This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
If you absolutely must use windows
Download the Pro ISO from windows.
Use MicroWin to create an iso without tpm requirements and with offline installation
Use MAS and use only the Enterprise edition. You might need to upgrade to Professional first.
Then use WindowsDebloater to tailor it to your liking.
Is Windows Enterprise LTSC a good idea?
Nope.
I finally switched to Linux for my daily driver and gaming PC. It was easy.
So honestly, which percentage of your game collection runs on Linux? Because I've looked into doing this just a few months ago, and unless the industry had some kind of mass exodus, less than 10% of my games run on Linux, and that's a generous estimate.
Not defending Windows or anything, this is just my experience.
At this point it's pretty much only the competitive games with kernel level anti-cheat that don't work on Linux because of their kernel level anti-cheat.
But then again, if 90% of the games you play are competitive games that require kernel level anti-cheat, you should probably consider expanding your gaming experience lol
Would "Steam Deck compatibility" be a good proxy, at least for Steam games?
Yep! 👍
idk where you looked, protondb.com is a good database for this stuff, from your later reply insurgency sandstorm and hund showdown are both "gold" rated, they should be okay
but the thing is ... you could just try for yourself, for free
I had just looked at the publisher's system requirements on Steam, since my experience with Wine from over a decade ago was a dead end. I've learned a lot from this thread, though, and it seems things have improved dramatically.
it seems things have improved dramatically.
Like maxo said, things are definitely waaaaaaaay better than 10 years ago.
I'd say roughly 80% of my windows only games run as good as on windows, and probably 25-30% of my full library (not just what runs in proton) runs better in Linux with proton/wine than they do in win11.
Mostly what doesn't work is stuff with kernel level anticheat.
It did. I recently downloaded steam on Ubuntu and you don't need to install any 3rd party stuff yourself. It's available as compatibility toggle in steam. Sometimes you need to configure different version of Proton for games to work and they are slower to start. But they run fast and I didn't experienced much bugs. It's amazing, now after end of win10 I can ditch windows completely, as this and photoshop was the only reason I still have win10 installed.
I just made the switch this weekend. I have not had a single incompatibility yet. I have seen an oddity here and there in Helldivers 2, but nothing crazy.
Oddity 1: In normal windows play async issues sometimes happen where a player steps on a mine in the other person's client but not their own. They continue to play because their client doesn't mark them dead. To the other person, they appear as a person missing some number of body parts (sometimes just a floating torso). We call this torso mode.
Since switching to linux I have not seen my friend go torso mode a single time. He still sees me go torso mode.
Oddity 2: The artillery rounds are color coded for what each of them does. Since switching to linux they only appear silver for whatever reason. It's a nonissue, I just read them when I walk next to them. If anyone asks my character is colorblind.
One additional note:
If you install steam with a flatpak, you're going to have to tangle with the permissions related to a flatpak. Once you add directory permissions for an additional directory via flatseal (for example, if you want a library on each of your harddrives), you won't have to touch it again and it's great.
Maybe these issues are significant to you, maybe they aren't. Ultimately, god I love my system starting up in just a few seconds. And having true control over it.
Its a fairly safe bet that your offline games won't have much trouble, from my experience.
What kind of games do you play? Unless a game has anticheat, it is pretty much guaranteed to run on Linux.
Most games that don't have kernel level anti-cheat tend to work.
Have you tried to play the games or did you look them up on a site? I've found that unless you are looking at a popular new game, a lot of the games listed are saying that they don't play, but we're last checked in 2023, and they do work now but no body has updated the new results.
I looked up my favorites, based on my experience in the past with unsupported games. Long ago, I tried using Wine, way back before Steam even had a native Linux client. I managed to get Steam to run through Wine but never succeeded in getting any game to run beyond a loading screen. That was ages ago, though.
Things have changed since then. Steam not only has a Linux client, but also has Proton which loads most Windows apps (it's marketed for games, but in reality it will work on Windows apps).
I'm on Garuda, every game I have tried has worked great, sometimes I just have to choose a different proton version with an easy pull down menu. The only game I have given up is Destiny 2, because they say they will ban anyone on Linux because of their anti cheat.
Multiplayer games and ones that require Uplay or Origin (can't remember their new names) have issues, but most single player stuff will run fine. You'll typically have to run them via Wine or Proton, but Steam will handle that for you.
i have an older desktop with 10, it doesn't have tpm, but there is a slot, i could get one and upgrade but also i mostly use linux on it
but i still feel like i'm going to lose something and it stresses me out a bit
What's MS's plan after this? Everyone I know that uses Windows/M365 hate it more with every passing day and is looking to leave.
I really don't want to be in tech support in 2029 when they kill off old outlook. There will be blood on that day.
Sounds like you live in an echo chamber. Windows is still by far the most popular computer operating system, and it’s not even close. There’s no sign of people moving away from Windows en-masse. Windows 11 adoption has been massive.
I work at a national IT support company talking to hundreds of windows users every week, and the general sentiment is that Windows 11 is unnecessary, new outlook is literally the Antichrist and people are sick of being charged more and more every year for crap they don't want or need.
Just l8ke I still see 2012R2 servers in the wild, Windows 10 isn't going away anytime soon.
Sounds like you live in a contrarian chamber. People really do hate the "new Outlook" (basically it's just Hotmail) and Windows 11 adoption has been slower than for most other versions of Windows. The requirements often mean needing to buy a new computer which a lot of people can't afford, especially if prices go up because of tariff nonsense.
There will be a lot of people still running on out of support Windows 10 systems at the end of the year.
I’ve had a Mac for over 10 years, still runs like the day I got it. Sure I can’t play games on it, but does absolutely everything else perfect for me.
Support for 2015 macs ended 7 months ago. Forget 10 years ago, my 2015 mac doesn't run like it used to in Big Sur.
That’s unfortunate for you I guess.
That’s great, but what does it have to do with the topic?
I thought Apple started the stopping support of Intel Mac's a couple of years ago? If you had the newest Intel from 5 years ago, support is supposed to end this year.
