> I'd probably agree too in the case where the user doesn't want to > install any new hardware or software. I think in most cases it is much, > much easier to install new stuff in Windows than in Linux. Most > hardware can just be plugged in and Windows already has the drivers. In > some cases you have to slap the driver CD in the drive. It just works. Hold on there, tiger. Are we talking about the same operating system? I have had NO END to trouble getting hardware to work properly and sometimes even at all in Windows. Starting way back with Windows 3.1 and all the way up to w2k. I could give more counter examples than I can possibly remember at the moment, but I'll only give two.
I recently did a hardware upgrade. A new mobo and CPU. Nothing odd, just a Shuttle mobo with a VIA chipset. Windows 2000 won't even boot - I think it has trouble talking to the hard disks or something. No love lost. Maybe someday I'll try reinstalling and see if the installation CD will recognize it. Linux didn't miss a heartbeat. In the meantime I made a DOS 6.22 disk for playing Liero which is the only real reason we have to boot into Windows these days. (of course DOS doesn't recognize the HDD either, but it does see the floppy and CDROM...) I recently helped my grandparents and aunts set up DSL at my grandparent's home. The installation CDs were fairly well thought-out and the documentation was good, but boy did I have to wrestle Windows to get it to work. My skepticism that 'normal' people are able to use Windows for more than a few months without serious in-person technical help or taking things back to the shop increases exponentially every time I make a house call. OTOH, I get more application-related 'support requests' with linux since people are used to their windows apps. If I want low-maintenance I let them keep windows - at least I feel more useful fixing a windows driver issue than explaining how to do X in OpenOffice like in Excel. (don't get me wrong - I take as many under my wing as I can, but I only have so much time) Most of these 'normal' people nowdays are willing to live with a surprisingly crippled system and I only have to come around when things really break. If _I_ were running windows, I'd spend all my time fixing stupid things that broke (instead of spending it all configuring cool things with gazillions of options in linux. ;-) -- Hans Fugal | De gustibus non disputandum est. http://hans.fugal.net/ | Debian, vim, mutt, ruby, text, gpg http://gdmxml.fugal.net/ | WindowMaker, gaim, UTF-8, RISC, JS Bach --------------------------------------------------------------------- GnuPG Fingerprint: 6940 87C5 6610 567F 1E95 CB5E FC98 E8CD E0AA D460
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