responsibility). You are doing modifications that are meant for experienced users when youbson’t know what you are getting into. User error user error user error. Linux kernel is also far more compatible with any congifuration rrally than windows ever could be, it’s the reason linhx works so well in older machines too. and distro maibtainer don’t have to accojbt for every set up it juat doesn’t work like that windows doean’t do that either. Kindly I propose stopping this stupid discussion because you only half know what you are talking about.
Nvidia GPUs require a custom kernel module. If you expect the average user to care that much about their computer, you are silly.
I know exactly what modification I’ve done and why. In fact, lots of distros ship with these modules then don’t update them properly. Despite that I’ve solved this issue many times. It’s just a time-consuming task that I don’t want to do. I have other hobbies.
You know nothing of what you talk about. You are extremely biased as you’ve pointed out in your other comments and proud of it. No one is saying people shouldn’t use Linux, people here are saying they don’t want a chore for an OS.
Also, your attitude is the biggest reason Linux isn’t a popular desktop OS. The Linux community keeps mass adoption away with this sort of attitude. I recommend stopping this conversation at the risk of truly exposing yourself as the angry troglodyte you are.