Andy Young, an ex-Microsoft senior software engineer, posted a message on X/Twitter bemoaning that even with his $1,600 Core i9 CPU and 128 GB of RAM, Windows...
This is what I’ve been saying for years. Windows 11 is a big step backwards for performance.
I have a beefy laptop with W11 and a Ryzen 9 5900HX and 32GB RAM and a high end SSD, but the start menu takes up to a full second to open, the File manager takes 2-3 seconds to open and 1 second to “work on” the directory I entered, task manager takes like 5 seconds now, and sometimes my CPU randomly spikes to 80+ degrees C while the desktop is idle.
On Ubuntu (not known for being lightweight, quite the contrary in the Linux world), there is extremely minimal lag and basic system functions are near instant. I’d use it more if the WiFi was more reliable (my average packet loss is 39% in some frequently visited areas where Windows doesn’t struggle at all)
Also, for work I used a W10 desktop with a i7-8700K CPU and random SSD, and nothing in the OS lagged or was unresponsive. File manager was nearly instant, even when the system was hit with significant load elsewhere.
My mother in law’s laptop was getting slower and slower and finally went BSOD with a memory error. She was going to toss it but I suggested trying Ubuntu first because all she did was in a web browser anyway . Installed. Ran fine. For 6 more years.
At work I have your standard corporate Dell laptop running Microsoft 365. I run Linux in a VM to do my work and it’s pretty funny how responsive it is compared with the host OS running on the actual hardware. Funny in a sad way, really.
And this is still on windows 10, not even updated to 11 yet.
This is what I’ve been saying for years. Windows 11 is a big step backwards for performance.
I have a beefy laptop with W11 and a Ryzen 9 5900HX and 32GB RAM and a high end SSD, but the start menu takes up to a full second to open, the File manager takes 2-3 seconds to open and 1 second to “work on” the directory I entered, task manager takes like 5 seconds now, and sometimes my CPU randomly spikes to 80+ degrees C while the desktop is idle.
On Ubuntu (not known for being lightweight, quite the contrary in the Linux world), there is extremely minimal lag and basic system functions are near instant. I’d use it more if the WiFi was more reliable (my average packet loss is 39% in some frequently visited areas where Windows doesn’t struggle at all)
Also, for work I used a W10 desktop with a i7-8700K CPU and random SSD, and nothing in the OS lagged or was unresponsive. File manager was nearly instant, even when the system was hit with significant load elsewhere.
My mother in law’s laptop was getting slower and slower and finally went BSOD with a memory error. She was going to toss it but I suggested trying Ubuntu first because all she did was in a web browser anyway . Installed. Ran fine. For 6 more years.
At work I have your standard corporate Dell laptop running Microsoft 365. I run Linux in a VM to do my work and it’s pretty funny how responsive it is compared with the host OS running on the actual hardware. Funny in a sad way, really.
And this is still on windows 10, not even updated to 11 yet.
What are the lightweight Linux distributions?
There are multiple tiers of lightweight.
“Middleweight”: Something like Kubuntu, Xubuntu, or anything with KDE or XFCE, or MATE
More lightweight: Lubuntu, anything with LXQt
Super lightweight: AntiX, something with Trinity Desktop Environment or just a window manager instead of a full desktop environment
Most lightweight: Just a command line with no GUI (barebones Arch maybe?)