Ask me anything: I switched from Mac to Linux because of Apple's surveillance

[greenmeanie]

Thanks for the question! I haven't tried any Linux video editors yet but am interested to hear about options. The one on my list is called Lightworks.

DaVinci Resolve​

I also recommend KuBuntu for a Linux Distro.
You can set it up to look pretty close to MacOS.

 

[crymimefireworks]

I have to ask, as a Linux user for the last 6 years, what mouse requires this outside of Apple (the Magic Mouse and Magic Trackpad don't even work 100% on Windows)?

Of all the machines I've run Linux on, I've never had to use the terminal to get the OS to run. Install some software or perform updates, yes, but not to get a stable OS after install. Probably the most baffling issue I've had was the computer would kernel panic resuming from sleep. Turns out the Wi-Fi card was causing it. Swapped out the Broadcom for an Intel and haven't had a problem since.

I've actually spent more time in CLI on Windows than I have Linux. XP used to have a "Repair" button in the Wi-Fi settings, but now you have to go into Command Prompt as an Administrator and run "netsh winsock reset" to get the same effect. For Linux, the most I'm there is to install software (Sudo apt install __) or perform updates (sudo apt update and sudo apt upgrade, but only on the Raspberry Pi), but that's for software I can't find in the Software Center or directly download as a .deb file.

All I can say is that questions like this are exhausting. Like the whole thing sounds so tone deaf. I don't believe you are tone deaf....but that's how I feel reading this. "Swapped out the Broadcom for an Intel" do you hear yourself?

 

[crymimefireworks]

Hi,
discovered this thread and registered.

I was never really a Mac user (had two, sold both), always had a Windows system for music production and „computer stuff“, but for the better half of a decade now my everyday machine and most personal device has been an iPad (posting from it right now). That got me into the ecosystem and you know how it is, now I have a phone, watch, tv, homepod, … I am usually not a fan of big tech companies, but somehow Apple managed to gain some trust, which they decided to destroy. I have to admit, when I read their announcement for the first time, I was shocked! It made me sad and angry, for real. I was sad because all my routines are somehow tied to their ecosystem, which in turn made me angry about myself - I should have known better. The announcement made me realize how much power they gained over me, whatever they decide to do tomorrow I have to accept. For me it took all the fun out of using their stuff.

Luckily the announcement came just in time, I was about to upgrade to an M1 iPad and maybe an iPhone 13 Pro later. Haha, spoiler: not gonna happen. Still undecided if I sell some Apple stuff, but I know I want a Linux system NOW! In fact, even longer than iPads I had the weakest and trashiest laptop money can buy. Some HP that was around 250 euros brand new. Because it couldn’t run Ubuntu I put Xubuntu on it and at some point stuck in an old SSD. Man, what a snappy machine! In the last years it had been mostly in a drawer, but everytime I took it out it was up in 10 seconds and ready to go.* Earlier this year I binged Mr Robot, which made me toy around somemore with Linux again, but sadly, after almost 9 years, I killed that machine by stepping on it at night (RIP). Apple however confirmed in a very nice manner that I shall proceed and get a new Linux system. How thoughtful of them! Thinkpad is on the way, super cheap from eBay (less than 300 bucks). I will finally put PopOS on it, which I wanted to try for months, but never found the time to do so.

Thanks, writing this was therapeutic.

*That’s what she said!

Check out Pop OS! It's the future of Linux for regular people. Welcome!!!

 

[crymimefireworks]

I’m not having a pop here, and when my new NAS arrives I want to see if this will run in a VM.
But how does POP OS handle your photos, messaging, documents, sharing of bookmarks , contacts etc.
Does it actually compare to Apple or are you looking for solutions to make things hang together?
With Apple I’ve got seemless intgrgration across most things, although a Synology NAS is better with windows rather than iCloud.

Pop OS doesn't have anything special here. Looking for apps to replicate iCloud. Am enjoying Standard Notes for notes! End to end encrypted, with self hosting options. No command line idiotics.

 

[crymimefireworks]

To be honest, you only have 2 options, either go with Windows or Mac. It all depends on what we are going to spend our time and what we did for work. Can you imagine, how an economist or accountant or CEO have to work using Linux? It’s not impossible, but it won’t be sustainable, they will end up choosing priority, between tuning the system to work for them, or work on their fields to make money (which they will pick up Windows or Mac).
I have walked that path long time ago. I used to be Unix sysadmin and Oracle dba. I still play on that fields only for hobby now, as I work on finance risk analyst during weekday.

Linux can be better. "Free" can be a foundation, rather than handcuffs.

 

[crymimefireworks]

This is basically me at this point as well. I've done enough of it as a hobby in my life, that now with having a family, I don't have time for it as a hobby anymore. I still maintain it professionally (Linux sysadmin, ISO, Oracle and SQL Server DBA), so I take care of it that way.

The thing about FOSS is everyone seems to forget the F in FOSS. If you're wanting it to be free, paying someone to be a sysadmin of your personal machine not only eliminates the Free in FOSS, but opens the door to even more security issues. Think about it this way:

If someone pays an outsider to maintain their personal hardware, that would either mean giving them access to your physical hardware (either actual physical access: coming into your house) or network access to your hardware, meaning that they would have root/administrative access to your hardware when you either arbitrarily give it to them, or 24/7, leaving them with the ability to wipe out your entire machine without any recourse or means to get your data back. A simple "cat /dev/zero > /dev/sda" or worse could take out your machine.

And that's just the security issue. If paying for the support, what makes MacOS and Windows any different? You're either paying for the OS, hardware, and support with MacOS, paying for the OS and support with Windows, or installing for free and paying for the support with anything FOSS. Regardless of what you do, you'd be paying.

BL.

If paying for Linux support, you're still supporting a foundation of open source software. With Mac or Windows you're not.

With that, I'm spent. I'm done on this thread personally. Kudos to all of you who are switching from Mac to Linux. Keep demanding that "it just works". Don't let Linux gatekeepers and mechanics get in your way. The world deserves better.

To all of you who want a Mac experience + open source to exist in the future, check out System76 and Pop OS. It's not all there yet but they have the right values to get us there.

 

[maflynn]

Can you imagine, how an economist or accountant or CEO have to work using Linux?

Correct, I work in IT and I support end users and many of them lack the technical expertise to even do a screen print. People in business don't want to spend time figuring out why something is not working on their computer but rather doing tasks that they were hired to do. IT support staff like me, don't want to spend time trouble shooting why a mouse doesn't work on a given PC or wireless. Linux on the desktop is relegated to the hobbyist/enthusiast and I don't see anything changing in the near future to move the needle on adoption.

What's your experience with paid options on Linux?

I have not paid for linux support but we have Red Hat at my company and support from them is no different then getting support from MS or Oracle.

 

[brendaningram]

Hi everyone,

What a thread! I'm posting here because I am a current Linux user (ex 20 years on Windows and 5 years on Mac), and would like to share some quick tips.

I produce music. I used to use Logic X on Mac. I now use Bitwig on Linux. It is amazing. I noticed Bitwig mentioned a couple of times in this thread, which is cool. Last week I created a video about getting setup for pro audio on Ubuntu using Bitwig. I'm wary that my first post here is to spruik this video, but I really think it can help. I've been asked so many times "I want to leave Mac/Windows, but how can I keep producing music on Linux?"

Anyway, this is my video (and I have guides for Fedora, elementaryOS, Debian, Ubuntu Studio, and KDE Neon currently in voiceover stage, and being published soon):

To address a few other questions in the thread:

My hardware: Lenovo Thinkpad T490 (and a custom built desktop PC that is hardly used)

My preferred distro: KDE Neon (the latest KDE on stable LTS Ubuntu)

Backup: Backblaze (maybe #1 choice for Win and Mac) has a solution for Linux that works well (but you do need a little bit of technical prowess). Otherwise DropBox runs great on Linux. And Duplicity (with a NAS) is also a good option.

Video editing: KDEnlive has all the features I need (and more) but has crashed on me a few times. Make sure autosave is on, and you'll be OK.

Graphic editing: Krita. Gimp is OK, but I find Krita more refined, and more similar to Photoshop (which I used for many years).

Photos: Digikam. I used to be a professional wedding photographer. I now have a 90GB (and growing) personal photo library that I manage with speed and stability using Digikam. I only shoot JPG these days, but when I shot RAW I used RAWtherapee and Darktable with great success (but be aware that they are VERY different workflows from Adobe Lightroom)

Word processing: Libreoffice, all the way. I don't have 1 single negative thing to say about Libreoffice.

Communication: Telegram, Signal, and Zoom for communicating with people on "mainstream" systems/OS. Jitsi is a fantastic free video tool when you want to have a video chat with a fellow "geek".

I'm here to help, so ask me anything too

Caveat emptor: Linux is amazing, and will cover almost everyone's use cases. But there will still be some things that are rough around the edges. Having said that, in 2021 (as opposed to even in 2018) if a personal/consumer Mac or PC user asked me "should I switch?" my answer would be "absolutely."

 

[maflynn]

Linux can be better. "Free"

Oh, and let me just say that I've tried to make Linux work, even just recently, sadly, the apps I need don't have a linux counterpart or at the very least not comparable feature wise. One of the biggest stumbling blocks, is the inability for me to use my company's VPN software on linux. We also use gotomypc, to remote in and that software dropped support for linux a few years ago.

I'm not down on Linux, it can be a good experience but I also highly doubt that it will ever be a mainstream alternative to windows or macos - at least in the consumer realm. On servers, its a different topic altogether.

I actually like PopOS, its a fantastic distro, and I've loaded it up in a VM to play with and see if I can improve my skills.

 

[Grey Area]

All I can say is that questions like this are exhausting. Like the whole thing sounds so tone deaf. I don't believe you are tone deaf....but that's how I feel reading this. "Swapped out the Broadcom for an Intel" do you hear yourself?

I'd concur that having to swap a card is not exactly a minor hickup. However, overall I have no trouble believing MrTSolar. I have installed Linux (mostly Mint) on many a machine in the past few years, and in most cases everything worked right away, and when something did not it was quickly resolved with a Google query.

Conversely, I have had far more problems with Windows. My main worry there is my Mom's Dell that I have to "support" every now and then: Under default settings it would start itself at night to run updates, and if on battery it would then often fail to power down properly and end up in a near-bricked state. The solution was to open it up, decouple the battery, and bridge two pins with a screwdriver to reset it (that is actually what the manual recommends!). This is not something I can expect someone in their 70s to do, so eventually I deactivated all the auto-updating, and I keep reminding her to update by hand. And then there are the bi-annual version updates - every single time Windows messes up and locks her out of her account. A known and fairly common issue that Microsoft still has not been able to fix in a simple manner. She still works sometimes, and thus needs MS Office with certain plugins - otherwise I would have installed Linux long ago, seems way more "senior-safe". The granny of my spouse uses Linux (browsing and shopping lists), no issues.

Of course, these are also just anecdotes. But maybe they illustrate how much experiences can differ.

 

[vir]

Ease isn't a factor.

 

[fzJNotIBOxgnbqejSeVCvJScL]

Free (libre) in FOSS refers to liberty. Free from surveillance. It does not mean gratis (no cost). Redhat charges a subscription fee but their software is FOSS.

 

[bradl]

Free (libre) in FOSS refers to liberty. Free from surveillance. It does not mean gratis (no cost). Redhat charges a subscription fee but their software is FOSS.

That is fairly well known. However, to expand on that, Linux, in its most vanilla form, is free from any type of surveillance; However, that depends on the distro. For example, up until 16.04, Ubuntu installed spyware and enabled it by default, embedded in its search facility. So it depends on what you know and what research you do before choosing the right distribution you want to use.

RHEL, SuSE, and Oracle Linux all come at a cost, which is for their support, not for the OS. You could install CentOS, change your repos to the RHEL ones, pay for the support, register your box on the RedHat Network, and be supported.

BL.

 

[MrTSolar]

All I can say is that questions like this are exhausting. Like the whole thing sounds so tone deaf. I don't believe you are tone deaf....but that's how I feel reading this. "Swapped out the Broadcom for an Intel" do you hear yourself?

For the mouse question, I really want to know. Even my Magic Trackpad supports basic point and click on a Raspberry Pi by just plugging it in.

Changing a Wi-Fi card isn't exactly rocket science. I could've just as easily sent it back to Dell for them to do it. 5 screws to remove the bottom plate, two cables and a clip, the card is out. New card in, boot machine, and perfect Wi-Fi. It took more to figure out how to reset my MacBook's USB port after it tried to send power to a charger, or why I had to wait 5 hours for an external drive to show up in Finder (it has to do a disk check after an unclean disconnect, with no progress bar or skip button anywhere).

Computers aren't hammers. They have moving parts that will break at some point. I've seen my fair share of stupid issues in both Windows and MacOS and spent cumulative days on with a lousy success rate. I've seen some headscratchers in Linux, nearly all of which were solved by either a reboot or CLI update and upgrade commands. One time I had to re-install the OS to resolve audio driver problems.

I'm sorry if I'm still coming across as tone-deaf. In my 2 decades of computer experience, if you want an electronic device to "Just work" and never break, it can't run a full software OS. I've only had that level of reliability from firmware-driven devices (old school cell phones, CD players, clocks, etc.).

 

[bradl]

For the mouse question, I really want to know. Even my Magic Trackpad supports basic point and click on a Raspberry Pi by just plugging it in.

Changing a Wi-Fi card isn't exactly rocket science. I could've just as easily sent it back to Dell for them to do it. 5 screws to remove the bottom plate, two cables and a clip, the card is out. New card in, boot machine, and perfect Wi-Fi. It took more to figure out how to reset my MacBook's USB port after it tried to send power to a charger, or why I had to wait 5 hours for an external drive to show up in Finder (it has to do a disk check after an unclean disconnect, with no progress bar or skip button anywhere).

Computers aren't hammers. They have moving parts that will break at some point. I've seen my fair share of stupid issues in both Windows and MacOS and spent cumulative days on with a lousy success rate. I've seen some headscratchers in Linux, nearly all of which were solved by either a reboot or CLI update and upgrade commands. One time I had to re-install the OS to resolve audio driver problems.

I'm sorry if I'm still coming across as tone-deaf. In my 2 decades of computer experience, if you want an electronic device to "Just work" and never break, it can't run a full software OS. I've only had that level of reliability from firmware-driven devices (old school cell phones, CD players, clocks, etc.).

This brings up a good point. For something to plug in and "just work", it requires the specs for the hardware to be released for drivers to be coded for it. If they aren't, then that is not a problem with Linux, but is a problem with the manufacturer not releasing that spec.

A Classic example: NVidia was more than known and guilty in not releasing any specs for their video cards, but instead would only release a binary driver that was buggy, and expected all users of their video cards to simply use it. The problem they had was that their drivers never supported newer hardware, and would insert bad instruction sets into the kernel that would cause the kernel to crash. Without the driver from NVidia, the kernel and the entire OS was rock solid, so the issue was squarely on the vendor there, not Linux. It shouldn't take a kernel developer having to attempt to reverse engineer a video card to be able to create a driver for it. That falls on the manufacturer.

A good current example of that is Apple. The HFS filesystem has been supported in Linux since the mid-late 1990s, along with the HFS+ filesystem, which is what gets MacOS their journaled filesystem from System Software 7 all the way up to Sierra. Starting with High Sierra, Apple implemented APFS. Linux doesn't have support for APFS, because Apple hasn't released the specs for the filesystem. That means that someone plugging in a drive with their data on an APFS filesystem and expecting it to work will find out that it doesn't work, and it isn't the fault of Linux that it doesn't work. That's on Apple.

BL.

 

[joevt]

A good current example of that is Apple. The HFS filesystem has been supported in Linux since the mid-late 1990s, along with the HFS+ filesystem, which is what gets MacOS their journaled filesystem from System Software 7 all the way up to Sierra. Starting with High Sierra, Apple implemented APFS. Linux doesn't have support for APFS, because Apple hasn't released the specs for the filesystem. That means that someone plugging in a drive with their data on an APFS filesystem and expecting it to work will find out that it doesn't work, and it isn't the fault of Linux that it doesn't work. That's on Apple.

Is Apple's APFS documentation insufficient to create a Linux file system driver? I suppose it could be missing some important details.
https://developer.apple.com/support/downloads/Apple-File-System-Reference.pdf

There's many apfs projects on GitHub. Many are probably work in progress. I believe this one is the main one for mounting APFS in Linux:
https://github.com/linux-apfs/linux-apfs-rw

 

[WriteNow]

Changing a Wi-Fi card isn't exactly rocket science. I could've just as easily sent it back to Dell for them to do it. 5 screws to remove the bottom plate, two cables and a clip, the card is out.

True. But one thought just hit me--the idea of opening up the computer is a foreign idea for many Apple users. Apple has long had the tendency of doing things to discourage people from opening up the machine. Whether it's putting a computer inside a case with dangerous voltage CRTs, laptops that take 3 hours to disassemble, or devices that have everything soldered in place.

I'm not sure I've read this...but I bet there probably have been articles published by Mac users who try generic PCs out, and comment "Wow! I was surprised at how much easier it was to work inside a Dell than it was my Mac!"

I've seen my fair share of stupid issues in both Windows and MacOS

Yes.

It interests me when I see commentary suggesting that "normal people" are better off with Windows because "Linux takes tinkering." My own Windows experience is with versions of Windows that are long out of date, so it's not relevant for today's world. But even with casually playing with Windows 98 years back, I encountered a lot of issues. It wasn't unlivable bad--but it was bad enough that I honestly wondered what those writers who said Windows 98 blew Mac System 7.x away were thinking! And I was experimenting with Linux for the first time about then--and I found that experience, even back then, better than Windows.

Windows has improved from what I hear--but one still hears horror stories. I even even hear tech experts talk about being careful with Windows system patches, because they've been burned once too often by a patch breaking a working system.

I'm sorry if I'm still coming across as tone-deaf. In my 2 decades of computer experience, if you want an electronic device to "Just work" and never break, it can't run a full software OS. I've only had that level of reliability from firmware-driven devices (old school cell phones, CD players, clocks, etc.).

And even simple CD players have their moments...

 

[WriteNow]

This brings up a good point. For something to plug in and "just work", it requires the specs for the hardware to be released for drivers to be coded for it. If they aren't, then that is not a problem with Linux, but is a problem with the manufacturer not releasing that spec.

Yes.

A Classic example: NVidia

I had problems with NVidia. It went onto my list of "companies to avoid" as a result.

 

[MrTSolar]

True. But one thought just hit me--the idea of opening up the computer is a foreign idea for many Apple users. Apple has long had the tendency of doing things to discourage people from opening up the machine. Whether it's putting a computer inside a case with dangerous voltage CRTs, laptops that take 3 hours to disassemble, or devices that have everything soldered in place.

I'm not sure I've read this...but I bet there probably have been articles published by Mac users who try generic PCs out, and comment "Wow! I was surprised at how much easier it was to work inside a Dell than it was my Mac!"


Windows has improved from what I hear--but one still hears horror stories. I even even hear tech experts talk about being careful with Windows system patches, because they've been burned once too often by a patch breaking a working system.

Ah. Didn't really consider that. I've only had Macs for a couple years. For the most part, opening the computer isn't necessary. Most anything should run a long time without the need to open it. That said, Louis Rossmann has a good business working inside MacBooks, and thankfully custom PCs are still somewhat common. It blows people's minds when I can fix no Wi-Fi or no charging on an iPhone by replacing an antenna or cleaning the charge port.

The install experience on Windows 10 is a whole new level above any version before it. A bare install of Windows 7 is a driver nightmare, whereas almost everything automatically works on 10. Updates are faster, and in general the system is snappier. I still don't like the "all or all" approach to how updates are applied or how long it takes for Explorer to open (though it's getting better). Heck, even my 13 year-old PS3 steering wheel works perfectly with Forza Horizon.

My Windows machine at home is a 2014 Dell Precision T1650. I upgraded it with 32 GB of RAM, a nice graphics card, and a solid state drive. It's fast. The install of Windows 10 I'm running was actually from my old work laptop. I had that drive laying around, popped it in, and it booted on the first try. That's the first I've ever had that work successfully. Spent a day doing updates, and it was ready to rock.

 

[nickdalzell1]

ironically I had far more trouble with MacOS 7.x than Windows during that time. I always had one of those 'bomb' errors (Sorry, a System Error has occurred, RESTART) that always brought the entire system down, regardless of how minor. It could take quite awile to restart that iMac Gen 1 CRT system with the amount of extensions I had installed. Angered me, Windows would just say an illegal operation occurred, I restart the app, fine. Even BSoDs in Win9x didn't always bring the entire system down, but on Mac, up to OS 9, it always did. The forums back then (The Mac 512, Classic Mac, etc) always spouted off 'Macs never crash! Windows ALWAYS crashes' but no amount of proof of the contrary with a System Error or Type 2 error would convince them it was far worse. Just opening up Eudora and checking email could bring my Classic down entirely. Linux used to have its share of growing pains, like forcing booting into initramfs for no reason (Got a Dell all in one that forces it each boot) or a kernel panic not syncing, again for no reason (the system was working, I rebooted it. Never booted again) or having to fsck for seemingly no reason, it was not easy back then. It's a lot easier now!

 

[WriteNow]

I always had one of those 'bomb' errors (Sorry, a System Error has occurred, RESTART) that always brought the entire system down, regardless of how minor. It could take quite awile to restart that iMac Gen 1 CRT system with the amount of extensions I had installed. Angered me,

Those system crashes could be annoying. I saw that message with the bomb a lot on my first Mac, thanks to Microsoft
Works crashes. ("Works"--perhaps the most oxymoronic name ever for a product.) Sometimes I'd have no real problems--but there were days when it seemed like all I did was restart the Mac. This was irritating, since I was a student at the time--and there times when I was working under pressure to get something done. (Finishing off a draft to take to a writing class in an hour.) Thankfully, the crashes occurred after saving a document, so there was no document loss.

Once I replaced Works, I found the Mac and System 6 were quite stable. And that continued through the years I ran System 7.x. But I know others weren't so lucky.

 

[nickdalzell1]

For the iMac it was often during a large download, say an ISO or even an MP3 from BearShare. It could just be sitting at the desktop and up and do it. The forums suggested hard disk failure but since the errors were so uninformative (no hexadecimals to plug into AltaVista like with Windows!) I never could pinpoint the cause. It was entirely random. No specific app, nothing. It seemed to pick a time and place to do it. Occasionally, it'd Sad Mac itself complete with a sound effect of a car crash (was that intended to be funny or annoy me more?!) and even those times when it gave hexadecimals never came up with anything on a search. These were super cheap Scully Era crapboxes I amassed for less than $7 each at a St Vincent De Paul store, so they were not really worth the effort. The devices consisted of that Mac, a Performa 466, Power Mac 5100, PowerBook (not a PowerPC, it barely worked, keyboard DOA), Power Mac G3 all-in-one (wannabe iMac in beige case) and many others. The Macintosh Classic was given to me from the college I was at then. They were throwing it into the garbage. I upgraded to 4MB RAM, and upgraded the HDD to the max allowed, but it refused to let me put 7.5.5 on it, it'd get 90% and complain insufficient disk space. It was only (barely) possible to get 7.5.3 on it, but no type I'd install worked well. System 6, 7, all of them inevitably crashed far worse than Windows 95.

 

[crymimefireworks]

This brings up a good point. For something to plug in and "just work", it requires the specs for the hardware to be released for drivers to be coded for it. If they aren't, then that is not a problem with Linux, but is a problem with the manufacturer not releasing that spec.

BL.

This I agree with. Getting Linux systems to be "just works" for professional non-coders means hardware manufacturers need to support too.

As buyers, we must avoid hardware vendors who don't support open source (Apple)

Some vendors put "Linux support" on the box (Lenovo, Dell) but still treat Linux as a third class citizen. Don't give them a pass either.

 

[c0ppo]

Some vendors put "Linux support" on the box (Lenovo, Dell) but still treat Linux as a third class citizen. Don't give them a pass either.

Lenovo has excellent support for Linux. I know, I use X1E with PopOS. Even BIOS and firmware updates are remarkably simple, and it's just a click away. Everything works out of the gate, and every driver is downloaded thru Pop Store.

What more could Lenovo do?

 

[keeper]

This I agree with. Getting Linux systems to be "just works" for professional non-coders means hardware manufacturers need to support too.

As buyers, we must avoid hardware vendors who don't support open source (Apple)

Some vendors put "Linux support" on the box (Lenovo, Dell) but still treat Linux as a third class citizen. Don't give them a pass either.

As buyers we must buy what meets our needs not what now matches your anti Appple views.

For many that will be Apple and they will continue to do so, you only have to look at the numbers posting waiting to get the new iPhone.

I put PopOs on my NAS to try and I personally wouldn’t like it as my daily OS.