this post was submitted on 24 Nov 2025
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I am a macOS user for work and had windows mostly for games on my personal computer, when I got a new laptop last year it came with win 11… it was so annoying to need to skip literally ads for Microsoft services… that even being my “leisure” computer… I spent the time getting Linux Mint, deal with Nvidia drivers on Linux just to have steam there
The games I am playing recently are working great on Linux and my computer feels faster now.
This particular laptop had a problem with WiFi drivers and Nvidia drivers, but getting past this first setup, I must say Linux Destop is easier and fast to use.
I would bet money the fanspeed also got much quieter.
I keep hearing about ads on computers, smart tvs, fridges and shit, is that solely an american thing? I'm in Europe and never get any of that shit. Sure, Microsoft will tell me at installation that they'd like to "personalize" some adds for me, but I have never actually had a single one. Did the EU block them or something?
You definitely get more in the US, but Europe isn't free from ads.
Windows still shoves OneDrive, office, and other things in your face in Europe. They still have featured news stories and the like. They still have recommendations in the start menu and such.
These are all ads, though we've been conditioned into thinking MS plastering OneDrive and OneDrive recommendations all over their OS isn't advertising. It very much is.
If you have an Android TV in Europe, 1/3 of the home screen by default is an ad banner, just like in the US. Etc.
We are not free from ads. We just have it slightly better than the US.
I don't get any of that. No ads for microsoft products, my start menu is literally just a blank space with Project Diablo 2 and Calculator as quick access. Not even on my Samsung tv do I get ads unless I choose to tune into one of their free channels.
It might be the version of Windows 11 you have installed, too. Enterprise has no ads (or can be configured not to have ads, at least). Same for Professional, I think?
You can also use a post-install "Playbook" to rip all the adware and spyware out of Windows. I used ReviOS in my Windows 11 VM and it works well for me, but I'm guessing that's not what you've done since you'd know about it, lol.
I'm super happy with my switch to CachyOS. Canadian laws roughly mirror US laws, so it's a breath of fresh air to not need to deal with Microsoft's bullshit (well, outside of the VM I need for work, anyway.)
I just have windows 11 home
Ms has different releases for Europe due to legal requirements
This is why you have no ads
Does that actually persist across forced updates? I know they've been known to re-install things on updates before.
Most disable Windows Updates for that reason, afaik? You can manually patch security updates without getting automatic updates, I think.
I don't really care about Windows Updates for my use case since it's just a VM and I know how to prevent most virus vectors anyway, but yes; there are major trade-offs to "debloating" Windows.
In the longer term, I want to try getting all my must-have apps for work running in browser apps or compatibility layers so I can just stay in Linux.
Everytime people say there is a problem with nvidia driver, what kind of problem do people have? I am running nvidia drivers on two different machines on arch linux. It was just
pacman -Syu nvidiaand thing just workI just bought a machine with an NVIDIA card which I am going to install Mint on. Do you have any advice?
(I had planned to get an AMD GPU, but was unable to for various reasons.)
Mint worked the best for me out of the other distros. 3060ti
Multiple monitor setup. One a 4k tv via HDMI others display port.
Had a helluva time getting it to not fuck the displays when one went on/off with anything other than mint.
YRMV
Send it! I've heard it has gotten better for nvidia users. The nice thing about a live USB is that you can just remove it and reboot if you don't like it.
Pop!_OS has a dedicated .iso just for Nvidia hardware.