migrating from Windows 7

[Bret Busby]

On 08/11/2021, Slade Watkins <slade at sladewatkins.com> wrote:
> Hi all,
> Somewhat long post but I think I need some help because while I am
> great with tech, I feel overwhelmed and a bit lost due to being semi
> out of the game and could use some help.
>
> To make a long story short, I am considering switching my primary
> workstation over to Ubuntu from WIndows 7 Pro (with ESU) either later
> this year or early next year. I recently did upgrades to the system
> hardware (after several years of not touching it and just running
> dated hardware) and have purposely avoided using 10 due to it running
> horribly. I've tried running 8.1 but there are things that bother me
> about it (or otherwise do not work) that I need to get things done.
> Obviously I've been pretty active on this list and I do run (a
> semi-older version of) Ubuntu LTS on a separate machine just for fun,
> but I've never considered switching for full work purposes since
> leaving all those years ago.
>
> While I did learn to use a computer on Ubuntu, it has been several
> years since I've used it for my daily work. I would say I've become
> incredibly reliant on Windows for several things over the years which
> frustrates me. Things came to a head recently when I realized that my
> days of running Windows 7 with ESU are numbered. Browser support could
> end at any time and I'm sure there are countless other issues that
> could arise. I've already felt some slowness in booting compared to my
> Mac and other modern OSes.
>

<snip>

> - Desktop Environments: How much has the default GNOME interface
> changed since 14.04.6 LTS? Should I consider not using GNOME?
>

The gnome interface changed after 16.04, and went bad.

A significant  number of people (in addition to me) apparently
subsequently abandoned gnome (which had abandoned us), and switched to
the MATE interface.

See https://ubuntu-mate.org/ .

Ubuntu has significantly changed, after 16.04, which is no longer supported.

Depending on the interface that you want, I have my computers, running
UbuntuMATE, with the interface configured so it appears like MS
Windows 95 or fvwm, I believe.

I have two computers running nVIDIA graphics, with Optimus, with
different cards, and, they run "natively"  ( believe that is the
appropriate term) - I did not need to install any additional software
after the installation, without any significant problems.

Whilst you stated that you have nVIDIA graphics, what is the CPU, and,
is your system "Legacy BIOS" and < FAT (?) - the name for what existed
before GPT> or UEFI/GPT based?

I assume that, because you have MS Windows 7, you have a Legacy BIOS
based computer.

You might want to consider replacing your computer, as, if it is a
Legacy BIOS based system, it might not be able to cope with larger
file sizes (>4GB) that you might need to deal with, now or in the
future. I know some video files can be greater than 4GB, and,
depending on what video resolutions you want to deal with, especially
if you are going to be creating videos for youtube, the file sizes
increase significantly as the resolution increases. If you go to the
"4K" video resolution, in you videos creation, you will be dealing
with quite large files.

What you might like to do, is to download an iso from
https://ubuntu-mate.org/download/amd64/
and write it to a USB drive, so making the USB drive bootable, and,
booting into that with your workstation, selecting the "Try Ubuntu"
option, and, having a look around, and finding how it works with your
hardware.

I suggest the UbuntuMATE option, because of your reference to gnome on
14.04, which will have been gnome 2., before gnome went bad with gnome
3, and, as you will probably find with the UbuntuMATE web site, the
intention of UbuntuMATE is to be like the gnome 2 interface.

Just some thoughts, and, I am not one of the more knowledgable people
on this list.

-- 
Bret Busby
Armadale
West Australia
(UTC+0800)
..............