Finally made the switch to Linux

[Major_A]

Idk if Redrock would be happy or disappointed, but since Mac is a proprietary linux maybe lol

I had plans of doing this by 2020 when support for win7 ran out, but due to a premature HD dying, I jumped into it.

The only hurdle I had was when I made the switch, my video card fan decided to die a day after I had MOH running under wine
which caused a month long "wtf did I do?" issue.

A kind helper in their forums help me track down that it wasn't me, and I ranted about nvidia and their qc testing cards inverted in atx cases
but it's all good now as I replaced their stupid fan they put on a 4GB video card, with a standard window case fan and been running great ever since.

I saved my windows thunderbird and firefox appdata and when I got the new OS installed just renamed a file and it was like I never left windows to begin with.
Things that stopped working in windows like youtube comments not showing or other stupid stuff suddenly started working again.

It was not hard to get MOH working under wine, also got Quake 3 Arena working as well and also helping a returned player/mapper/programmer make us some new mapping and admin
software for the game and am happy to be part of it, mostly the graphics stuff, but it lead to other utilities for the software which is great.

I know you guys are past MOH, but as a post in general about computer life beyond microsoft, yes it's pleasant, joyous & can be done


I switched to Antergos - Arch Linux with the KDE Plasma Desktop, looks like a win desktop, but you can see what's in the taskbar without glasses

Fully updated install takes about 20 minutes, maybe less "No services packs & and your video cards proprietary drivers are installed!!"
My machine boots in 2:30 and shuts down in about 5 seconds.

Just thought I'd post the info if anyone toyed with other OS's

I'll never go back to windows.

[Lamron]

Does Wine run inside Linux as a virtual machine, or do you have to reboot into it? Can you be running Linux programs and Windows programs at the same time in different windows?

[Major_A]

Nope, no rebooting and yes there is a way to run multiple wine bottles & linux programs.

Instead of simulating internal Windows logic like a virtual machine or emulator, Wine translates Windows API calls into POSIX calls on-the-fly, eliminating the performance and memory penalties of other methods and allowing you to cleanly integrate Windows applications into your desktop.

www.winehq.org/

You can make 32x or 64x wine folders.
A wine folder comes with a drive C folder which contains a windows folder users and program files and contains a registry.

The windows folder mainly just contains system32 folder and a few others, basically the place where all your drivers go for whatever your doing.
As an example I've got moh running under a 32x install and another wine folder 64x for photoshop.
I also had alien arena and moh running at the same time, with alien arena being natively run under linux, there was a little video lag with a 4gb video card but it's not like
you could play them at the same time lol.

You can also set up each wine directory as a certain OS. One can be XP and others can be win7 98 or even 10 now I think.

You can also install POL - Play on linux which has automated installers in it.
Play on linux is set up to install the GOG version of MOH.
As an experiment, I made a 32x pol folder but directed it to the MohRevival.exe installer and it worked just fine.

winetricks is pretty helpful too, it's basically a frontend for wine so not doing all by cmd line

This link will take you to basically what you need for just about anything you run
askubuntu.com/questions/316025/how-to-install-and-configure-wine

You are going to scroll to where it says
"Install all that I have marked (and any additional you need). This covers many apps:"

That's what winetricks looks like under ubuntu but all the same stuff is there.
Aside from a few extras I needed everything under that section that's marked, got spearhead to work just fine.
clicking to install one thing may install others so watch.

If you decide to try out Antergos with the KDE desktop, there is a system program installer to search for the programs you need for the version of linux you have.
It will not update the OS unless you tell it to, but then again, unless there is a new features under linux update, then no reason to update.

But if you need to reinstall, basically just back up your main folders like Home and any other stuff you downloaded and reinstall.

asamof, I'd reinstall it a few times to to get the feel of setting up the drive partition but it will auto do it too.
Install takes about 20 minutes fully updated.

[Death's Shadow]

Linux is a great program if you have the know how to run it, and get the programs that are non Linux to run on it. I ran Linux back in the day of Win Vista/ME... I returned to windows because jumping through extra hoops to run windows programs was a waste of time for me.

I am on a new pc that I put together back in October. I bought and installed windows 10 pro 64bit onto a M.2 internal SSD I have an 8 core amd cpu running at 4.0 Ghz, with 32 gig of memory and, Radeon R7 graphics.

Windows fully boots up in about 30 seconds and we are off to the races. I noticed a massive performance upgrade from my old pc when playing MOH, I can actually hit the people in game that I aim at now.. LOL

Anyway if Linux is your thing, gratz man. I will say it is cheaper than windows, and if you like to tinker with coding and programing it is much more in depth. Good luck to you and happy computing.

[Major_A]

True in the more tinkering dept. DS, it is satisfying that way especially that the devices mikrosoft stopped supporting work when you plug them into a linux box.
maybe I'll get to that usb camera telescope and microscope mod I've been wanting to do with these old usb cams that don't work in windows anymore.


One thing I have noticed is I could REALLY use a third monitor with this as even with 2 21" displays I seem to run out of room for everything I'm doing.
idk, probly just my crappy eyesight anymore lol

[RedRock]

A colleague of mine uses Linux for a lot of the reasons you mention above, including more control and privacy. I don't understand any of that and want no part of it. I use a Mac, and have been since 1983 (back when it was MSDOS people had to use for most things), so that I won't have to do stuff myself. Macs come with the hardware I need already pre-chosen and optimized and working, and when it's time to get more memory or faster cpu's for newer apps or newer OS's, it's usually time just get a new Mac. I have been running Windows on my Mac because 1) until recently, the dictation software I use (Dragon) worked much better on Win7 than Mac OS, but the latest Dragon for Mac seems to have erased that advantage; and 2), COD:UO can't run on latest Mac OS's, and until last year, it was COD:UO I mostly played, and COD4 on Mac runs but is inconsistent on joining servers that run PB (some work, some don't; my Laptop has no problem joining, my desktop won't; maybe I'll reinstall and try again). So I went to Win7Pro for those two reasons, Dragon and COD UO and 4 gaming. I'm playing very little UO and mostly 4, and now COD:WW2 is about to come out, so my 4 might decrease a lot (depending on the WW2 platforms), and I won't have to depend on Win7 for Dragon, so I don't know if I'll continue with Win7. If it becomes unstable and I still need it, I might just wipe my parition and start over with Win10 or 11 or whatever is out there, rather than try to learn Linux stuff. Still, I enjoy hearing you techies talk about it. Reminds me of the old joke, how many lesbians does it take to change a light bulb? Answer: One to do it, and 10 to sit around and talk about how much better it is than having a man do it.

[Major_A]

Don't sell yourself short Redrock, you may know more than you think you do with Mac being a branch/version of a linux type system.

Here is a shot of Forklift file manager in mac which I'm sure your familiar with.


here is a shot of Dolphin file manager for other linux



Also your root folders in Mac that are etc, bin, opt, sbin and the other standards are the same as well.


If you ever decide to tinker on an extra machine, you may find your way around easier than you think.

have fun if you do.

I was going to mention too, I've read wine can be installed on mac as well if you ever decide to play with it, or maybe you already have?

I've still got 2 windows machines atm myself, but all the rest are linux boxes.

[RedRock]

Thanks for the kind words. I don't know what wine is, never heard of it. I'll have to look it up. I have two different Mac emulators and went so far as to install one on my Mac, but I've never actually tried it (for direct running of Win games on the Mac desktop).
My fear is, given my tendency to OCD, if I try to build a machine for gaming and put Linux or Win10 on it myself, I'll never get the job done, or it won't run right, or I'll be continually chasing driver fixes and upgrades, and end up not being able to play, just spending all my time and effort on the machine.