Well, I'm on Mint at the moment! I did fall back to W10 for some reason yesterday, most likely to print an asset transfer form that I bungled, download a couple YT videos using YT-DLP, which my Linux version doesnt work for some reason, but the W10 command line one does.
W10 said it needed to restart for updates; yah, we'll "restart" alright; back into Linux. Scrolling is still incomparable, with W10s response to my trackpad way out on top. It's not a deal breaker, but soundly annoying; I'm getting used to it.
Still havent got around to upgrading my printer, Netgear's through-the-router to USB service shows up, but hangs indefinitely on "getting printer information" when I print in Mint. Mint sees my network connected color unit, so I assume when I get the other Brother plugged in and connected to the router, it'll "just work". Sheet of lyrics / chords and an occasional ebay label is about all I routinely print these days.
The only audio app I've used on Mint is Audacity. Havent yet plugged in the Scarlet Solo to see what happens. My BT headset annoyingly needs to be re-paired when I move back into W10, after pairing it in Mint. Gee, the wired headsets dont seem to care...
Having dual boot with Mint definitely has diluted my W10 usage significantly. It's like quitting smoking - I'm still at the "patch" stage, having an occasional. Havent worked on getting my whole, entire W10 install into some kind of container that I can run in Mint as a VM; I'm reluctant to start from scratch on that idea.
There's got to be some software that works just like a drive clone, only you end up with a VM, instead of a booting image on another physical drive. I've yet to find such, but havent put much effort lately into looking either.
W10 said it needed to restart for updates; yah, we'll "restart" alright; back into Linux. Scrolling is still incomparable, with W10s response to my trackpad way out on top. It's not a deal breaker, but soundly annoying; I'm getting used to it.
Still havent got around to upgrading my printer, Netgear's through-the-router to USB service shows up, but hangs indefinitely on "getting printer information" when I print in Mint. Mint sees my network connected color unit, so I assume when I get the other Brother plugged in and connected to the router, it'll "just work". Sheet of lyrics / chords and an occasional ebay label is about all I routinely print these days.
The only audio app I've used on Mint is Audacity. Havent yet plugged in the Scarlet Solo to see what happens. My BT headset annoyingly needs to be re-paired when I move back into W10, after pairing it in Mint. Gee, the wired headsets dont seem to care...
Having dual boot with Mint definitely has diluted my W10 usage significantly. It's like quitting smoking - I'm still at the "patch" stage, having an occasional. Havent worked on getting my whole, entire W10 install into some kind of container that I can run in Mint as a VM; I'm reluctant to start from scratch on that idea.
There's got to be some software that works just like a drive clone, only you end up with a VM, instead of a booting image on another physical drive. I've yet to find such, but havent put much effort lately into looking either.
Linux has partitions set independently as devices in the file system, quite apart from their direct usage like you'd see in windows. They can therefore be written in or out at low level using basic commands, or even stored as files or piped elsewhere.
It's not a novice topic but hopefully it gives perspective. There's little that can't be done. You may need to have a little knowledge of the VM filesystem ways and access methods, and a little knowledge of the windows boot process for manual installation.
- People often post step by step guides for things like this. I'd also advise looking for people's prior experiences with your trackball and printer.
You know... having two small computers... like Micro Form Factor Dells... with a nice ethernet switch between them... and perhaps a simple NAS hanging on.... is not expensive nowadays and makes life so much simpler.
I gave up on making my computers complicated, and I have several machines with different OS.
Get a BIG widescreen display, hook up you Windows machine to it. then use Putty and Mobaterm and you can do both machines on a single display, single keyboard and you can share a common file system. I like to export X terms from the Linux boxes to my Windows screen. Also, you can add more Windows machines and use Remote Terminal.
It's FAR easier than what you're trying to do.
If you have some security issues, then invest in a good KVM switch.
Cloning to a VM isn’t all that difficult. The problem is that Windows typically explodes when you transplant it in such a manner because all the drivers that are currently installed for the source (real) machine are not the ones Windows will need for the virtual machine. Even if it does boot, Windows will notice that all the hardware has changed and then typically demand to be re-activated.
But if you really want to try it, then it is simply a matter of imaging the Windows drive with Clonezilla (or your cloning software of choice) and then creating a new VM with appropriate virtual specifications and enough (or more) drive space and then just restore the Windows image to the VM. Not complicated at all. Or rather, the only complications are due to Windows itself.
Who knows, you might get lucky. I do predict you’ll boot straight into BSOD, though.
After trying to update my W11 laptop to W11 24H2 for two days only to have it take an hour, then display "undoing the changes made to your computer" and rebooting I did some digging. It seems that Microsoft has quietly raised the minimum CPU requirements for Windows 11 24H2 while declaring loss of support for W11 22H2 with W11 23H2 losing support in November of 2025. OK, Microsoft expects me to ditch the 6 year old laptop that i paid nearly $1000 for because they decide that it's not good enough for them. Updates past 23H2 will now fail unless you have an 11th gen CPU or newer. My MSI laptop has a ninth gen core i7-9750H that does anything I throw at it. "F" that, how about letting the user decide what's good enough for them. I don't play games, and the most demanding applications the laptop will see are the really tough ones, like Word, Excel and Eagle PCB version 5.11. I'm stuck on the older version of Eagle because Autodesk says I need the pro version of the current Eagle because of my large board sizes. Their extortion rate is beyond what I can afford, and the 10 year old version works good for my tube amp boards. Slowly trying to learn KiCad but I would need to create a lot of vacuum tube related parts from scratch.
https://www.pcworld.com/article/261...y-bumped-up-windows-11s-cpu-requirements.html
Thanks for that idea, I guess I'm too DUMM to think of it. I have several old computers including a few tiny ones laying around unused. Already have a NAS box and a 44 inch 4K TV for my main display. I have two Ryzen 9 5900X machines that are on W11 24H2. Every other computing device I own is now not good enough by Microsoft's standards. If they just changed the rules, they WILL do it again. I'll just use one of the Small Form Factor boxes that I have for Linux. The little Lenovo ThinkCentre has an 8th gen core i5. It has windows 11 pro, but will not take any updates past 22H2. The larger Asrock Desk Mini has an eighth gen core i7-8700 that also runs W11. I have not tried to update it in a while.
https://www.pcworld.com/article/261...y-bumped-up-windows-11s-cpu-requirements.html
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... and that is why I refuse to run W11. Trying to transition to some flavour of Linux. At least they respect their user base, and they are stable.
I may be forced to run a small Windows box. It will only be for specific applications. I would probably load it up, and isolate it from the internet (and Microsoft). Nothing good comes from Redmont.
I may be forced to run a small Windows box. It will only be for specific applications. I would probably load it up, and isolate it from the internet (and Microsoft). Nothing good comes from Redmont.
Redmond.
I know good people that live there... It's a nice place.
The last time I upgraded a machine was from 486 to 486DX2... or something like that. I ended up only reusing the case... pffft...
After that I've stuck to a motto... I build a machine for a specific purpose, after that I don't change it. If I need more, I build another one.
That worked out well when I build a LAN in my home, back in '92. From then on, it became easier.
Oh, I don't ever, EVER, update my version of Windows in the machine.... NEVER... last time it slipped under my nose, from W10 to W11, it broke the machine... Damn it, I was furious... but I had a disk backup.
At work, around '16, we had a hundred++ machines updated using Mint.. It slipped under our noses. Took forever to fix them. At least, as an engineer I didn't have to do it... the techs got stuck with the work.
BTW, I'm running W11 in this machine. It works fine... but it was something I planned for.
I know good people that live there... It's a nice place.
The last time I upgraded a machine was from 486 to 486DX2... or something like that. I ended up only reusing the case... pffft...
After that I've stuck to a motto... I build a machine for a specific purpose, after that I don't change it. If I need more, I build another one.
That worked out well when I build a LAN in my home, back in '92. From then on, it became easier.
Oh, I don't ever, EVER, update my version of Windows in the machine.... NEVER... last time it slipped under my nose, from W10 to W11, it broke the machine... Damn it, I was furious... but I had a disk backup.
At work, around '16, we had a hundred++ machines updated using Mint.. It slipped under our noses. Took forever to fix them. At least, as an engineer I didn't have to do it... the techs got stuck with the work.
BTW, I'm running W11 in this machine. It works fine... but it was something I planned for.
Or more likely their ecosystem's stockholders, an ecosystem which has long been all about customers wanting, needing, must-having, the latest and greatest, in the ideal-for-them case. Never did find the killer app, did they?
They probably think "Those old hardware users have been ripping us off for so long now, we feel it's time they pay their fair share or something along those lines. They probably feel $30 is a fair and just tarif on those old, decrepit W10 machines for a year of continuing security, as nefarious organizations continue to pound on its backdoors that must be patched on a regular basis - or else.
Gettin a MAC , even a used older one, will clear the eyes of "how computers should work". User interface stays, applications
will contunue to work even if the MAC is updated, in short it just works. Add to that a c-compiler ( yes it's unix below),
and a real working backup mechanism ( Timemachine) that is available in case of a disk crash, restoring the
machine after a disk change will resore everything to within an hour.
In short a quantum leap for MS suckers.
will contunue to work even if the MAC is updated, in short it just works. Add to that a c-compiler ( yes it's unix below),
and a real working backup mechanism ( Timemachine) that is available in case of a disk crash, restoring the
machine after a disk change will resore everything to within an hour.
In short a quantum leap for MS suckers.
Yep, "upgrading" my machine from Win7 Pro to Win10 Pro broke everything. Security? A joke, I have had far more issues with W10 than W7. Apps are now flakey, yes I have reloaded the machine a few times. Many things that use to work on my network no longer do because of "security".
My honest feeling is that Microsoft programming staff are incompetent, plus Microsoft steals too much information from users. I think my biggest security risk is from Microsoft, they get hacked and the world is in trouble. I think they do get successfully hacked on a regular basis, but they would never allow the world to know. They are doing their best to make software as a service a reality.
Has anyone looked at a Photoshop license lately? I lost my CS license recently, HD failure. I can't find it and I can't just buy a copy. The rental is ridiculously expensive. I will not be using Photoshop any longer.
My honest feeling is that Microsoft programming staff are incompetent, plus Microsoft steals too much information from users. I think my biggest security risk is from Microsoft, they get hacked and the world is in trouble. I think they do get successfully hacked on a regular basis, but they would never allow the world to know. They are doing their best to make software as a service a reality.
Has anyone looked at a Photoshop license lately? I lost my CS license recently, HD failure. I can't find it and I can't just buy a copy. The rental is ridiculously expensive. I will not be using Photoshop any longer.
Even old hardware has its use. I have a 14 year old Toshiba laptop with a Pentium B940 CPU. It runs W10 home V 22H2. I use it to display schematics, layouts or PDF files on the workbench where soldering irons, a Dremel tool and several other items that could cause damage while I'm trying to build something. It spent several years on a shelf unused because its WiFi chip failed and the battery wouldn't hold a charge. I bought an Asus laptop in 2014 and forgot about the Toshiba. I got it off the shelf, ordered a $20 battery from Amazon and loaded W10. It now serves a useful purpose, but I won't care much if it gets damaged or dies.
The Asus laptop was a POS from day one. It came with W8.0 which sucked big time. I loaded 8.1 after the first week. The computer did random stuff by itself whenever it felt like it, and would shut down in the middle of something resulting in lost work. Despite a large sticker on the box which I still have, that read "2 year rapid replacement warranty" Asus customer support told me that I had a 1 year warranty from the date of MANUFACTURE which was stated on the bottom of the laptop itself that had expired. I no longer purchase Asus products. After a loss of patience that almost resulted in a flying laptop, I ripped it apart. Manufacturing shortcuts were the demise of what was otherwise a good machine. The little bracket that held the hard drive was laser cut with very sharp edges. That edge cut through the flex circuit that connected the keyboard to the motherboard causing random keypresses. A little Dremel tool work on that edge and some Kapton tape on the flex made it work again for about a year. The flex circuit that was glued to the keyboard had died. Attempts to repair it failed. I asked google to find me a "replacement keyboard" which led to a $20 "direct ship from China" keyboard on Amazon. I paid my $20 and waited. I was expecting a recycled keyboard but surprised when I received a new keyboard which was far better than the one I pulled out with a thicker flex circuit. This was clearly a common problem. It took a complete disassembly of the laptop that resulted in a SSD, more RAM, (optimistic thinking) and a fresh install of W10 on that new SSD. My wife still uses that laptop today with no issues. For some reason it gets updates every month or so, but the W10 version remains 22H2.
I just fired up the Toshiba for the first time in several months. It's currently chewing through a whole page of updates. I'll see where it ends up. It took me over an hour of "updates failed" figure out that a seriously wrong (years) clock will do that.
The Asus laptop was a POS from day one. It came with W8.0 which sucked big time. I loaded 8.1 after the first week. The computer did random stuff by itself whenever it felt like it, and would shut down in the middle of something resulting in lost work. Despite a large sticker on the box which I still have, that read "2 year rapid replacement warranty" Asus customer support told me that I had a 1 year warranty from the date of MANUFACTURE which was stated on the bottom of the laptop itself that had expired. I no longer purchase Asus products. After a loss of patience that almost resulted in a flying laptop, I ripped it apart. Manufacturing shortcuts were the demise of what was otherwise a good machine. The little bracket that held the hard drive was laser cut with very sharp edges. That edge cut through the flex circuit that connected the keyboard to the motherboard causing random keypresses. A little Dremel tool work on that edge and some Kapton tape on the flex made it work again for about a year. The flex circuit that was glued to the keyboard had died. Attempts to repair it failed. I asked google to find me a "replacement keyboard" which led to a $20 "direct ship from China" keyboard on Amazon. I paid my $20 and waited. I was expecting a recycled keyboard but surprised when I received a new keyboard which was far better than the one I pulled out with a thicker flex circuit. This was clearly a common problem. It took a complete disassembly of the laptop that resulted in a SSD, more RAM, (optimistic thinking) and a fresh install of W10 on that new SSD. My wife still uses that laptop today with no issues. For some reason it gets updates every month or so, but the W10 version remains 22H2.
I just fired up the Toshiba for the first time in several months. It's currently chewing through a whole page of updates. I'll see where it ends up. It took me over an hour of "updates failed" figure out that a seriously wrong (years) clock will do that.
The most annoying thing on this ThinkPad laptop, while running Mint, is the window scrolling. For example, it is NOT POSSIBLE to put the above paragraph starting with "The Asus laptop was a POS from day one." as the first line seen below the diyAudio banner. Of course just typing that out, it does it - but only happens to land there because I have the reply edit window open.
The arrow keys function with finer resolution up/down jumps than the trackpad and I can use them in addition to position things. The arrow keys do move just one line in the edit window, but not while simply reading the thread, where they move the text body 3 lines. The track pad jumps 7 - at a minimum.
You tend to take being able to easily position displayed text / graphic windows where you want for granted using W10. I'm surprised this difference in trackpad "Human Interface" behavior isnt more illuminated as a difference between these OSs. Perhaps it's just this machine.
The arrow keys function with finer resolution up/down jumps than the trackpad and I can use them in addition to position things. The arrow keys do move just one line in the edit window, but not while simply reading the thread, where they move the text body 3 lines. The track pad jumps 7 - at a minimum.
You tend to take being able to easily position displayed text / graphic windows where you want for granted using W10. I'm surprised this difference in trackpad "Human Interface" behavior isnt more illuminated as a difference between these OSs. Perhaps it's just this machine.
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In and of itself that may not be so bad, but it's inexcusable that the updater doesn't check whether the computer is compatible before wasting your time with the update. That's just classic Microsoft.
Tom
I know this isn't the solution you want, but seriously... See if you can dust up a used Mac. Ideally one with the newer Apple silicon, but even one of the older Intel ones would be fine. The Mac mini is a great place to start.
Mac OS is basically linux/UNIX with a user-friendly window manager. Once you have the hardware, the OS comes for free from Apple.
Tom
Like I said... DO NOT update...
And you haven't lived until when you plug your Android phone in your car to be greeted by the "Update required to use Android Auto" window.... Google is way worse than Microsoft.
Huh? I got an appointment in 15 minutes, I don't have time to do its seemingly "monthly" upgrade.
That said, my W11 can be a PITA. It has a habit of telling me that it's got an "update"... but I set it up -via the registry!- not to install anything unless I approve it.
Then you got the interface between our LG OLED TVs and the Rokus. It used to be that the Roky would tell the LG TV to tune into its input... but then LG "upgraded" the firmware and broke that.
WTF? Why does a TV have to update its firmware? Remember how fast those old Sony XBR tuned the channels? Wham... no delay...
Hi Tony,
At least your Android tells you it needs an update. When it starts doing stupid things in the car (it's always in the car), I check for updates manually. What I don't get is why it stops working without any changes.
Now Windows. Yeah. They push updates constantly, always by surprise when you boot up. Why do you boot up? Because you have to do something. For me, it is work and updates can stop me for 15 minutes or more, longer if they mess the package up. "Reload the system" is a three day job, so no.
I can't afford to run Windows to be honest.
At least your Android tells you it needs an update. When it starts doing stupid things in the car (it's always in the car), I check for updates manually. What I don't get is why it stops working without any changes.
Now Windows. Yeah. They push updates constantly, always by surprise when you boot up. Why do you boot up? Because you have to do something. For me, it is work and updates can stop me for 15 minutes or more, longer if they mess the package up. "Reload the system" is a three day job, so no.
I can't afford to run Windows to be honest.
Hmm... I don't shut down my machines.
IMHO, shutting down a working CPU is asking for trouble. Things BREAK when you reboot a machine.
Android Auto..... I think I'm getting some understanding of what is happening. The worst case is when it won't connect. Now, whenever my daughter plugs her iPhone into my car's Navi, it breaks my Android Auto connections.... it seems like the car's Navi ( a '20 Honda ) gets "stuck" on the iPhone connection and it takes several tries for it to realize that it's not an iPhone but an Android that is making the connection request.
Even her just getting in the car with her iPhone and Bluetooth enabled has a habit of disrupting my Android connection.
I figure this is an Apple problem as in its quest to make it uber-reliable it keeps retrying to connect and will not give up.
Try roaming with WiFi in a house. I got three access points set up... same SSID but different channels... The iPhones stick to one access point and will lose it... it will not attempt a shutdown/connect. So, the user has to disable the WiFi interface and then enable it again for the iPhone to do a new search for the SSID and then connect on a different channel.
Android, OTOH, does this automatically for you. It knows when a channel is weak and a stronger one is available for the same SSID, so it hops to it automatically.
This is the precise roaming behavior we want, but it makes the system less reliable... hence, Apple doesn't do it.
Apple is sticky... fine if you're with Apple, but it screws the rest of the World.
IMHO, shutting down a working CPU is asking for trouble. Things BREAK when you reboot a machine.
Android Auto..... I think I'm getting some understanding of what is happening. The worst case is when it won't connect. Now, whenever my daughter plugs her iPhone into my car's Navi, it breaks my Android Auto connections.... it seems like the car's Navi ( a '20 Honda ) gets "stuck" on the iPhone connection and it takes several tries for it to realize that it's not an iPhone but an Android that is making the connection request.
Even her just getting in the car with her iPhone and Bluetooth enabled has a habit of disrupting my Android connection.
I figure this is an Apple problem as in its quest to make it uber-reliable it keeps retrying to connect and will not give up.
Try roaming with WiFi in a house. I got three access points set up... same SSID but different channels... The iPhones stick to one access point and will lose it... it will not attempt a shutdown/connect. So, the user has to disable the WiFi interface and then enable it again for the iPhone to do a new search for the SSID and then connect on a different channel.
Android, OTOH, does this automatically for you. It knows when a channel is weak and a stronger one is available for the same SSID, so it hops to it automatically.
This is the precise roaming behavior we want, but it makes the system less reliable... hence, Apple doesn't do it.
Apple is sticky... fine if you're with Apple, but it screws the rest of the World.
My personal favourite is when you show up for work on Monday morning to check the results of the 2-day experiment that ran over the weekend only to find that Windoze has spontaneously rebooted to run some update, thereby killing the work that was in progress.
OTOH, not installing Windoze updates isn't really an option either. At least not if the machine has internet access.
Tom
OTOH, not installing Windoze updates isn't really an option either. At least not if the machine has internet access.
Tom
^ Windoze updates isn't really an option either. At least not if the machine has internet access.
Not true. It can be done. For Win 10 and 11 it requires a change in the registry.
And Linux will do it too if you don't disable it. How about losing a lab's worth of machines running regression tests overnight? That time it affected a lot of our work ( 100+ engineers ) since we verified our Git Repos nightly and delayed our customer upgrades.
( Hmm... maybe our customers were happy we weren't pushing our upgrades? LOL )
And work... don't even go there..... my current customer's IT has a habit of pushing security updates that require rebooting.
So, there you go with an open IDE, open connections to the lab machines, VPN all configured, all development licenses loaded, access to the file servers enabled, etc, etc.... all your windows nicely set up so you can edit/compile/transfer/reboot target/execute in target/debug target...... etc... and then some IT buffoon decides that you have to reboot to upload some "security thing" that you never need...
But there is one Windows thing that truly pisses me off... the "Do not shut off while we install xxx".... right when you shut the machine down to go home.
But no, Apple is no better so far as I'm concerned. My designs are far superior... but I do firmware...
Not true. It can be done. For Win 10 and 11 it requires a change in the registry.
And Linux will do it too if you don't disable it. How about losing a lab's worth of machines running regression tests overnight? That time it affected a lot of our work ( 100+ engineers ) since we verified our Git Repos nightly and delayed our customer upgrades.
( Hmm... maybe our customers were happy we weren't pushing our upgrades? LOL )
And work... don't even go there..... my current customer's IT has a habit of pushing security updates that require rebooting.
So, there you go with an open IDE, open connections to the lab machines, VPN all configured, all development licenses loaded, access to the file servers enabled, etc, etc.... all your windows nicely set up so you can edit/compile/transfer/reboot target/execute in target/debug target...... etc... and then some IT buffoon decides that you have to reboot to upload some "security thing" that you never need...
But there is one Windows thing that truly pisses me off... the "Do not shut off while we install xxx".... right when you shut the machine down to go home.
But no, Apple is no better so far as I'm concerned. My designs are far superior... but I do firmware...
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I'm not saying it can't be done. I'm saying it isn't an option. By that, I mean that I would not want to run an un-patched Windoze box that had internet access. Especially if it also had access to my home or business network. That's a security risk.
Tom