Windows 10 support ends - Are you interested in Linux support by FAS?

[rossipedia]

For me the takeaway from this discussion is that I don't want to have this discussion, I want to be productive.

I don't want to be an IT guy, I want to make music. I've spent more time reading this thread than managing computer problems in my studio.

The only time I have had to think about my computers in a long time was the recent release of Sequoia and compatibility with my apps and plugins. I solved it in 2 seconds by waiting to upgrade, although I loaded it on an M1 Macbook Pro and it rocks.

Been happily on Mac for audio production since the mid 2000s. My DAW computers are appliances. They serve one primary purpose: to make music. I don't need fancy themes, or tweaks, or an App Store, or whatever. They're not general productivity machines (aside from Music). I just need them to work with minimal headache, and Macs fit the bill. I've tried every other OS and platform available and Macs by far are the least problematic and let me get on with making music instead of wasting half a week trying to get things just right to make the OS happy. And I've been a computer guy / software engineer since the 90s, I know my way around these things. I can get any of the OSes to work, and have. I still choose to use Mac, because



As far as company ethics goes, you wanna have that fight, more power to you. I got shit to do. Apple / Microsoft / Ubuntu / etc, these are businesses. They don't give a shit about you or your principles. Their priority is making money, and that's what they're going to do.

So go ahead and be mad about it if you want, that's your right. Me?

I can't afford to hate. I don't have that kind of time
- Bob Ross

 

[rossipedia]

I may regret saying this, but I'd appreciate it if some of you "Apple is evil" folks could pm me your reasoning.

I've had that same feeling for years, plus they've been outrageously expensive. However, the cost/performance ratio seems to have changed some recently, so I'm reevaluating, and i want to solidify my sense of how and why they're so evil. It's not like Microsoft is choirboy central either.

Thanks.

Out of all the big computer companies, Apple is the least evil IMO. They're still profit-driven, and will make decisions based on that, for sure.

But their product isn't people. They make their money selling hardware. And that at least lines up some of their incentives with my own. They have a vested interest in keeping their users' devices secure, and have the best track record when it comes to privacy of all the big hardware manufacturers. Apple Music also is one of the highest payout streaming platforms for artists, which is a green flag in my book.

They're not the best, and they do tend to push people to upgrade to the latest and greatest more often than is necessary, but for me, I choose the lesser evil.

 

[sprint]

Yeah, I mean it’s a publicly traded company with responsibility to their shareholders, just like everyone else. Except that after supporting thousands of machines, they’ve provided the most reliability and support.
Microsoft lets you spend hundreds of thousands, and still tell you to get bent if you have issues.

I often think back to my early days as a newb mainframe programmer (84) fascinated with, what at that time, was the niche nerdy hobby of personal computing, just on the verge of exploding into the mainstream. Paid the following to have a "PC"! in my apartment (ooooh, computer at home was a rarity back then, but took precedence over a car purchase for me).

• Main Unit + kb (MS DOS, 80286 processor running @ 4Mhz w 256k ram, 2x 5+1/4" floppies (320kb ea)) > $2000cdn.
• CGA color monitor > $1000Cdn
• Mouse > $250Cdn

In today's $ > about $6k US. It was an awesome beast at the time lol!, tho quality was not great. And it stayed relevant / properly supported for about 1y (lol I have a 10yo Mac here still viable + supported). We've come a loooong way but younguns won't necessarily see it - "planned?" obsolescence?, not really imo, more like continuing to push the evolutions as hard as possible, as its been since the beginnings, with the least amount of legacy drag, yes, to max profits + also, to extend tech leads on competitors, + also ... cuz

 

[IAmThePepperoniKing]

I often think back to my early days as a newb mainframe programmer (84) fascinated with, what at that time, was the niche nerdy hobby of personal computing, just on the verge of exploding into the mainstream. Paid the following to have a "PC"! in my apartment (ooooh, computer at home was a rarity back then, but took precedence over a car purchase for me).

• Main Unit + kb (MS DOS, 80286 processor running @ 4Mhz w 256k ram, 2x 5+1/4" floppies (320kb ea)) > $2000cdn.
• CGA color monitor > $1000Cdn
• Mouse > $250Cdn

In today's $ > about $6k US. It was an awesome beast at the time lol!, tho quality was not great. And it stayed relevant / properly supported for about 1y (lol I have a 10yo Mac here still viable + supported). We've come a loooong way but younguns won't necessarily see it - "planned?" obsolescence?, not really imo, more like continuing to push the evolutions as hard as possible, as its been since the beginnings, with the least amount of legacy drag, yes, to max profits + also, to extend tech leads on competitors, + also ... cuz

Yeah. I hear the “planned obsolescence” thing. Sure, I guess. That being said, my son just recorded a crapload of tracks with VSTi’s on his 2014 Mini last night with his band. Works great.

 

[unix-guy]

As far as company ethics goes, you wanna have that fight, more power to you. I got shit to do. Apple / Microsoft / Ubuntu / etc, these are businesses.

Ubuntu is a Linux distribution... It's open source.

Any income the parent company (Canonical) make is derived from offering paid support and consulting to businesses that want to pay for it.

 

[TheRedDevil]

Oh, ok. The CachyOS (Arch) distro has a repo install for it. The one other thing I could suggest is that you try different runners for it. Try using Cafe, Wine-sys, or Proton instead of Soda. One of them might be more compatible with the Axe software and your video.

Soda and Wine-Sys made no difference. The rest is not available. Well, I just can hope that FAS is motivated to support Linux.

 

[rossipedia]

Ubuntu is a Linux distribution... It's open source.

Any income the parent company (Canonical) make is derived from offering paid support and consulting to businesses that want to pay for it.

You're right, I completely forgot about the Canonical/Ubuntu distinction. My bad But still, IIRC Canonical has made some a few moves over the years that are a bit... suspect.

(It's still my preferred *nix distro though, primarily because I don't really need to spend the time f--king with my distro. I just want shit to work.)

 

[oacikgoz]

I'd just get an M4 Mac Mini. $600, tiny footprint, beast of a machine for the price, less headache/hassle than either Linux or PC (been using all three OSes for damn near 30 years now).

I second that

 

[oacikgoz]

I don’t think Linux support will bring substantial benefit as others quoted. On the other hand, I would be very surprised if you couldn’t run your favorite windows apps on linux nowadays with all wine-based tools out there. Might need some tweaking though.

 

[frankencat]

You guys got me thinking and now I am installing Mint.

 

[DLM]

Soda and Wine-Sys made no difference. The rest is not available. Well, I just can hope that FAS is motivated to support Linux.

You can add other runners if you click the options menu on the main bottles screen and then click preferences. On the general tab, in the general and integration sections, turn on everything but close bottles after starting a program. On the runners tab, drop each one down and click the disk icon on the latest one to install it. When one's installed already, there's a folder icon on it instead. Install the latest version in each one, and then on the DLL tab, install the latest DXVK if it's not already. When you've done all that, close the settings and then go into your bottle where you have the Fractal stuff installed. Click settings, and in the top sections select the latest of each one. The other runners should be selectable now. Now go down to Advanced Display settings. It should be set to GL by default. Try changing it to GDI and run the program to see if it works. If not, change it to Vulkan and run it again.

By the way, what window manager are you using? That could be the problem in and of itself. I'm using KDE Plasma Wayland.

 

[Keybi]

Not at all.

 

[Androo]

I would. Was trying to make time to test my FAS software & plugins today in my Mint partition. I had a presonus soundcard that prevented my success before so I got a Focusrite because they work natively on Linux. I have a dual-boot configured. My alternative to Win11 is to just use my Win10 for audio, off the net by default, and use Mint for my email, surfing, and most other daily stuff.

 

[Moondog Wily]

I hate both Apple and MS and I have been a programmer professionally for 30 years (wrote my first code 40 years ago on some Apple product). I use Windows because I have for decades despised many of Apples "my way or the highway" edicts, and their continued attitudes and business practices will continue to prevent me from purchasing their products. When I need to use them for work purposes, I do, and they have very solid products, but I will not give them any of my money. Here is the most recent known example of their evil that is being swept under the rug by paying out $95 mil but not admitting any guilt (wouldn't it be great if a criminal could do that "Yeah, I robbed the bank, but I gave the money back so no harm done, right"):

https://www.reuters.com/legal/apple-pay-95-million-settle-siri-privacy-lawsuit-2025-01-02/

One of reasons they are paying this out is it was estimated by many scholars that this lawsuit could cost them upwards of a billion dollars if they did not take this "out". What others do not say and will not say in public is, this case going to trial and the associated discovery process would likely have exposed some serious criminal behavior on their part in violating people's privacy rights.

I deleted my next two paragraphs because TL;DR would have been the general consensus, but suffice it to say, big bro is here and we are paying him to be in our lives every day! Apple may have been caught for this instance, but 9 hours profits (that is what this lawsuit will cost them based on 2023 net income) is a small price to pay for the profits they likely reaped from this operation while it was in place ;~)) It's just a cost of doing business to them ;~((

As for Linux support, IDGAF, what I have works and I concentrate on using it rather than trying to find other ways to do the same thing ;~)) I am not concerned about Windows 10 EOL nor having to eventually move to Windows 11 or 12 or whatever, I do what I can to protect myself while still taking advantage of the most recent technology advances as I desire.

 

[Dave Merrill]

I hate both Apple and MS and I have been a programmer professionally for 30 years (wrote my first code 40 years ago on some Apple product). I use Windows because I have for decades despised many of Apples "my way or the highway" edicts, and their continued attitudes and business practices will continue to prevent me from purchasing their products. When I need to use them for work purposes, I do, and they have very solid products, but I will not give them any of my money. Here is the most recent known example of their evil that is being swept under the rug by paying out $95 mil but not admitting any guilt (wouldn't it be great if a criminal could do that "Yeah, I robbed the bank, but I gave the money back so no harm done, right"):

https://www.reuters.com/legal/apple-pay-95-million-settle-siri-privacy-lawsuit-2025-01-02/

One of reasons they are paying this out is it was estimated by many scholars that this lawsuit could cost them upwards of a billion dollars if they did not take this "out". What others do not say and will not say in public is, this case going to trial and the associated discovery process would likely have exposed some serious criminal behavior on their part in violating people's privacy rights.

I deleted my next two paragraphs because TL;DR would have been the general consensus, but suffice it to say, big bro is here and we are paying him to be in our lives every day! Apple may have been caught for this instance, but 9 hours profits (that is what this lawsuit will cost them based on 2023 net income) is a small price to pay for the profits they likely reaped from this operation while it was in place ;~)) It's just a cost of doing business to them ;~((

As for Linux support, IDGAF, what I have works and I concentrate on using it rather than trying to find other ways to do the same thing ;~)) I am not concerned about Windows 10 EOL nor having to eventually move to Windows 11 or 12 or whatever, I do what I can to protect myself while still taking advantage of the most recent technology advances as I desire.

It's pretty much a certainty that both Microsoft and Apple are pirates, and given that, it makes sense to choose what makes economic and usability sense for me personally. Apple used to clearly be off the table on that basis, but that doesn't appear to be true any more.

It's also been my impression for years that Apple makes design decisions that are significantly hostile to users, but I'm trying to figure out how true that actually is. I'd love to hear examples of you've got them. (Not just you, everyone.)

 

[Andrew Male]

It's also been my impression for years that Apple makes design decisions that are significantly hostile to users, but I'm trying to figure out how true that actually is. I'd love to hear examples of you've got them. (Not just you, everyone.)

Well there's a few recent examples, Apple not allowing 3rd party app stores on ios devices thus using their monopoly power to take massive chunks of revenue from developers. The EU has ordered them to allow that though.

https://techcrunch.com/2024/08/20/move-over-apple-meet-the-alternative-app-stores-coming-to-the-eu/

Also the EU forcing them to use USB-C instead of annoying proprietary lightning connectors.

None of this makes macOS a bad operating system though, it's very good.

 

[WhiteRoom]

Lots of sensible discussion here, which is great to see

I've been a software developer for too long. I've worked with Windows since '98, and Macs since the early 2000s. I tried Linux briefly in the early 2010s.

This is my view: Windows can do anything you want it to almost as well as the things that the other main OS's aim to specialise in (MACs, design & audio, Linux, hacking ), and it has the broadest range of mature software of the 3. MS rarely completely deprecate support for older software, and even when they do, it's usually only a matter of months before someone somewhere develops a workaround - that's the advantage of an OS that is backed by billions of $ and used more than any other globally.

In terms of music you have a really good choice on Windows, better than the others in that regard, but imo apart from Studio One, none are quite as reliable as Logic on a Mac. I use Studio One 7 on latest Win11 and it is excellent both in terms of value for money and performance.

A Rant:

If privacy is something that concerns you, be proactive and block the traffic because almost everything wants to know you and control you nowadays - as a software developer I see first hand how governments and businesses, almost without questioning it, collect, mine and utilise personal data, due to the fact that the functionality comes ootb on all cloud platforms. Infrastructure is hosted in the cloud and development is now done in the cloud too. Imo people need to push back hard on the idea in principle that it is acceptable and normal for their identities to be mined and manipulated this way because "that's the way the World works". Things have improved a little bit but we're a LONG way off being properly protected. GDPR regulations are mainly just box ticking exercises, even after the legal changes enforced a few years back. If a company wants to use your activity to try to make you buy something, it isn't even very challenging from a technical point of view any more. There are other uses of the data acquired through your activity online (bearing in mind that because of the increasing uptake of IoT devices and phones you are almost ALWAYS "online"), that are even more nefarious and disturbing, some of them fairly widely documented. This is a legal issue that The West MUST get a serious grip on, in Parliament and Congress. Rant over.

 

[Werpinater]

I use the new M4 Mac Mini, and that thing rips!

But just for fun I’be been trying to get my SteamDeck to run Axe Edit via Proton and have had decent luck so far. While not the same branch of Linux as Ubuntu and Debian versions, still a Linux derivative. I tried Axe Edit in Wine and it would not connect, but it does in SteamOS’s Proton layer in gaming mode and it’s pretty zippy.

Supposedly Valve will be releasing the latest SteamOS and Proton compatibility tools to the public in 2025, which could be a Linux option to run Axe Edit. (It’s the Windows version running in Proton)

I know it’s an aside, but IMO a potential for Axe Edit in a Linux branch!

 

[GlennO]

It's pretty much a certainty that both Microsoft and Apple are pirates, and given that, it makes sense to choose what makes economic and usability sense for me personally. Apple used to clearly be off the table on that basis, but that doesn't appear to be true any more.

With all due respect, the idea that Apple is sharing Siri conversations with advertisers is laughable. If this was happening, it would necessarily be known to large numbers of people outside of Apple. Yet nobody has claimed to have any knowledge of that happening. There were a couple of odd coincidences with advertisements showing up on a web page after a conversation. Considering the number of conversations people have near Apple devices everyday, it would only be surprising if there were no such coincidences. That's why the settlement figure was so tiny.

All big corporations do horrible things, and Apple is no exception. However, unlike other tech companies, Apple does not rely on sharing information about you as a part of their business model.

It's also been my impression for years that Apple makes design decisions that are significantly hostile to users, but I'm trying to figure out how true that actually is. I'd love to hear examples of you've got them. (Not just you, everyone.)

Hostile? All design decisions are compromises, meaning there will be some factors that are important to somebody that don't get priority. If you want to hack your iPhone, your wishes will take a back seat to security features. There are plenty of FAS design decisions I take objection to. That doesn't mean Cliff is hostile to his customers .

 

[Dave Merrill]

With all due respect, the idea that Apple is sharing Siri conversations with advertisers is laughable. If this was happening, it would necessarily be known to large numbers of people outside of Apple. Yet nobody has claimed to have any knowledge of that happening. There were a couple of odd coincidences with advertisements showing up on a web page after a conversation. Considering the number of conversations people have near Apple devices everyday, it would only be surprising if there were no such coincidences. That's why the settlement figure was so tiny.

All big corporations do horrible things, and Apple is no exception. However, unlike other tech companies, Apple does not rely on sharing information about you as a part of their business model.



Hostile? All design decisions are compromises, meaning there will be some factors that are important to somebody that don't get priority. If you want to hack your iPhone, your wishes will take a back seat to security features. There are plenty of FAS design decisions I take objection to. That doesn't mean Cliff is hostile to his customers .

Just to be clear, the siri example wasn't mine.

I'm actually looking for concrete examples of why people are anti Apple.
I have been myself, and I'm questioning that attitude on my part still makes sense.
The part that's about price seems to have improved, though you do get gouged on upgrades.
My family did get screwed out of hundreds of dollars worth of iTunes purchases, but that's ancient history.

The part that's about the UI being counterintuitive is trickier.
I've been away from Apple for many decades, but am a programmer professionally, not a computer newb, so maybe I'd just get used to it.
Some of my sense of Apple difficulty may be "inherited" from my wife, who TBH is not good with computers.
She's frequently confused about what's a browser and what's an app (that's the missing back button thing I think), and about computer things in general.

Question is, are there valid reasons to avoid Apple today, more than there are for Microsoft?