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Bulbagarden Conversational Chat Thread Vol.5

genuinely how does one use linux

the same way one would use windows or mac, presumably. i've used linux a fair few times (linux mint, elementary os, ubuntu, zorin), but the distros i've used were similarish enough to windows to not feel too offputting.

the only thing that made me feel kinda out of place was that i feel that in order to get the most out of linux, you need to learn shell commands, and that's... not something i'm ready for, yet. there isn't really a reason for me to use linux anyway, i'm perfectly fine with windows as it is, for now. @_@
 
yeah linux is literally just an operating system

well family of operating systems, typically packaged as a distribution or distro

i use linux mint myself (although i dual-boot with windows. got windows 11 on my 1 TB M.2 SSD and linux mint on my 512 GB M.2 and i also have a 2 TB SATA SSD for more storage)

and let me tell you something, i know for a fact that i've mentioned this before here i believe, but holy fucking shit was the install process for linux mint 10000000000 times easier than the install process for windows 11

just for some clarification here: the SSD that my current laptop (that i got as a christmas present for myself back in december) came with was the 512 GB SSD and that originally had windows 11 on it. in addition to the M.2 slot occupied by the preinstalled SSD, this laptop has a second M.2 slot and space for a 2.5 inch SATA drive (and it included the cable, bracket, and screws to install such a drive).

thanks to me having gotten this laptop to replace my old gaming laptop that died, i obviously had that 1 TB SSD from my previous laptop and i wanted windows on that drive and linux on the 512 GB drive.

so here's what i had to do to get that done and exactly WHY i fucking hate windows so goddamn much linux needs to take over i swear to god:
okay so let's start out with what i had to do before i actually began the install process(es)
- FIRST. i backed up my files. didn't really have much on the 512 GB SSD (since i'd only had the laptop for a few weeks before i managed to get the time to do this stuff) but i still backed up what little i did have that i wanted to keep and from my 1 TB SSD, i backed up my entire user folder (since that's, you know, where my personal files and shit are all saved in), as well as my steam installs, my EA installs (READ: the sims 4), my civilization 4 install, my retroarch install, and my paint.net install (mostly so i could just readd all the plugins i'd downloaded to my new install once i got windows reinstalled and paint.net downloaded again). as you probably figured, i backed all these files up to the 2 TB SATA drive

- SECOND. i needed to create installable media. for windows 11, it was easy. went to the microsoft website, downloaded the media creation tool, plugged in one of my usb drives, and let it create a bootable windows 11 usb stick. then for linux mint...it was also easy. downloaded rufus, went to the linux mint website, downloaded the then-latest linux mint ISO, plugged in a different usb drive (because doing this whole thing wipes the flash drive you use), used rufus to create a bootable linux mint usb stick

NOW WE GET TO THE WINDOWS INSTALL PART OF THE STORY:
- i didn't want anything to go wrong here so, to be extra safe, i made the decision that i will only have the drive that i am going to be installing each operating system onto installed in my laptop during the install process. so that meant that, for the windows 11 install, i completely removed the 512 GB M.2 drive and just disconnected the 2 TB SATA drive's cable, so only the 1 TB M.2 drive was connected

- i plug in my windows 11 usb, turn my laptop on, and mash f12 until i get to the boot menu. the boot menu confirms that the only two boot options i've got are: the 1 TB SSD and the USB drive. obviously as i am going to be installing windows 11, i select the USB drive to boot from it

- the windows 11 installer starts up, i go through the first few things just fine. select the language, currency and date format, and keyboard layout i wanna install, agree to the license agreement, say that i don't have a product key (since i logged-in to my microsoft account, it'll just automatically use the key that way) choose that i want to just install windows (and not move over my files, programs, etc. with it) and then i have to choose the drive where i'll be installing windows on to and....it's not there. my 1 TB SSD isn't showing up. the installer isn't detecting any drives at all. what the fuck.

- i think 'well i previously had this 1 TB SSD in the second M.2 slot but moved it to the first one, maybe i should move it back and see if that fixes it? nope. and the drive shows up in the boot menu and, after i put the 512 GB SSD back in (so i could login to windows and try and figure out what the hell is going on + also the 1 TB drive was still showing up there too), it turns out that i need to get the intel rapid storage technology drivers. THANKFULLY i had a third usb drive so i downloaded the drivers, put them on that flash drive, turned off my laptop, removed the 512 GB SSD, and restarted the install process

- i get to the 'choose where you want to install windows option' again, select 'load driver', install the intel rapid storage technology drivers, click 'refresh' and hooray the drive and its partitions shows up!! so i delete the partitions, select to install it on the (now blank) 1 TB drive, and go on my merry way installing windows 11!

- HAHAHAHAHA just kidding, i fucking wish it were that simple. a little bit later in the install process, microsoft wanted me to connect my laptop to the internet to continue the install process. and guess who's laptop didn't have any wifi network adapter drivers installed so she couldn't connect to the wifi?

- AND HOO BOY THIS WHOLE RIGAMAROLE. microsoft actually have instructions on how to (re)install these drivers during the install process if they're missing (which they mark as being for 'advanced users' because this is very much not anything some random dipshit with a PC is going to understand what the fuck to do).

- so what i had to do was this:
-- on my tablet, go to acer's website, enter in my laptop model number, and download the wifi drivers i needed and put them on my usb drive, making sure the .inf file was on the root of the drive
-- plug the usb drive into my laptop
-- press shift-f10 to open command prompt
-- type 'diskpart' and hit enter
-- in the diskpart window, type 'list volume' and hit enter, making note of the letter that was assigned to the usb drive
-- press shift-f10 again to open a new command prompt window
-- type 'pnputil /add-driver (the usb drive letter):\*inf' and hit enter
-- type 'pnputil /scan-devices' and hit enter
- and then i'd have wifi and be able to continue the install!!!

- ONLY THAT'S NOT WHAT FUCKING HAPPENED. that whole process did jack and shit. sure it said that the drivers were installed but still no wifi. AND command prompt would fuck with my keyboard as well. i could press shift-f10 to open up a command prompt window and then none of my keys would work. well none of the keys i'd use actually type with (kind of important when this whole process required me to type in commands). i could still press shift-f10 to open up MORE command prompt windows and press tab to select options (did i also mention i couldn't use my trackpad because i didn't have drivers for that either?)

- i do some searching and i find the solution to fix command prompt not accepting keyboard inputs during the install process: alt-tabbing. yup, that fixes it. BUT I STILL DON'T HAVE WIFI DRIVERS.

- i do some more searching and i find a youtube guide and holy fucking shit this random ass guide i find works and holy fucking shit what i had to do is just like holy fucking shit

- here's what i ultimately had to do to fix this issue:
-- shift-f10 to open command prompt (and then alt-tabbing so i could actually type commands)
-- type in 'taskmgr' and hit enter, which opens up the task manager
-- in the task manager, i right-clicked the windows install process (at this point, i'd plugged in a usb gaming mouse that came with my laptop to make it easier for me) and chose 'open file location'
-- this opened up where the installer was located in windows explorer
-- since i was now in file explorer, i could then navigate directly to 'devices and drives', click to browse the files in my usb drive, and manually install the wifi drivers

- thankfully doing this gave me wifi and i connected to the internet and was able to finish installing this trash operating system.

- oh and then after i installed some updates and was restarting the PC, it was hanging on the 'updates are in progress please keep your PC on' screen for like 15 minutes and it turns out that i had to remove the usb that had the windows 11 installer on it (after forcibly shutting the laptop off since it was hanging) but even still you know

NOW THE LINUX MINT INSTALL PART OF THE STORY:
- i turn off the laptop, remove the 1 TB SSD, connect my 512 GB SDD, and plug in my linux installer usb drive

- i turn the laptop on, mash f12, get to the boot menu, boot from the usb drive, and load into the linux live installer

- while i could fuck around and test out linux mint in the live test enviroment, i decide 'nope' and just go right for the 'install linux mint' option

- i go through the whole setup process without any issues whatsoever. don't need to install any drivers to get it to detect the SSD or be able to connect to my wifi network. IT. JUST. WORKS.
 
christ, yeah. microsoft can make me “upgrade” once i’m dead and buried….. though i probably will end up being forced to before then :P. i’ll probably have to end up becoming a linux user too whenever that happens
 
I mean in all honestly you should upgrade to Windows 11 just because support for Windows 10 is ending next year lol.

It's literally just Windows 10 but with some slight improvements (and downgrades, why the fuck do I have to click 'show more options' when I right-click stuff to see all the options, why can't you move the damn taskbar, ugh).

Like literally that's just what Windows 11 is for the most part: a slight reskin of Windows 10 that really makes you wonder why the Hell was this marketed as a new Windows version at all.

(Also if you have an Intel CPU that's 12th gen or later with performance and efficiency cores, Windows 11 just works better with them than Windows 10 does lol)
 
Yeah Windows 11 is very much not a Vista situation or an ME one either, it's just a victim to the now-standard 'every other version of Windows is considered bad/disliked' thing. But it's also the least bad out of all of the 'bad' versions of Windows, y'know?

People loved 98, hated ME, loved XP, hated Vista, loved 7, hated 8, OK maybe saying 'love' is too much but 'think it's better than the previous one' 10, and dislike 11.

I guess there is Windows 8.1 in there between 8 and 10 but most people just skip over that one or just consider 8 and 8.1 to be the same thing pretty much.
 
yeah, more of my trepidation about 11 is more in the direction of not liking ultra-sleek minimalist modern design and like. restriction of customization and access, along with mandatory implementation of dumb shit. i will admit i don’t know the specifics of these when it comes to win 11 and should probably do some research. i know it isn’t terribly egregious, but i just remember hearing some things.
 
I'm pretty sure I was one of the Vista haters as a kid, and kind of remember hating it being trendy for the people I surrounded myself with lol. But nowadays I look back on my memories with it fondly. I played a lot of PC games, especially MMOs, at the time and knowing almost all of them are closed now with no idea what all those friends I made are doing now.. cries.
 
I mean Vista objectively did suck ass though, for a bunch of reasons.

UAC-prompt-Users-of-Windows-Vista-or-7-saw-this-prompt-in-the-experimental-condition.png


Loved seeing this fucking pop-up pretty much every fucking goddamn time I was trying to run something on my old Vista laptop.

Like maybe among your friend group they were just hating it because it was trendy, but it really was awful. I remember when Microsoft ran ads showing off their 'new version' of Windows called Windows Mojave to people who had never used Vista but heard it was bad and they'd have someone from Microsoft helping them as they tested Mojave. Only at the end to reveal that Windows Mojave was actually Windows Vista and it wasn't really as bad as everyone said it was.

And honestly looking back on those ads as an adult, they read like 'Yeah Vista is actually pretty good when you have someone from Microsoft there to literally guide you through the damn OS'.
 
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