So I have a situation. I really want to switch to Linux as my main gaming/production OS but need the Adobe suite as I am a graphic designer. Adobe is the golden standard for this industry (and likely to always be) so while Gimp and Inkscape might work, they are not feasible for my career. I also know that there will be situations where games just don’t run well or at all on Linux.
Dualbooting works but is not really worth it for me as I would have to stop what I’m doing and restart my PC. I heard that you can set up a single GPU passthrough for games and software but it seems complicated. How difficult would that be to set up for a new user to Linux? I would consider myself a tech savvy person but I know very little about the ins and outs of Linux. I have a massive GPU (XFX RX 6900 XT) with a big support bracket that covers the second PCIE slot so buying another GPU isn’t really feasible either.
I do have an Unraid server with decent specs that I use for a hosting Minecraft servers and Jellyfin so setting up a VM on that might be a good option.
What would you guys recommend me to do?
Just stick with Windows, it works for you (as it is for me); as the saying goes, if it ain’t broke, why fix it?
But Windows is broke. I recommend using it only if you truly have to (e.g. software dependencies for your work). If you think or know you don’t need it, then don’t use it, don’t recommend it and also please don’t claim it’s not harmful or “just a tool like everything else”. Tools don’t spy on its users. The monopoly situation due to too many users still using is also in itself harmful for competition/alternatives, and on top of that its users suffer from massive amounts of privacy invasions.
If you don’t want to continue to use Windows (which is an important realization to make), but feel like you can’t use Linux yet for whatever reason, use OS X. It’s sort of middle of the road. Also not great for various reasons, and also not recommended, but it will at least ease your transition to Linux later on because OS X is also Unix-like, and it’s at least slightly less bad than Windows. Always re-evaluate from time to time, whether you still need Windows or OS X, and if not, switch to Linux.
Windows isn’t broken for me, and given their market share, many others. What’s an issue for you isn’t necessarily so for others.
The issue is that most users aside from nerds, programmers and other professionally very tech involved people don’t care about their operating system, or how much it spies on them. They want it to work without much thought, everything else is a secondary concern.
And this crowd is tough to capture for Linux, because if there is one thing that defines Linux it is the fact that you have to put in some effort to make everything work, especially with not supported applications like most games.
Not even developers. I know plenty of developers that use M1 MacBooks as a comfortable middle ground between Windows and Linux with excellent battery life, software compatibility cough Adobe, and an aight Unix environment. Many also prefer MacBooks cause they don’t want to deal with Windows problems and hacking Linux, since they already troubleshoot technical problems for a living.
I’m actually almost the only one in my dev social circle that uses Linux and dual boots Windows for compatibility reasons, everyone else sticks to Apple.