Five reasons I'd rather run Windows 8 than Linux

Many of us use Linux every day. Thankfully, most of the people using Linux don't know they're using Linux.

My octogenarian parents, for example, have been using their TiVo DVRs for years, but have no idea that there's a variant of Linux running deep inside. The guy who installed my kitchen cabinets, who loves his Android phone but insists Facebook is hard to use has no idea he's using a variant of Linux....


Reason #1: As soon as you mention one distro, all the fanboys go insane claiming you've made the wrong choice.
You did it, didn't you? Just as soon as I mentioned Mint, a whole bunch of you started to foam at the mouth. Mint's not the distro-du-jour anymore. There's Bodhi. There's Xubuntu. There's the truly unfortunately named DouDou.

Read more at: Five reasons I'd rather run Windows 8 than Linux | ZDNet

 

[lehnerus2000]

There must be something horribly wrong with your computer.

And vm's are too slow - ...

My Windows 7 VMs report a higher WEI than my Windows Host system.
The W7 VMs take much longer to start (VM 1.5 min to 2 min vs Host 30s to 50s) but they seem to run the same once they have started.

Interestingly, my XP VMS only take ~10s longer to start than my XP install (~1 min).

My Linux VMs boot almost as fast as my Linux Mint install (i.e. ~20s).

You definitely need lots of RAM (I've got 8 GB) for VMs.
When my PC had 4 GB, I could only run one VM at a time.

Also, unless you have an SSD, don't run your VMs on the same drive as your Host OS.

And some can take about half an hour to just load (linux live)

Live CDs/DVDs/USBs can take 5 to 10 minutes to load.

 

[whs]

Live CDs/DVDs/USBs can take 5 to 10 minutes to load

CDs yes, they are slow. But I run Mint from USB sticks in USB2 and USB3 (practically no performance difference). Those load very fast. But you have to have the right sticks. Mine have 0.3ms and 0.7ms access time and a data transfer rate of 168MB/sec. Example:

 

[pparks1]

Wow, that's a fast USB stick. I've never had a stick anywhere near THAT fast.

 

[lehnerus2000]

Jeez, Red Hat systems aren't that bad O. I use CentOS, which is a clone of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, for our work servers.

CentOS is nice.
If I wasn't running Linux Mint, I'd probably run CentOS as my Linux install.

Live CDs/DVDs/USBs can take 5 to 10 minutes to load

CDs yes, they are slow. But I run Mint from USB sticks in USB2 and USB3 (practically no performance difference). Those load very fast. But you have to have the right sticks. Mine have 0.3ms and 0.7ms access time and a data transfer rate of 168MB/sec. Example:

Last time I tried that it was a disaster.
My USB stick performance was worse than the Live CD.

 

[pparks1]

I just tested out my current SanDisk Ultra USB 3.0 32GB card and it came in around 55MB/sec on read.



On a more positive note, I just benchmarked my SSD in my MacBook Pro. That's a bit better.

 

[whs]

I just tested out my current SanDisk Ultra USB 3.0 32GB card and it came in around 55MB/sec on read.

That is not too bad. The access time is healthy and the data rate does not have such a big impact on the OS performance.

 

[nonono]

Well, speed is a thing that is different for everyone, so its almost imposible to compare, one mans trash can be gold for another man.
And another thing is, there is no such os as linux, there is linux distributions, so depending on distribution, live version can take 1-30 minutes to boot.

 

[CountMike]

Well, speed is a thing that is different for everyone, so its almost imposible to compare, one mans trash can be gold for another man.
And another thing is, there is no such os as linux, there is linux distributions, so depending on distribution, live version can take 1-30 minutes to boot.

It's even more complex than that, there are different kernels, distros, packs etc. but it's "Live" system being developed by many people all the time. Ad to that largely unknown iterations for specific jobs, like variations for mobile thingies, machines, robots, cars and a lot more.
Windows is more centralized OS and Apple even more so, they can rely on their large base of applications that can run on most computers and it's continuity is what attracts SW developers that can actually make big money. Some games have larger budgets and profits than most Hollywood Movies. Large number of freeware programers hope that their free applications will atract attention of commercial SW developers and will one day get at least a job with them and get a large paycheck.
Than, there's advertising, virtually unknown thing for Linux but Windows is always in the press and being talked about everywhere, Linux just in enthusiast's and highly specialized circles.

 

[Superfly]

live version can take 1-30 minutes to boot.

Not sure where you get those figures from... Here is an example of boot times - oldish article but still relevant.

 

[jimbo45]

Hi there

actually even an SSD on a USB2 slot makes a good place for VM's -- I've a couple of older 128 GB SAMSUNG 830 ssd's which I attach via a SATA==>USB2 cable to the USB slot.

I take the SSD as it's thin and easily portable -- IMO better than even a USB3 stick.

On it I have a bootable Host Linux opensuse system with VMware running a W7, a W8.1 VM and a second bootable Linux rescue system. I use this as "My Windows to Go" type of device and performance is better actually than NATIVE windows running from a laptop's internal standard HDD (spinner). Wit a direct SATA pr SATA==>USB3 connection I'm sure would be even better but probably wouldn't make a huge amount of user difference when actually USING the system.

I use the W7 system for connection to corporate VPN's, SAP systems etc where I can also have multi language office 2010 etc.and the W8.1 system for general Windows testing etc, the Linux rescue system for obvious reasons if something breaks on my laptop and still have around 20 GB over.

If you are replacing smaller capacity SSD's with bigger one's get the USB2==>SATA adapter -- then the older SSD's make excellent external devices (and very fast too).

I haven't had ANY problems with SSD failures. reliability problems etc.

IMO as SSD's become cheaper -- (I can almost afford one of these new 1TB SSD's !!!) USB sticks will be on the way out -- in any case they are very easy to lose -- a 2.5 inch ultra thin SSD fits snugly into a pocket and isn't so easy to lose. -- and you can keep a lot more data on it. !!

Try this for portable systems too.

http://www.eightforums.com/installa...make-portable-windows-system-any-version.html

Cheers
jimbo

 

[CountMike]

Most of computers, desktop and laptop, made last few years have eSATA too and that can make them even faster, just as fast as any internal drives.

 

[whs]

Here you can comparfe boot times. It's in virtual (for recording purposes) but it is an apples to apples comparison. The boot starts when the OS logo appears. The rest is VMNware setup time.

[video=youtube;103mlrKLTAk]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=103mlrKLTAk[/video]

 

[Cr00zng]

Here's my Windows 8.1.1 in VMware Player:

[video=vimeo;93380261]http://vimeo.com/93380261[/video]

The actual boot time to desktop of 20 seconds for W8 is not too bad. The login requirement also adds about five seconds to the boot time...

 

[CountMike]

Just wandering, did somebody try running some performance test like Cinebench on a computer running W8 or 8.1 from a VM on Linux and on native 8.1. ? With the same amount of memory of course.

 

[Cr00zng]

In general, video tests don't run in VMware hosts; the benchmarks require direct access to the video card.

I did run the AS SSD benchmark in VMware on Windows 8.1:



The system runs on an older OCZ SATA 3 SSD drive using the StarTech removable HD enclosure; the enclosure has a USB 3.0 port for portability:

Newegg.com - StarTech.com Removable 2.5" SATA Hard Drive Enclosure and Backup System for 3.5/5.25" Bay

 

[CountMike]

That's really good result, about same as my Kingston V300 connected directly to SATA3. So it looks like file transfer and disk speed do not suffer at all running from VM.

 

[whs]

Just wandering, did somebody try running some performance test like Cinebench on a computer running W8 or 8.1 from a VM on Linux and on native 8.1. ? With the same amount of memory of course.

Well, the easiest numbers to compare are the events 100 and 200. Those are right there in event viewer. No need for an extra tool.

I run all my virtual VMware systems from an external disk. So there is an extra challenge.

 

[Cr00zng]

That's really good result, about same as my Kingston V300 connected directly to SATA3. So it looks like file transfer and disk speed do not suffer at all running from VM.

I wouldn't say that....

There's about 20% performance drop with VMware when compared to the native SSD benchmark, under Windows 7:



And it gets worse, when the portable drive is connected to USB 3.0 interface for a Windows box:



It's still pretty good speed for a portable drive, but note the access time increase.

Connect the same portable drive to a USB 3.0 port on a Mac Book Pro (MBP), and the transfer rates are closer to the rates of the VMware benchmarks. Since MBP components are Intel hardware, I am wondering what MS is doing with the drivers?

 

[jimbo45]

Hi there

all good but in the real world if your VM's are on an SSD a typical user wouldn't actually notice much difference - if any -- so long as your VM had proper hardware graphic acceleration enabled and working and 3-D graphic set enabled. - Jittery mouse actions, video "shadow trails" and any lag on keyboard input are what bothers users FAR MORE than how quick the system boots -- some of our work network systems take AGES to get logged on to -- I go and grab a coffee -- but once it's up and running performance is usually acceptable for normal type tasks.

Just try for example on W7 VM playing Spider Solitaire on a VM when the 3-D and graphic hardware acceleration is NOT enabled or doesn't work properly -- even if your VM is on a fast machine and resides on an SSD. The sheer bad performance of the game will show you there's a lot more to getting VM's to perform correctly than a base I/O measurement of an SSD.

Try these on W8.1 VM as well -- I can give you a private dropbox link to get these old games working on W8.1 -- they are EXCELLENT for this type of testing BTW !!!! --. Due to Forum rules I can't publish a direct open public link.

Cheers
jimbo

 

[whs]

These are the boot times of 8.1 from an external SSD on eSata. All numbers in Milliseconds as shown in Event Viewer - Event 100. Overall time is 32 seconds and then the breakdown.

BootTime 32188
MainPathBootTime 11288
BootKernelInitTime 16
BootDriverInitTime 265
BootDevicesInitTime 3956
BootSmssInitTime 1755
BootCriticalServicesInitTime 562
BootUserProfileProcessingTime 623
BootMachineProfileProcessingTime 219
BootExplorerInitTime 1482
BootNumStartupApps 2
BootPostBootTime 20900
OSLoaderDuration 772
BootPNPInitStartTimeMS 16
BootPNPInitDuration 4210
OtherKernelInitDuration 200
SystemPNPInitStartTimeMS 4397
SystemPNPInitDuration 199
SessionInitStartTimeMS 4610
Session0InitDuration 444
Session1InitDuration 72
SessionInitOtherDuration 1238
WinLogonStartTimeMS 6365
OtherLogonInitActivityDuration 2597
UserLogonWaitDuration 302