Episode Transcript
[00:00:08] Speaker A: Welcome to Examining, a technology focused podcast that dives deep.
I'm Eric Christensen.
And I'm Chris Hans.
[00:00:24] Speaker A: And welcome to another episode of the Examining podcast. This is episode 84 and I am Eric Christiansen. This is another solo episode as my colleague Chris is still away.
But today we have something a little bit different to talk about. And what I wanted to discuss was this idea of Windows 10 being discontinued and tying that in with Linux and why Linux has not dominated the desktop industry. And we're going to end today with a tip that'll further help those Windows 10 users who are perhaps being left behind by the Windows 11 upgrade from episode 79.
So let me just preface this by saying that we're going to start by talking about Linux and I'll explain what that is, and then we're going to go on to some tips. So this is kind of a bit of a history.
[00:01:20] Speaker A: But also kind of an interesting retrospective at the same time.
So Linux started in the 1990s and it is an open source desktop operating system. Now what's interesting about Linux is that Linux actually powers the majority of the Internet, so it is a preferred platform for running on the server side. So if you are working with Amazon Web Services or Microsoft Azure and you want to host a website or some sort of web app, Linux is often the preferred platform for doing that. You can obviously use Windows as well as a web platform, but Linux is preferred because of the development environment, the tools that are available.
But also it's very lightweight, it's very quick, and it was kind of designed from the get go as an alternative to some of the more dominant interfaces.
But despite this, and despite powering the majority of the Internet, Linux hasn't really ever taken off or hasn't ever really broken through, I should say, as a mainstream desktop operating system for everyday users. Now, there's a long running joke among tech enthusiasts that this is the year of the Linux desktop and it's been repeated sarcastically for decades. In reality, however, Windows and to a lesser extent macOS have really owned and dominated the personal computer market.
However, looking ahead in 2026, 2026 might finally be the year of the Linux desktop, at least for a specific group of users, namely those running Windows 10.
So those would be people who either don't want to Upgrade to Windows 11 or can't because of the Windows 11 hardware requirements.
If that describes you, it might be time to consider giving Linux a shot as an alternative operating system.
In particular, you might want to check out Zorin OS18.
So this is a Polished version of Linux. We call these versions that exist out there distributions. And it's really designed to make you feel like you're still running Windows. Of course you can design it to look like macOS and other versions of Linux as well, but it's a very, very close look and feel to Windows 10. And Zorin OS is built really for or sorry to be familiar to Windows users. And it can behave a lot like Windows 10 while offering all the benefits of Linux, including speed, security and compatibility with older hardware.
And so before we dive into Zorin OS and how you can get started with it, let's explore why Linux hasn't taken over the desktop already and what's changing now.
[00:04:08] Speaker A: So as of late 2025, you know, Linux occupies only a small single digit percentage of global market on desktop computing, in the order of about 2 to 4%, according to several different web analytics sites. For comparison, Windows still holds the majority, 70% and macOS sits at around 15% of the desktop market.
Now to be fair, Linux has grown a bit. It's hovering around the 3% mark worldwide and even higher in other regions, which is a big improvement from previous years.
And thanks to projects like Valve's SteamOS and Proton compatibility, Linux has become a formidable gaming platform.
And by some measure, nearly 90% of Windows games are now playable on Linux systems via this Proton layer that Valve has created. So some of the increase in market share for Linux is due to the gaming community.
But this progress has fueled some optimism. 2026 is still unlikely to be the overall year of the Linux desktop in the general use case sense.
[00:05:16] Speaker A: But why has it struggled to gain dominance thus far despite being a free operating system? Well, there's a few key reasons for this. The first is that there's too many distributions and too many choices. So unlike Windows or Mac, Linux, quote unquote, isn't a single os, but comes in hundreds of difference of flavors called distributions or distros for short.
[00:05:40] Speaker A: They all share the Linux kernel and that's the kind of the core piece of the operating system, the core engine of the os. But each distro package packages things a little bit differently and this gives power users a lot of choice. So you can pick a distro tailored to your preferences, but that also fragments the platform and can confuse newcomers. So there's no unified Linux OS that everybody uses.
Instead there's versions like Ubuntu, you may have heard of that Fedora, Mint, Manjaro, Arch, Zorin and so on. A non technical user doesn't know where to Begin or which one to choose.
With passionate communities behind each distro, there's an endless debate over which is the best, but no single consensus option for the average person.
[00:06:33] Speaker A: There's also no standard user interface. So along with these different distributions comes different desktop environments. So some of these include one called gnome, spelled G, N, O, M E, K, D, E, X, fce, et cetera. These are all names of different user interfaces that are common and you can use across different versions of Linux. So there's no consistent universal user interface. And each distro might look and behave like a little bit differently. You know, in contrast this with macOS or Windows, almost everybody runs the same user interface except, you know, unless they're running a different version of the operating system. But even then it's pretty close.
Now the variety is great for customization, but it can be jarring for new users. So in short, one Linux can look and feel very different from another.
This lack of a unified, familiar interface has historically made it harder for Linux to present itself as a clear alternative to Windows. Now the good news is that many of the modern distros are addressing, as we'll talk about later, the last issue is hardware and driver compatibility. And this is probably the biggest practical hurdle that has been, which is really driver support. So not every PC component works seamlessly with Linux. Often Linux will run on hardware out of the box, which is great. But in some cases you might boot up a Linux USB to find, for example, the WI Fi or sound card isn't recognized. Now over the years, Linux has made huge strides in hardware support and the vast majority of common devices do work at this point. But it's still not perfect.
[00:08:07] Speaker A: Especially on very new or very niche hardware. Manufacturers may not provide Linux drivers at all, or they may arrive much later.
In contrast, Windows has stable driver APIs and a broad vendor support. So new hardware pretty much works out of the box. It has to, because Windows is the dominant platform. But on Linux, support might lag months or years if the community has to develop custom drivers without them, manufacturer's consent or help. And this means the likelihood that Linux will work flawlessly on any random machine can be a bit of a toying cost. It's way better than it used to be, but incompatibilities still pop up. Now the good news here is that if you're running an older device, it's probably more likely that Linux will work if it's say, five, six, seven, eight years old.
Because of factors like this, the Linux adoption has always remained relatively low around the 2 to 5% range over the years, depending on how it's measured. And now, of course, if we were to throw in mobile computing, this would be a different story, because Android, which is the dominant mobile platform worldwide, is essentially based on Linux. So if we were to include mobile in the mix, the data would look a little bit differently. But today we're just focusing on.
[00:09:24] Speaker A: Desktop computing environments.
[00:09:28] Speaker A: So it's essentially stuck in a niche popular among developers, tech enthusiasts, and certain educational government users, but not the default for the average person.
Even Microsoft, funny enough, has pointed to Linux's existence as evidence that it's actually not a monopoly in the OS market. And this came up in the 1990s when Microsoft was taken to court for antitrust for its monopolistic behavior. And they said that, well, Linux could overturn us at any point, so we're not a monopoly.
[00:09:58] Speaker A: However, these times are changing. In recent years, we've seen convergence of trends making desktop Linux more viable and more appealing than before. I think, especially on the user interface side.
[00:10:10] Speaker A: And especially this might be of use to Windows 10 users.
So let's flip the page a little bit and talk about why, kind of. There's tough times for Windows 10 users. So Windows 10 had a really great run. It launched in 2015 and became one of Microsoft's most successful OS versions, receiving really regular updates and support for a decade.
But as of October 4, 2025, Windows 10 officially reached its end of support.
So Microsoft has stopped providing free security updates and bug fixes for the general Windows 10 user. However, if you are looking for a free way to extend support for a year, episode 79 does have tips on how to do that. Essentially, you just have to sign up for a Microsoft account and back up your operating system settings, not all your data.
Or you can pay 30 bucks for a year's worth of extended support.
So for many Windows 10 users, however, upgrading to Windows 11, this is the key problem. Why don't they just Upgrade to Windows 11? Well, it's not always that straightforward.
Some people just might not want to, and that's understandable. But Windows 11 is different because Microsoft sets some pretty strict hardware requirements for Windows 11.
So there is something a hardware feature built into many modern PCs called Trusted Platform Module, specifically version 2.0, as well as a firmware support called Secure Boot.
And that's relegated to relatively recent CPUs.
So in plain terms, if your PC was built before, let's say, 2016, there's a really good chance that it can't officially run Windows 11. Now, you could run Windows 11 on unofficial hardware, but that can be a problem and you'll run into kind of a Linux like solution where drivers might not be supported, et cetera. So essentially, Microsoft drew a line in the sand that left millions of older but still functional PCs unsupported because of these hardware requirements. And they're for security reasons. They're good hardware requirements, but hardware requirements nonetheless. So here's a situation. You have a perfectly good computer that can run Windows 10, but it doesn't meet the Windows 11 rules. Windows 11 is now past end of life, meaning that over time it's going to become increasingly insecure. As new vulnerabilities are discovered, it's possible that they won't be patched. So what are your options? Well, you can either buy a new PC that supports Windows 11 and pay for the extra extended support, or get it for free, or you could switch to an alternative operating system that does still get updates on older hardware. And this is where Linux kind of comes in to save the day. Linux has long been famous for running well on older and modest hardware. So many lightweight Linux distributions can kind of breathe breath of fresh air, new life into an aging computer. And so now that Windows 10 is ending support, this is a good time to consider Linux as an alternative.
[00:13:12] Speaker A: In fact, the end of Windows 10 has kind of proven to be a catalyst because many of the Linux distributions and projects are now seeing a lot of increased download and usage because of these millions of people who aren't able to run Windows 10 due to those hardware requirements. And one of the growing Linux distributions, the one that I want to focus on today, is called Zorin os, namely Zorin os version 18.
And so let's talk about Zorin OS because it's really tailor made to Windows users. So the Linux distribution Zorin OS is developed by a small company, it's kind of headed by two brothers in Ireland. And it kind of provides a familiar, comfortable experience for people coming from Windows, oh, or Mac.
It basically is based on another version of Linux called Ubuntu, which is a very popular mainstream distribution.
So under the hood it's running this other version of Linux, but it adds this kind of polished user interface and a lot of tools that emulate the look and feel of other operating systems. And in the latest release, Zorin OS18, which came out in perfect timing in October 2025.
[00:14:26] Speaker A: Was literally timed to coincide with Window 10. And of support explicitly was marketed as a refuge for Windows 10 users who are kind of left behind.
So I've been testing Zorin OS18 and I have some something to say that I'm really really impressed with it. I've played with many Linux distributions over the years Ubuntu Linux, Mint popos, arc Linux, etc. And they're all pretty user friendly. But Zorin stands out of just how seamless it can mimic a Windows environment.
In fact, the tech YouTuber savvy Nick and I'll link to this video in the Show Notes did an overview of the Zorin OS current user interface and showcases how easy it is to configure and how it can look really exactly like Windows 10 with the task Manager, the taskbar, the Start menu, everything.
I think I could put this in front of any Windows user and they would hardly notice, to be honest. So Zorin strategy seems to be working.
It's seen a surge of interest, hitting over 1 million downloads within weeks of the version 18's launch, which suggests a lot of Windows users are interested in at least trying it out.
[00:15:43] Speaker A: So let's talk about the look and feel. One of the first things you notice in Zorin OS is that it doesn't really look foreign at all. It looks like a version of Windows or Mac, depending on which theme you choose when you first set it up. So on first boot, Zorin actually lets you choose between a few desktop themes or layouts. There's a Windows 10 like layout which has a Start menu and a taskbar, and kind of a Mac OS like layout which puts the dock in the bottom middle of the screen and a layout that looks like that other version of Linux called Ubuntu.
Now you can pay for a premium version of Zorin which gives you more themes, but the free version, if you're a Windows user, has everything you need and that's the best way to run it in my opinion, is to make it look like Windows.
So I selected the Windows style theme and instantly had a taskbar at the bottom with the Zorin logo in the left acting as the Start button and it just looked like Windows 10. Clicking that Zorin menu bar pulls up an application menu that's strikingly similar to the Windows Start menu. So there's a column of categories, kind of accessories, office, Internet, etc. On the left, and your applications listed in a and searchable on the right hand side.
There's a file explorer built into Zorin called Files that uses an interface that's almost identical to the Windows File Explorer with the same types of top level folder icons, panels, address bar, et cetera. And I'd bet the typical Windows user, if they had just seen the file system, wouldn't even know they were running Linux. They'd be able to use it right away.
One of the nice things about Zorin is that it does, I think, better than other versions of Linux and you know, tries to emulate Windows is a great, does a great job of the Windows style window management.
So for example, you can drag a window to the edge of the screen and it will snap to fill half the screen. Or you can put different apps in quadrants or you can put it in three column layout. You have a lot of flexibility with regards to how you outline or sorry, how you arrange Windows on the desktop. On the desktop very much like the Microsoft Snap Assistant.
There's also support for multiple desktops so that you can switch between them. And there's a cool option in Zorin where instead of moving over right or left to the next desktop environment, you can actually rotate a 3D cube and that becomes the interface, which is kind of an interesting touch.
[00:18:07] Speaker A: Another thing that's really cool about Zorin is the integration with online accounts. So there's actually a setup for connecting online accounts like Google Nextcloud, Microsoft 365 or OneDrive. So you can actually just do that from a setup screen and then those are available right from the file manager of the Zorin os, which is super, super handy. So if you're using a lot of the Microsoft products, namely the storage, this will be really helpful to you.
Another killer app of Zorin OS is how it handles Windows software. So Zorin comes with this cool called the Windows app support and it allows many Windows EXE programs. So programs with EXE are designed to run on Windows, but they're designed to run on Linux.
Even better, Zorn will proactively assist you if you try to install a Windows app. So let's say you install a Windows app from the web. For example, if you double click on the Windows installer, let's say it's the Microsoft Office Setup Exe, Zorin will intercept it and put up a pop up dialog that says hey, we noticed you're trying to install Microsoft Office. You might want to use LibreOffice, which is a free open source alternative which is already installed on this device.
Or you can use Office365 on the web as an alternative. And so it kind of gives you these alternatives and points you towards things that you might not even know about with regards to Linux software. And there's excellent Linux software support.
This kind of tailored guidance is really helpful for newcomers it's kind of the first I've seen of it. It eliminates a lot of the googling, the guesswork and the OS itself helps you find the right app or workaround. Of course, you can attempt to still run a Windows program with the Windows app support if you really want to.
I tried launching a few common Windows installers and the suggestions were reasonable and relevant each time.
And so it really underscores their philosophy to make the Linux transition as painless as possible.
So to sum up, look and feel of Zorin is almost exactly like a Windows machine. The themes, the navigation, the windowing behavior, and it's all engineered to kind of reduce the learning curve to near zero for somebody coming from a Windows 10 environment.
[00:20:28] Speaker A: Now, I want to broaden our view a little bit here and talk about in general why switching to Linux is far more palatable in 2025, or let's say 20, than it has been in the past.
Well, some of the long standing hurdles that kept Linux from mass adoption, that fragmentation, usability issues, software compatibility. There's some of those to be sure, but they've dramatically lowered over recent years.
[00:20:57] Speaker A: Linux desktop distributions in 2025 are light years more user friendly than they were say 10 or 15 years ago.
And Zorin is a great example of that.
So you have very familiar layout. I wouldn't be worried about the learning curve if you want to give Linux a shot when you're doing this. Secondly, the rise of web applications and kind of cross platform software support has solved a lot of these problems, right? So think about it. A decade ago, if you had switched to Linux, you might think, I can't run Office, I can't run Photoshop, I can't use itunes, I can't use my web browser.
But you had to find an open source replacement for those, which is tedious as well. So today, so much of what ordinary users already do is in the web browser. So email.
If you're not an Office user and you use Google Docs and Sheets, that's going to work fine.
Streaming video and music, especially from the web versions, they will work fine because you have a web browser. Both Firefox, Chrome, Brave, mostly supported by most Linux distributions, you can do your banking and securely. And then for those tasks, Linux is no barrier at all, right? All the web browser things that you're used to will just work in that sense. The actual operating system is kind of not that important because so much is done through the browser these days. Think of how many tabs you have open. Does it really matter what the File system app looks like if you're working through Google Docs.
And so what about when you do need a dedicated desktop application and it's not there now? Fortunately, the Linux ecosystem has matured very well. There are many free, capable alternatives for virtually every common need. In fact, I recommend any new Linux user, especially one coming from Windows, take note of a few key applications that can kind of fill the void of their former Windows programs. So here's some examples. So web browsers, you're already covered here. Both Chrome and Mozilla are available on Linux. Zorin os, I have tried them both and it's very easy to install and they work great. If you work in Microsoft Office, you could use Office Online.
Microsoft Office in the browser works great.
However, you could check out LibreOffice, which is compatible with all Microsoft DocX, Excel sheets, PowerPoint, et cetera. They might not open perfectly, but. But they work very well if you're an Apple user and you use Pages, Keynote and numbers. All of those are also available in the web in the browser if you have an Apple account. So you don't even need to install a native application if you rely on notes and organization. So let's say you use Microsoft's OneNote or Apple Notes, you'll find excellent alternatives on Linux. And again, both of those examples, OneNote and Apple Notes, are available in the cloud. In the browser, however, you could try something like Obsidian, which is for power users and making a personal archive. I've talked about this on my blog before.
Or you can use simplenote, or you could use something called Joplin, which is. Those are two terrific open source notes applications.
Photo management and editing is probably the big one where people really need a desktop application. Of course you could use Google Photos. There's many alternatives, especially if you're an Android user. But I understand the need to have an equivalent to Apple Photos or the Image Manager on Windows.
So one example of a Linux program that's excellent is called digicam and that's a really advanced photo organizer and viewer, kind of capable to Picasa or Adobe Lightroom.
Has a lot of cataloging features, tagging, et cetera. If you want to edit images, there's a great piece of software called GIMP G I M P called the GNU Image Multiplatform Manipulation Program. Long standing Photoshop alternative on Linux. It's extremely powerful, a bit more of a user interface curve, but a very excellent piece of software. Now I could go on and on and there are Linux alternatives for pretty much everything. Video editing, audio production, email, clients, but the Linux software repositories are overflowing with really high quality free open source apps that are well supported, secure and easy to use.
And if a specific Windows program has a Linux version, there's a good chance that you'll be comfortable with one of these alternatives.
Additionally, as noted earlier, Zorn OS and some of the other distributions are making it really easy by guiding users to those alternatives automatically. Like I mentioned, you don't need this, you can use this instead.
And that makes things super easy. So my takeaway today, my tip is to give Linux a shot. For some folks, the easiest path will be just to get a new PC with Windows 11 that meets all the hardware requirements. If you want to live in that environment, and if that works for you, then go for it. There's nothing wrong with using Windows, but if you do want to give Linux a try, you can do this on your computer without erasing anything. Most Linux distributions, including Zorin, which I just talked about, allow you to run a live session from a USB stick, so you can play around with it. So you can go to the Zorin website and you can download version 18. The free version is called Core Edition. So you're going to download the ISO.
You can create a bootable USB hard drive using a tool like Rufus from Windows, and then you can actually boot from that USB drive into. So instead of booting into Windows, you'll boot into the USB drive and you'll boot into Linux. From there. You can either try Zorin out, so you can just run it from the USB drive and click around to see if it's palatable to you. This will be a little bit slower than installing it on your computer, but it's kind of a risk free way of giving Linux a try. Or you can though, go in and install Zorin on your computer. You can either install it as a partition, or you can replace Windows entirely if you wish. So I'm going to link to some guides on how to do that, But I think 2026 could be the year of the Linux desktop for Windows 10 users. So my call to action is to give Linux a try and see how it works. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised. And if you're working on a Mac laptop, you can also install it on that as well.
So thanks very much for listening to this episode of the Examining podcast and we'll talk again until next time.
