12/25/2025

Switching to Linux

On the 22nd of November, I uninstalled Windows 11 from Pretty Pink and Graceful Green (see more about them on my computers page), and installed Kubuntu Linux, an Ubuntu flavor with the KDE Plasma Desktop Environment.

For what purpose??

There isn't anything in particular that I have against Windows 11 other than my general dislike of Microsoft. My installs of W11 were fairly stable, and there's really isn't anything I couldn't do. To be completely honest, the switch was fueled more by "proprietary software bad" than "Windows bad." While I had considered Linux before, and I had knowledge of how to use it, the first time I genuinely considered using it daily was during the writing of Cloudflare and Unreliable Services, where I talk about the use of proprietary software and how I want to step away from it. While writing, I realized I was using a whole proprietary operating system, and that goes against my entire point. So, I wrote my thoughts into the page, lamented over the loss of Fortnite, and made the switch 3 days later.

Why Kubuntu?

Another great question! I have a vitriolic disgust with the GNOME desktop environment, and I know KDE Plasma decently well since I own a steam deck, so I knew pretty quickly it was gonna be my DE of choice. As for the actual distro part, I know Ubuntu decently well because of my use of it in my two servers. So, KDE + Ubuntu = Kubuntu.

How has it been?

It's been pretty alright! Overall, it's honestly no worse than Windows.

The experience of installing most software is a lot more flawless than Windows, since most programs can be installed in a couple commands or directly from the KDE Discover store.

Updates consist of clicking the update button and restarting at my leisure, no intrusive Windows Update.

The resource usage was probably the most shocking thing of all. Right now I have a YouTube video and 3 browser other tabs, Discord, Steam, Discover, A file manager, a task manager equivalent, a screenshot tool, Prism Launcher, a text editor, and a terminal open, and I'm only using 8 GBs of RAM. I have no source for this claim, but I feel like Windows would use a lot more.

It's not all great though. In my first week, I was having a problem with my game drive. Since it was formatted NTFS, my system was having trouble launching games off of it, so I formatted it as EXT4, and the next time I rebooted my system, I had no more operating system. It was just gone. I'm still not entirely sure what caused this, but reinstalling wasn't too big of a hassle.

Additionally, when I ran Windows, I used a program on Graceful Green called LittleBigMouse, which helped adjust the mouse between monitors, removing the odd jump that can happen if one of the two monitors is not the standard size for its resolution. Linux does not have an open source equivalent, at least not one that I could figure out, so I've been living with weird jumps for a month.

Despite the many problems (believe me there are so many I haven't mentioned), after the first week or so, I got pretty warmed up to daily Linux use. Despite its shortcomings, it's been a pretty okay experience.

Will you continue to use Linux?

You ask a lot of questions, but I will! I have come to enjoy Linux in the past few months, and I've come to prefer its jank over Windows jank. In fact, I bought a used 2021-ish Thinkpad laptop, and when it arrives, I'll be running Kubuntu on it. So while I do not recommend its use to people who are not technically inclined, Linux has been a great experience for me.