No more forced junk and changes I have to undo? My computer can stay the exact way I like it for a long period of time without Microsoft fucking it up? Sounds like a dream.
This is a meme about enterprise equipment lifecycles.
Huge corporate entities with machine inventory counts in the hundreds of thousands aren’t going to give a shit about trying to upcycle old hardware - they just want it to not be their problem anymore.
I predict there will be a few companies that pop up to refurbish the hardware and sell it as a thin client solution. Places like call centers live on refurb equipment and are moving to a vdi infrastructure.
generally computers won't stop doing things they were already capable of doing. tons of machines and businesses may rely on older hardware and software to complete specific tasks.
but yeah, a 486 is pretty past its prime, and the task could have been accomplished on something far more modern.
But those aren't affected usually. For them it's about stability because their certification processes are a lot of work and they won't risk any interruptions unless absolutely necessary. So they actually pay a lot of money for support beyond the normal EOL.
I'm sure some releases have become unsupported. The nature of Linux distros makes it a bit harder to define exactly which ones, even harder is you consider flatpak and snaps.
I would be surprised if any of the big ones released at the time Windows 7 was released is not supported. If course there's no gatekeeping on the upgrades that I'm aware of (in general at least)
They'll definitely know. Microsoft's last update for Windows 10 will make sure to add as many notices, popups and scary alerts as possible.
And as a result plenty will care, particularly those who aren't tech savvy. If you've got relatives for whom you are their go-to IT person, be prepared.
Now imagine if PC was invented after "post-PC"/iPhone era and you will need a different OS build for every model and there were "promises" of Windows updates for each machine after which it cannot be longer updated. Also basically computers would have locked bootloaders or void warianty when a system is touched.
I wonder how many phones could be saved from the landfill for the last 10 years if there were supported by Linux.
Just running Linux is one thing, but making it working with anything outside the CPU like the motherboard onboard chips and other components is a different task.
When I was a residential garbage collector, I saved close to a dozen computers from the landfill that just needed a quick cleaning. A lot of people will get rid of their year old Alienware once it fills with cat hair.
Doesn't mean it won't either - most people won't realise the computer is still usable, either by workarounds or installing a different OS - they'll either trash the PC, recycle or sell it. Or keep using it not caring that its complaining constantly that it's out of support. (And when they do, it's "how can I get rid of this annoying error" not "how can I update this?" - they probably didn't even read the error - and god forbid you manage to do the update, they won't like it if you do)
Hell most people don't even know Linux even exists, and a lot of them couldn't even tell me what their operating system name is.
I've had relatives that try to ask what's going on and say "I have 11" without elaborating that it's windows 11. I remember years ago my aunt said I have version 97. Referring to, at the time the totally unrelated fact that she had Office 97 installed on her winXP machine. Took me ages to work out what she actually meant.
Exactly. Just bought a Dell with an i5 9500 for €200. That'll be my new home server. I just hope more people get wise to how cheaply you can run a setup with a little bit of getting informed.
Windows 11 doing this is more ewaste not less. It's more ewaste even if 100% of the existing stock gets reused because some (many?) of those computers will get replaced with new ones.
When/if this happens, if I got the money, I hope I find someone selling their old desktop to upgrade to 11 so I can get a cheap computer to use as a personal testing grounds server that I don't mind nuking if I accidentally mess up something.
At least in the enterprise sector, you’re absolutely right. My company’s already got a massive list of all of the PCs that need to be discarded due to Win10 EOL. It freakin sucks because they’re very powerful PCs, but the damn lack of a TPM2.0 chip means they are basically garbage for our uses. And they don’t let employees take anything home :/ what a waste of
You should ask them again. Most companies just fear the ways the storage drive could be restored. Maybe they gave them away without the storage.
A couple of years ago we gave old core2duo out for free. I prepared them with dd'ing only /dev/zero over the storage. Should be enough, but replacing would be better.
lol, I wish. Luckily I have plenty of computing power at home already! But unfortunately we’re definitely not allowed to take anything - have asked a number of times :/ has nothing to do with storage and everything to do with capital BS
Do you have access to businesses upgrading computers or shutting down that division? They tend to have some interesting stuff for playing with on Linux.
All I see is more Linux Servers and PCs to try Arch and Gentoo on over my Fedora desktop that I use because I need a good balance of stability and up to date software