Final paragraph sums it best:
Don’t want any bloatware or subscription services preinstalled on your computer? Consider installing Linux instead of Windows the next time you’re reinstalling your computer.
I’m quite interested in using Linux, but it won’t run many, if any of the 100s of plugins I own, let alone my audio interface, or my production software.
At least, that’s my assumption. I did a search and can see there’s a decent DAW for Linux (the amusingly-named Cockos Reaper), it’s affordable at $80. But I’d also need to buy a new audio interface, there’s a few that have Linux drivers. An expensive experiment. My interest is because it’d be amazing to have a stable system to play music live, with no weird Microsoft shit happening in the background guaranteed.
Reaper is awesome. It’s pro tools for non-millionaires.
Reaper is awesome indeed. But the DAW isn’t the issue, it’s the VST, very few work on Linux
it’s wild to me how many people I see saying this. I assumed I was one of like… 3
Maybe Ardour can fit? You can pay $1 or more for the binary or compile it yourself.
Reaper is the best there is for Linux. There are other alternatives of you want FOSS, but they are not as good.
Not a pro DAW user. I use it to just substitute Adobe Audition to some extend. Tenacity is used most of the time.
In that case there are many viable FOSS alternatives.
Ardour is very appealing to me because it supports VST3! There is a ‘wrapper’ available to make VST3 compatible with Linux, but that’s just adding the complexity and potentially bugginess that I’d be trying to escape from.
FYI I am using reaper on Linux and I have all my windows plug-ins working through yabridge (32 and 64 bit vst/vst3), focusrite interfaces don’t even need special drivers, that and my alesis midi keyboard just worked when I plugged them in. I just started using Linux semi-permanently at home last week for the first time (though I am a developer)
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The ‘proprietary software’ you’re referring to is Cubase, which is one of the industry standard DAWs. I think I’m OK relying on the DAW / company that created the VST protocol and is used by pros all over the world.
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With some industry software, the proprietary stuff really is better. There are plenty of great FOSS tools out there, but not always the exact thing you need. For example, PDF software: I don’t know of any editor as powerful as Acrobat. And I absolutely hate Acrobat, but it’s the best tool out there for modifying a PDF.
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Bud you don’t control any of the software on your device I’d bet. FOSS or not. Even if you’re building from source, are you inspecting every line of code on every update? Are you reviewing every PR that gets merged? No, of course not.
Does the interface that you have now work under Linux? Linux has pretty good support for a lot of things now, so you may be able to use what you have. Reaper also has a generous free trial, so potentially this is a free experiment. (I’m no expert and just tinker with this stuff, but I have Reaper and I find it similarly easy/difficult as every other DAW I’ve used) Several distributions have “live images” where you can run it from a flash drive without copying anything to the hard drive. I don’t know if you could set up Reaper and your interface from a live image.
If you do decide to do an installation, consider buying a different hard drive and installing Linux on that. You can install both Windows and Linux on the same drive, and it’s not difficult, but it is slightly easier to use a separate drive and they are not expensive.
I have used Linux and Windows a lot, but I have only used Reaper in Windows, so unfortunately I can’t say whether it’s a similar experience.
Unfortunately, not only is my interface not supported, but it straight up doesn’t work with linux (according to all the forum posts I’ve seen of people trying, failing, then asking UAD why no Linux compatibility). It’s a UAD Apollo USB, ASIO-only.
I’ve got a frankly ludicrious number of M2 / SATA drives in my music PC so installing on a separate drive is no problem. Thanks for the tip! I bought a new interface for mobile production / live work, so maybe I’ll fare better with that than the UAD beast. Certainly wouldn’t want to stop using that because it’s an absolutely fantastic interface, not to mention the 2x SHARC chips which allow me to run CPU-intensive UAD hardware recreations without smashing my CPU.
If you want to try Linux, try Ubuntu or mint. Those are the easiest to make an entry into.
Thanks, noted.
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Guess it depends on the industry. I’m a web developer so it doesn’t matter what OS I use, and frankly it’s far easier to install and configure the tools I need on Linux than it is on Windows. I can leave a Linux system online for weeks at a time, which in some cases is the entire length of a contract.
Windows is good, but it requires just as much training as any other system to become a real power user.
I disagree. If you consider a power user using PowerShell or terminal, then sure. But simple things on windows are more complex on Linux. Like installing a program, if you can do it through snap or apt get then great, still more complex for the average user compared to windows where you just download and click.
Literally it’s just download and click.
From the Store if it’s there, or from the application website.
No it’s not, if it’s not on the store (outside of Ubuntu does a store even exist?) then it’s more difficult to install. Half the time it’s an appimage you have to download, make it executable and then run. Then if you install it from a website you have to go through the trouble of adding a shortcut into your application menu / desktop and it’s just way more complex than Windows.
The repositories for the big distros are so full that you rarely need to ever install anything that isn’t already there for you. I use a crapload of software, and I have literally one thing that I’ve installed that I downloaded from the internet. All updates are handled by the package manager, so there aren’t dozens of services running to check for updates. Installing software on linux was already so much easier, byt Flatpak and SNAP have made it absurdity simple.
On windows, you literally go to some website download an executable, and run it. Every time I need to do it for work, I’m shocked that it’s such a messy and insecure setup.
I get shit done on Linux, too.
Sure, and once you’ve clicked through the “finish setting up windows” pop up that inexplicably appears every few reboots, done the mandatory updates it keeps nagging you about and threatening to reboot if you happen to walk away for too long, and cleared out all the ads in your notifications, you can get right to it!
You know, I’ve never had this happen to me at all, but I am using the Pro version, so maybe that’s why.
Does it prevent Bing, Teams or Edge to ever get installed without your permission ?
Yes, that is the N version.
I run N, I like it.
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For most things, Linux just works. There are specialized apps like cad packages, graphic design and such that are very problematic on Linux but most of it is fine. Just look at how successful Chromebooks are. They’re all Linux.
That’s funny, that’s the reason I ditched Windows completely. The workflow is just so bad on it.
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Well yeah, because we don’t have the marketing billions and monopoly that Microsoft/Apple enjoy. So we gotta do the promoting ourselves.
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Linux has hundreds of distributions, plenty of which feature gui alternatives like Linux Mint, everything’s not arch. I’ll remind you console commands are a thing on windows as well.
Lol, tell me you don’t know anything about Linux without telling me you don’t know anything about Linux.
Steamdeck runs what OS… ?
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Nice try Microsoft! I’ll never install Windows ever again.
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Uhhhh I don’t know about y’all but I got one Windows license for free back in college, and I’ve upgraded that one ever since to newer versions of 8, 10, and 11 for free. Oh yeah, and I actually scammed a second license out of that one, I just held on to my old Win7 drive for a few years, then booted it up in a new system one day and associated it with a different MS account, and upgraded it all the way to 10. The upgrade process gave me a second Windows key apparently, so I got two licenses for zero dollars.
And that’s not even mentioning the $5 OEM licenses that you can get online… Also, you know you don’t NEED a Windows license, right? You can leave Windows deactivated indefinitely, the only downside is that “please activate Windows” shame text on your desktop (which you can get rid of with a registry edit).
Why do any of that shit when you can walk into your local library/community college and grab the key off of that for free? And it wont suddenly shit out on you one day like those 5 dollar “OEM” OS keys.
You think stealing from your local library is somehow better or more reliable than an OEM key? LOL
You think those 5 dollar “OEM” keys are legit? They are not. Plus, its a blanket license. The only one to count those is to get a physical machine count. If its a crime its victimless because they don’t lose any access, microsoft just loses a buck and I dont give a fuck about a megacorp and their OS money
I didn’t say they were legit. You seem to think that stealing keys from your local library is, though? Lmao
Its more legit than those 4 dollar cards on ebay. The key itself is anyway. I’m not really sure what your beef is when this harms no one.
Usually you have to pay $500+ for a course in a course that would justify giving you access. They don’t just hand them out to anyone who walks in the door without paying.
Have you tried it? Its a community college not a university. Most aren’t IDing people as they walk into the door. The public library also does not require classes to use.
Yes, I’m speaking from experience.
I guess that makes 2 cases of anecdotal evidence. I’ve never had my library ask questions though. To this day I’m still rocking a community college’s OS key on my Windows machine.
Years ago I worked for a company that provided employees with an MSDN subscription. When I left I went in and activated all the product keys and put them in a spreadsheet. No one in my family has had to buy Windows in a long time
This will get patched fast. Microsoft loves the bloat!!
Aye. But make them work for it, eh? XD
