I finally decided to drop Windows from all of my home computers (currently three systems) and move them all over to Linux. I had already moved two of them, one that I use for a home theater, and one I use for general work. The third was being used for general work and for controlling my old home automation system.
In the past the issues keeping me on Windows was software. Some of it was games, but I am not playing those games anymore. I was using Adobe products which were provided by the company I was working for, but I am now retired and don’t have access to those products, and although I like them, they are too expensive. I have found replacements for all of them in Linux.
The hardest piece of software to replace was the home automation software I had been using to control my X10 system. But I found some and after some work have gotten it to work on Linux.
Here is a list of the software I use to use on Windows and what I am now running on Linux. The Linux distro I am using is Zorin. It is more Windows like than some other distros and is very easy to install and use. I have used and tried many other distros and any of them would do, but I find Zorin the one I like.
Software
Comparison of Windows to Linux software| Purpose | Windows | Linux |
|---|---|---|
| Outlook | Thunderbird | |
| Web Browsing | Firefox, IE, Chrome | Firefox, Chrome |
| Photo Editing | Irfanview, Photoshop, Olympus Raw Editor | Irfanview (wine), Gimp, RawTherapee, |
| Word processing | Microsoft Word | Libreoffice Write |
| Spreadsheets | Microsoft Excel | Libreoffice Calc |
| Presentations | Microsoft Powerpoint | Libreoffice Impress |
| Taxes | Turbo Tax | Turbotax on the Web |
| Home automation | Alex10, Ha-Bridge | Mochad, Ha-Bridge |
| Video Editing | Pitivi |
What drove me to make the change was the ridiculous amount of time it was taking Windows to boot up, and to do updates. Also I got really tired of the antivirus software ads popping up all the time.
I really like how easy it is to install and uninstall most software on Linux. While I like the software managers (similar to the “store” in Windows), I will often just go to a terminal window and install software from the command line. It is really easy. Occasionally (actually very rarely) I have installed software by “building it”. This is what I had to do for some of the home automation software, but it was straight forward, following instructions from the web.
So far I have had no regrets.