I would very much like to switch (back) to Linux. I used it (and FreeBSD!) 20+ years ago as my daily driver.
Unfortunately, there are a few things that keep me stuck in windows…
-Music production. I know Reaper exists (I use it and script for it daily), but my Maschine hardware that I paid good money for won’t run with Linux. And beyond that there’s still a subset of plugins (again, that I’ve paid for) that I’m just not likely to be able to use, and most of that which I can use will be unsupported.
-Adobe. Lightroom in particular. Eventually I will wean off this, but as of now, it’s simply the best tool I have to unify all my photography (old and new) across all devices with very, very little friction.
I can find a suitable counterpart for just about everything else I use.
Also, FWIW - I recently revitalized an old laptop with Ubuntu and that’s become a springboard for seeing if I can map out a path to Linux for my other needs.
(Apologies for rant - it’s front of mind for me lately!)
I’ve never had a VST not work on Linux through WINE and a bridge. Native Instruments plugins are a bit of a pain due to Native Access, but it’s still possible to get running. Serum works, but requires a DLL bypass. Most Windows-only DAWs also work via WINE, but I’d recommend checking out Bitwig.
Also check out darktable instead of Lightroom. I haven’t used either, but I hear darktable is a good replacement.
Not sure about Maschine hardware since I don’t own any.
Similar issue, I’m bound by programs that only seem to work on Windows.
For me, it’s heavily modded Skyrim and Fallout 4. Something about linux seems to break skse/enb and after a few hours trying to debug it, I got nowhere.
Steam in-home streaming might help you out for the odd game that is only works in Windows for you. You have a Windows machine with the game installed/setup, and that gets streamed to the computer of your choice over your LAN. A few of my buddies use it to play computer games on their TVs when they don’t feel like sitting at their desk.
Plugins should be easy to use and pretty painless thanks to yabridge. Also just running reaper fully on wine is fine option with a ñn asio bridge to JACK. I tried it once just to play around and was impressed at how easy and performant was.
Shame in the maschine hardware, this is the only thing I could find about that https://github.com/wrl/maschine.rs
I also got triggered by win11 to switch to Linux half a year ago and couldn’t be happier on endeavour os, no problems so far on the music production side,even with heavy drm’d plug ins. Work flow s also much better, as I can run higher sample count with lower latency than windows thanks to pipewire.
That maschine.rs tool looks intriguing, though limited to mk2 (I have mkiii). It keep seems to connect it as a midi device, for use in midi mode, which is not my main use case. I may try though. If I just want a midi pad controller there are plenty of choices beyond maschine, whose actually killer feature is full edit workflow through its own interface (connected to PC, yes, but you can avoid using the computer for the most part).
Someone mentioned darktable. I am familiar with it - it’s a perfectly serviceable interface/non-destructive editor, but it’s the interoperability/workflow that lightroom provides that is the secret sauce (ie - all devices, edit anywhere, sync to desktop (where I keep originals and do heavier edits) and back). I’ll look at darktable again now that I have an install.
At some point (with some use cases) the Linux desktop switch becomes an exercise of putting a square peg in a round hole - an uphill battle of shoehorning in workarounds. I’m game to try - pls don’t read this as being dismissive - but I’ve gone down this path many, many, many times.
The real answer (pie in the sky) is to get commercial product manufacturers to actually support Linux. Snaps exist (software can be done even if inefficiently), but HW requires commitment from the builders.
I would very much like to switch (back) to Linux. I used it (and FreeBSD!) 20+ years ago as my daily driver.
Unfortunately, there are a few things that keep me stuck in windows… -Music production. I know Reaper exists (I use it and script for it daily), but my Maschine hardware that I paid good money for won’t run with Linux. And beyond that there’s still a subset of plugins (again, that I’ve paid for) that I’m just not likely to be able to use, and most of that which I can use will be unsupported. -Adobe. Lightroom in particular. Eventually I will wean off this, but as of now, it’s simply the best tool I have to unify all my photography (old and new) across all devices with very, very little friction.
I can find a suitable counterpart for just about everything else I use.
Also, FWIW - I recently revitalized an old laptop with Ubuntu and that’s become a springboard for seeing if I can map out a path to Linux for my other needs.
(Apologies for rant - it’s front of mind for me lately!)
I’ve never had a VST not work on Linux through WINE and a bridge. Native Instruments plugins are a bit of a pain due to Native Access, but it’s still possible to get running. Serum works, but requires a DLL bypass. Most Windows-only DAWs also work via WINE, but I’d recommend checking out Bitwig.
Also check out darktable instead of Lightroom. I haven’t used either, but I hear darktable is a good replacement.
Not sure about Maschine hardware since I don’t own any.
Similar issue, I’m bound by programs that only seem to work on Windows.
For me, it’s heavily modded Skyrim and Fallout 4. Something about linux seems to break skse/enb and after a few hours trying to debug it, I got nowhere.
Steam in-home streaming might help you out for the odd game that is only works in Windows for you. You have a Windows machine with the game installed/setup, and that gets streamed to the computer of your choice over your LAN. A few of my buddies use it to play computer games on their TVs when they don’t feel like sitting at their desk.
Plugins should be easy to use and pretty painless thanks to yabridge. Also just running reaper fully on wine is fine option with a ñn asio bridge to JACK. I tried it once just to play around and was impressed at how easy and performant was. Shame in the maschine hardware, this is the only thing I could find about that https://github.com/wrl/maschine.rs I also got triggered by win11 to switch to Linux half a year ago and couldn’t be happier on endeavour os, no problems so far on the music production side,even with heavy drm’d plug ins. Work flow s also much better, as I can run higher sample count with lower latency than windows thanks to pipewire.
That maschine.rs tool looks intriguing, though limited to mk2 (I have mkiii). It keep seems to connect it as a midi device, for use in midi mode, which is not my main use case. I may try though. If I just want a midi pad controller there are plenty of choices beyond maschine, whose actually killer feature is full edit workflow through its own interface (connected to PC, yes, but you can avoid using the computer for the most part).
Someone mentioned darktable. I am familiar with it - it’s a perfectly serviceable interface/non-destructive editor, but it’s the interoperability/workflow that lightroom provides that is the secret sauce (ie - all devices, edit anywhere, sync to desktop (where I keep originals and do heavier edits) and back). I’ll look at darktable again now that I have an install.
At some point (with some use cases) the Linux desktop switch becomes an exercise of putting a square peg in a round hole - an uphill battle of shoehorning in workarounds. I’m game to try - pls don’t read this as being dismissive - but I’ve gone down this path many, many, many times.
The real answer (pie in the sky) is to get commercial product manufacturers to actually support Linux. Snaps exist (software can be done even if inefficiently), but HW requires commitment from the builders.