I've been messing around on PC since the Counterstrike days in highschool. For gaming i never owned a console, was always into custom PC. I always enjoy learning new things regarding research, new hardware.
On GAW I have learned how to archive, meme, scrutinize more strictly and find better primary sources among many other things. I would like to learn more from my brethren here.
I will share a few. Keyboard shortcut basics:
https://prabidhi.info/en/keyboard-computer-shortcut-keys/
Clear cache/cookies manually:
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/search?query=clear%20cache
We are all thirsty for knowledge!
I'm not an IT Pro, but I'm very comfortable with computers. Linux is definitely secure but it's not easy to deal with when things go wrong. I've had a couple Linux Mint installations crash to the point of having to erase the whole OS and start over. I was not messing around with anything either, these were just updates that turned out to be catastrophic to my system.
I would not suggest Linux for the average computer user unless you're ok with the OS possibly deciding never to boot again. In other words, it's great for casual surfing and entertainment, but not for anything you absolutely need for making your living, unless you are an IT guy.
Well, there are a lot of versions of linux that are very user friendly now as compared to years ago. Most of the current debian versions are out of the box easy to use. Even fedora which is redhat based, is easy to use. You do not need to know the command line to get started immediately, or have to use vim(nano sucks). You do not need to compile drivers and tweak them as we had to many years ago, most every device now will run on linux. I always suggest people try and get away from windows, there is an open source version of most every piece of software you use, it might not always look as "polished" as something from windows world but it will do what you need, and in some cases will do more than you were expecting. You can customize most of the various GUIs very easily. You can make your installation your own.
Linux is also much more secure, thought it is not 100% secure. The only 100% secure computer is one that is unplugged and locked in a closet. It's super stable, there is a BSD machine sitting in Berkeley that hasn't been rebooted for a couple of decades at last I heard. Yes once in a while you will get an issue, the ubuntu 22.04 upgrade tanked one of my test boxes, and I have had to do a few kernel roll backs at work but nothing is perfect.
Give linux a try, you can run it as a live OS without installing, just burn to a disk or usb and see what it has to offer.
sauce: me, been using linux/bsd for 25yrs for work.
Sounds no different than Windows lol
Honestly the last 2 times I did a fresh Windows install, weird random crap went wrong that required more tinkering than my average Linux install.
I think most Linux distros have gotten a lot better, and Windows has gotten a lot worse, such that they have almost met in the middle now.
I've noticed that most people usually don't allow Windows to finish setting up. They would just start using Windows as soon as Windows boots up, interrupting the setup process.
That's one of the common issues that was brought into the shop I worked at and I had to do a system recovery or a clean install of Windows then just let it do its work until I see the "New Account" screen.
But the main reason why I stopped using WIndows about 10 years ago is because I got tired of waiting half a day for Windows to finish installing a single update.
That's weird, as any enthusiast PC would take seconds to minutes including boot times for most updates.
Windows Update has a penchant for corrupting itself in some fashion and completely breaking though which is incredibly annoying. Has happened even somewhat recently, and was -- depressingly -- due to an issue with Windows store which also has issues out the butt.
Troubleshooting Windows is basically an industry all its own at this point.
Yeah, the update situation is my biggest gripe too.
Not only how long they take, but the unpredictable restarts to install, and sometimes when they fail, figuring out how to get them to reinstall is a nightmare.
Windows 10 was especially bad. 11 has been a bit better as far as OS updates, but Windows will still sometimes try to pull in random vendor crap that’s actually wrong or outdated, and then any app that gets updates through the Windows Store is a whole other can of worms.
Haha, well since Windows 10 came onto the scene, I've been really happy with its stability. Sure it gets slow after a couple years and would benefit from a fresh install, but it rarely would fall as bad as Linux did. I want to love Linux so much, but I always get burned.