It took a bit of effort and finding a really stable Linux distro on my hardware. For me that was Linux Mint.

Switching was made relatively easy by dual-booting and running Linux as much as possible while going back to Windows if I didn’t have time to figure something out. After few months of this I wasn’t using Windows at all and eventually deleted the partition.

You got a year? Ubuntu must be improving! I’d typically get 2-4 months and then have to spend hours troubleshooting to get something working again. I can’t remember the last time that happened to one of my Mint installations.

You aren’t alone having stability problems with Ubuntu. As much as I like the OS, my Ubuntu installs always broke and required troubleshooting at some point. Right now I only have Ubuntu installed on a bootable USB ssd that I use for backups and other disk operations, but even on that the desktop crashes regularly.

I eventually got tired exploring different distos and switched back to Mint. It’s been running with regular updates and upgrades on my desktop PC for 5 years and 3 on my laptop. I’ve had very few problems. Debian has been just as stable on my server.

It’s also possible to configure Linux to automatically pause a Virtualbox VM when the window is not in focus so Windows doesn’t keep burning CPU cycles when not actually in use.

I’ve tried various methods to run a couple Windows programs I use occasionally and most reliable method I’ve found (without buying a commercial package like Crossover) is a VM. With a decent multi-core processor and enough memory the only downside I’ve found is it makes my laptop run warm.

Raspberry Pi OS is based on Debian. You should be able to do what you’re describing and more by enabling SSH even without changing the OS.

Assuming it’s a Pi 3, Wireguard will work on it, as will Syncthing (useful if you add an SSD) but the interface bandwidth is limited so it can be a bit slow. That may not be too much of a problem though. My cable Internet’s upload speed is limited to 20Mbps, and despite the limited bandwidth both Wireguard and Syncthing are surprisingly useful.

A few years ago I booted up Windows after months of exclusively using Linux. When I ran Windows Update it deleted and overwrote my Linux partition! This wasn’t a grub issue, my files were gone and even file recovery utilities couldn’t find much. Plenty of others have experienced the same thing.

This is still happening and is unquestionably pure maliciousness on Microsoft part.

I had very similar problems with Realtek wifi on an HP laptop.

A possible fix:

Run “iwconfig” and check your adapter power management setting. If it’s on turn it off: “iwconfig [interface] power off”.

This solved most the wifi problems on my system.

I used DD-WRT for 9 years and had no reason to switch until I was forced to. At some point after a firmware upgrade my routers began to occasionally lose their configurations after power failures. Months of troubleshooting, logging errors and recreating configs made no difference. I had been concerned for some time that the project seemed to rely on one guy, and although what he’s doing is amazing, it is not possible for him to thoroughly test each firmware release. When one of my routers lost its config when I was 200 miles away and I lost alarm monitoring I was forced to make a change.

Open-WRT has been a really pleasant surprise. It’s completely stable on the same routers and the feature set is unbelievably broad. The learning curve was a bitch though.

Glad you haven’t had any issues. Have a good night.

Do you have any experience with Linux viruses? Have you had your own Linux installations infected with viruses or malware?

You sure though?

What do you want? It should go without saying that I am absolutely sure of my own experience.

In probably 15 years total of running Linux I have not had a single problem with malware or viruses. Part of that time was also running Windows regularly and my Windows systems DID become infected with both malware and viruses occasionally, despite my best efforts. And you’re not mentioning the fact that Linux runs on 63% of the server market and those systems are under constant attack.

Reports of Linux system infections are truly rare, and considering the nature of the user community would be widely and loudly reported if they were happening.

Do you have any experience in this matter? Have you had your own Linux installations infected, or are you a Windows user questioning what you’re reading? (Perfectly reasonable if the 2nd one’s the case.) Please fill us in on the details.

I’ve used Linux Mint and other distros daily for more than 10 years. Never had a virus or malware issue and don’t even run antivirus software.

During that same time I’ve had to help friends remove viruses and malware from their Windows machines dozens of times. The latest Windows disaster I’ve assisted with was a few months ago. A retired friend had her Windows 10 machine hijacked and $8K stolen from her savings account. Making sure the malware was removed required hours of work formatting the drive and reinstalling Windows.

IMO you are far safer with a plain vanilla Linux install that you are with Windows, no matter what steps you take to secure your Windows installation.

On my Linux Mint laptop Winboat installed quickly and allowed me to install and run the one program I use that requires Windows. This biggest issues were with that same app’s windows when they were rendered on the Linux desktop. They sometimes couldn’t be moved, resized or closed, however the same app ran just fine on the Winboat Windows Desktop itself.

The latest version is identified as an alpha release on the UI, so these problems aren’t surprising. What is surprising is how well so much of this works for an alpha release, particularly how polished the installation process is.

Looking forward to using Winboat when it progresses to the beta.

I didn’t figure it out either. It was a educated guess and I got lucky.

I had similar issues with Home Assistant initially and had two failures that looked like database corruption in less than 6 months. I decided to give it one last try and switched to MariaDB. That was nearly 3 years ago. Since then it’s been rock solid.

You had a lucky escape, HA is addictive.

I have a Surface Laptop 4 and have been running Mint exclusively for a couple of years. It’s less well supported than the tablets and the initial installation took a bit of work, but once installed it has worked perfectly. The Linux Surface project has a detailed feature matrix that shows what’s supported for each model.

It’s amazing how much damage those scammers cause.

Last year I ran into a retired neighbor at Staples buying a new laptop because her existing machine had been hacked. She came back after leaving it running to find someone was logged in remotely. They drained $8k from her retirement account. Turned out 6 months earlier she got a call from “Microsoft” asking to connect to her machine because they “noticed it had a problem.”

Most of the people I know are computer illiterate. They know nothing about PC’s and don’t care to learn because they think of PCs as appliances. They want word processing, email, photos, and web, and don’t give a damn what’s going on under the hood. Microsoft support is generally pretty bad, but it’s far better than none at all.

That lack of any support (except me) is the only reason I haven’t moved friends and family to Linux.

For non-enterprise users only two things:

1. Zero reasonably priced options for support when things go wrong.
2. Breaking changes caused by updates that make that support necessary.

If my neighbor’s Windows or Apple machine breaks they can call Microsoft or Apple, the PC manufacturer or a bunch of different support providers. Microsoft provides free support if one of their updates causes problems.

I can’t find any Linux support aimed at home users, only very expensive enterprise support options.