For the last year and change, I've carried a particularly fast thumb drive with Linux Mint installed on it (it's actual mint, rather than an installer/preview image). I'm constantly surprised by how many machines it "just works" with. Laptops from many different brands, workstations and desktops, AMD, Intel, Nvidia... Everything I plug it into seems to work fine.

With that in mind, I want to echo the sentiments in other comments. I'm still using Windows, but only because of the software.

At home I run windows only because of the software I use (Photoshop/Lightroom, games, and Equalizer APO).

At work I still need to use Windows simply because the toolchains I use are often exclusive to windows (Visual Studio and Atmel Studio in particular).

All they want to do is browse the web, and not have to fight with their computer at random points. I do pity these people who spend a lot of money on their computers for it to not even be fit for purpose.. and spend more money on Norton snake oil, which only makes it worse.

I believe this is why smartphones and tablets took off so well, they just work.

That's really the key to it all. Frankly, Windows, macOS, and just about any Linux are all good enough and have been for a while now. For most people, it all comes down to what software they want to run.

Valve for linux very much exists, but definitely not everything is ported.

There are a few other things I need it for (like FPGA/circuit tools, home theater programming, etc.) but those can be easily handled by a VM.

That said, I am thinking of switching back from Mac to Windows for a daily driver, or to Linux, because these new MBPs are so bad. I need another keyboard replacement and I do not want to be without my computer for a week. This time double keypresses instead of none. What a joke, and the TouchBar makes VI hard (and no, after 31 years of VI I am not switching to caps lock).

How do you figure? Every part about Ubuntu, from keybindings to menus to window management to user interface expectations, are directly copying windows.

But seriously, who in their right mind would tolerate advertisements in software that they paid good money for?

Ubuntu tried to pull some weird netbook phone hybrid that didn't work well on any type of device. 8 years we had to live with Unity.

I'd say that the UI of Windows 10 is about ten years ahead of anything in the linux world (and I doubt linux well ever be as polished). I say that as someone who is possibly going to do the switch to linux this year, but I'm in for a rough transition.

Windows 10 is really really nice these days...

Darn, pardon me. I should have said the Windows 10 interface. Yeah, Mate is copying Windows 7/Vista task bar stuff, with perhaps less of that system's unneeded flash.

Linux is usable for daily tasks, but only barely, and it gets further behind state of the art software every year. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone who isn’t fluent with critical debugging skills (bash, knowlege of logs and how to search them, the ability to manipulate system tasks, x11 and graphcis driver configurations, etc etc).

Until the FOSS community decides to unify behind a single experience and actually invest in the experience, it’s always going to be a shitty clone of the user interfaces people actually want to use.

I use linux every day but the idea it is usable for the average person without paying someone to support them through issues is an utter pipe dream.

People always say this whenever Linux is under discussion. No one actually wants this. If you want "one-size fits all" use MacOS or Windows and see how that fits you.

People who trumpet a unified Linux experience expect the river to somehow flow backwards.

looks at user counts for each OS

reads parent comment again

Would you say the same for Chromebooks? Chromebooks are Linux. If not that proves that it's at least possible for a user-friendly experience to exist on Linux. And I would further suggest that running Ubuntu on well-supported hardware closely approximates the Chromebook experience for most users. I personally know several ordinary users who find Ubuntu as easy as Windows to use, if not easier.

I think your statement that Linux gets "further behind state of the art" as time goes on is probably the oddest claim you make here. It runs counter to everything I've heard from anyone running Linux for a long period of time. Most reasonable hardware configurations just work right out of the box. Remember that the average user never installs an operating system. Either the OS comes with the computer or someone competent is doing the installation for them; in any case the end user isn't expected to fix any problems that arise. Whenever I've installed Windows I've encountered driver problems that had to be fixed to get a working experience, but that's not something I count against Windows when talking about the end-user experience.

Recently I am unhappy about the stability and also about the RAM requirements of KDE since I only have 8GB Ram. I am pretty sure my next installed Linux system will be Bodhi Linux on my Laptop.