For me, Windows 11 mandatory account, and Internet on setup. Yes there are bypasses, yes I could upgrade from 10. But where I’m from, having the internet isn’t always a given.

So imagine dropping $500-$1000 on a new laptop booting it up for the first time, and learning that its now a brick since Windows refuses to let you use it since you have no internet. No Pro license can unbork you from this.

Even MacOS isn’t that dumb (for now).

The account thing is a personal beef I have with windows. I.e. my PC my account, why does it need to be online, I have no reason for it.

So my plan was to migrate to FOSS or proper cross platform software for work, see if Linux works, and if it doesn’t move to MacOS. So far Linux Mint has been stable.

This is how switched, though I’d recommend properly platform agnostic software (Windows, Mac, and Linux support) since if you don’t find Linux proper works for your workflow, you could switch to a Mac.

Another thing which helped me was switching my Laptop first before my Desktop since if I had problems (which I did) I could loose my laptop and not worry about data loss.

As of now, I am 2 year with Linux on my laptop and 6 months on my desktop with no noticeable difference between my Windows experience and Linux.

PixelJunk Monsters Ultimate, while I love the games music, it’s not necessary since it’s a tower defence game.

The last time I used bags the system lost its file system. So probably the other one. Exfat4 formatted

Orchestral my pick is Journey, with Uncharted as a close second

Actiony my pick is Scott Pilgrim vs The World The Game. Love the band.

Retro - Chrono Trigger/Spyro 1-3/Pokemon Ruby Sapphire Emerald.

I did not any it’s beautiful. Good bye KDE connect

Need iOS support, and the ability to send many files. Looks cool though.

For those, like me who entered this chat wondering why the hostility? Here is a great write up of what happened in 2021.

https://hackaday.com/2021/07/13/muse-group-continues-tone-deaf-handling-of-audacity/

My reason is that it’s extremely buggy. I find it looses the plot if you are moving more than 1 file at a time, and it often can’t find paired devices even if they are on the same network. Plus it’s over bloated with no default configuration. I.e. I just want to send files. I don’t want it to act as a mouse pointer. And disabling it for each and every device is tedious.

Granted it’s better than any other alternative apps I’ve found. Which is why it’s installed, even on my iPad.

Honestly for art I’ve started using my iPad for it, and transferring the results onto my Mint install. Since mint or gnome (not sure which one) integrates Apple file sharing into the files app.

The FunkoPop Store EB Games here in Canada were re-labeled to GameStop recently. They’re still in every Mall in the land from what I’ve seen. Though they are doing better. Game selection isn’t what it use to be, but the variety is growing now. I was surprised when I found Manga in our local GameStop.

Not exactly my cup of tea, but catering to “Nerd” culture, and going beyond “Merch” is something I can get behind, since it’s rare to see another store not selling the same old drivel as everyone else.

Somewhere between Minecraft Java edition and a modern title made with the Steam Deck in mind, like TMNT Shreaders Revenge.

I’m just happy to see a slowly increasing support base, even if its just to support wine

$500 for a Krabby Patty?

With cheese Mr. Squidward, with cheese.

For an alternative, when I was looking into server os’s, from what I can tell RHEL (Red Hat Enterprise Linux) is the go to since it’s stable. That said RHEL is not free, so what people use to do is get a free OS which is down stream to RHEL, that’s your Alma and Rocky Linux.

However back in 2023 IBM made some changes, and now Alma and Rocky had to rebase off of CentOS Stream which is what RHEL is based off of.

For all intent and purpose I’d recommend using Debain, but Alma and Rocky are alternatives you may want to look into. Personally using Alma and outside of the learning curve of using a RHEL based OS, it has been quite stable.

I presumed the issue was probably Flatpak Sandboxing (Steam is natively installed but my emulators were not). However Sunshine + Moonlight isn’t a viable alternative since I am trying to play on my TV with a Gamepad, and Moonlight wasn’t controller friendly on Android the last I checked.

That said if this was PC -> PC then yeah Sunshine + Moonlight is amazing.

Oh how I wish I had nemo on the iPad rather than apple’s own files app. The issue with SMB is getting files off of the iPad, this is a little easier for me since I can do so from my PC. And I’m not dealing with Apple’s files app silently crashing on me.

According to a brief Google search: Apple File Conduit (AFC)

In most non Apple Desktops, the most you’d get from connecting your iPad/iPhone is access to the photos and videos. You’d need to use iTunes to access the music or device documents.

On Macs it “Just works” and gives you full access to music and files.

While I can’t access my iPads videos and music in Mint. It’s nice to at least get me access to the documents, along side the camera videos and pictures. Not as good as I’d like it to be, but a lot better than what you can do with Windows… without installing iTunes.

I think how happy I am depends on what I am comparing it too.

Compared to Windows? I am very happy with Mint since thus far everything I need works, and I can even play some games.

Compared to my dream distro which doesn’t exist. Not as happy. Since it works, but asks me to use the terminal more than I want to.

Windows 95 -> Windows 98 -> Windows XP -> Windows Vista -> Windows 7 -> Dual Boot Ubuntu -> Windows 7 -> Dual Boot Ubuntu -> Windows 7 -> Windows 10 -> Ubuntu (VM) -> Pop_OS! -> Windows 10 -> Manjaro -> Fedora -> Manjaro -> Open Suse -> Linux Mint -> Linux Mint DE -> Fedora -> Debain -> Linux Mint