[capidamonte]

Originally Posted by SameOldStory

What you, like my wife, can't understand is that there is no perfect "whatever" for everybody. Just because I've upset you by not liking Linux does not mean that I'm trashing Linux.

Sorry you're having trouble with the wife. What I'm saying is not what your wife is saying.

I never said that it was perfect; what I said implied that your experience is not normal. If it's not normal, then your complaints and dislikes might scare someone off in disproportionate measure to their likelihood.

80486-level performance is quite a claim, and certainly off-putting. And, given my years with Ubuntu, seems incredibly, lottery-winning unlikely.

Simply put, I've expressed my opinion that Linux is not for me.

Fair enough. But whenever something is different, it's scary. Maybe not to you, but to some readers. People don't know much about Linux, so your story is powerful beyond its intent. And you're carrying cultural baggage that Windows is the baseline.

I sorry that you're so easily offend, and that you have a problem with those who’s opinion differ from yours.

I'm not easily offended, I'm easily provoked by the spreading of FUD. Unanswered FUD is FUD victorious. It may not be your intention, but it's the effect.

I bought a monstrously cool laptop yesterday, and restored it to its factory-new OS (Vista). Living in Linux-land for so long, the experience was terrifying -- constant pop-ups about programs running, warnings about vulnerabilities, AV programs hawking themselves by being embedded in the OS. There were at least a dozen visible icons in the tray, all sucking CPU -- never mind what was going on invisibly. This is without installing or changing a single thing. I had a constant feeling that I was out of control, that it was trying to train me how to behave.

Now, it's Vista, notoriously bad. But the mode of interaction with it is entirely different than the mode I engage in with Linux. The OS is in charge in Windows, constantly "protecting" you from yourself, fighting customizations, hiding configuration. (The Registry! AGH!) In Linux, yeah, sometimes you have to Google, or use the command line. And sometimes there is no solution, largely because hardware manufacturers tie themselves to Windows. But at least I can do what I want, and change what I want -- and I don't have to live in fear, or bear the constant harangue of marketing.