On my Job I regularly have to install Windows PCs and sometimes even install the USB Drivers for Mouse and Keyboard to work. Why dont I have to do that on Linux ever? Seems weird not to have them installed on Windows.
On Linux, all those drivers are already included in the kernel out of the box. Linux has much better hardware support than Windows in general, the only issue are proprietary drivers from third parties that don’t support Linux.
I had the experience recently with two wifi usb sticks. Linux: Work out of the box, no hassle. Windows: One was not supported on Win 11 and caused blue screens, the other only works on USB2 port, not on USB3 and it was a real hassle to finde the right drivers.
That’s why I don’t understand people who say Windows is easier than Linux.
Because it hasn’t always been this way. When I was first learning linux you couldn’t guarantee support for any hardware unless you compiled the kernel yourself. Even then you’d run into many problems that would frustrate a non-techy person.
To be fair, it is very important to remember that some community member has put work into making it work, the way that it does. I’m incredibly thankful, that we’re in a position, where OSS outperforms proprietary software in so many ways. Support these people, if possible
More often than not, it is the companies themselves that commit drivers for their hardware to the Linux kernel
My experience with my usb wifi dongle was different. It would work way faster on Windows compared to Linux for some reason until I replugged it some time and ever since it works in similar speeds. I couldnt reproduce what went wrong on the Linux one ever since.
Can you explain what you mean by this. I have only a bit of experience with a few distros but hardware issues have always been a bugaboo for me with Linux. This statement seems quite the opposite of my experience. I mean I guess it’s because of the third party proprietary drivers, but that’s a decent chunk of the hardware pie and it’s hard for me not to include that in “better hardware support”
There are basically two different approaches to drivers. Windows will have some very basic drivers built-in, but most of them are downloaded and installed when a component that requires them is detected in current versions of Windows.
Linux on the other hand includes every driver it knows about out of the box. You won’t ever need to install additional drivers if the hardware is supported. This makes Linux an excellent portable system, you can just take a drive out of one pc with an AMD CPU and Nvidia GPU and put it into one with an Intel CPU and AMD GPU without driver issues*.
*as long as you stick to the included drivers
Linux runs on a LOT more different systems than Windows. The stuff it doesn’t run well on is mostly built into desktop computers, so that’s what the average user notices.
Not my experience at all. Always having to deal with hardware compatibility with Linux, for mundane stuff that Windows never even blinks over.
My best example is a Logitech mouse, arguably the most prolific and popular mouse out there, they don’t work in Linux at all, until you find a third party tool. In Windows, they work immediately, albeit without Logitech’s fancy management utilities. But they just work.
I see this all the time on Linux, with mundane stuff.
Which mouse and which distro? I’m genuinely curious. I’ve plugged my MX Master 3S directly into my work laptop running Arch many times and have never had to do anything to make it work.
Where as I’ve got my 3S plugged in to my work laptop running fedora and, and I regularly have to cycle the connection setting away from the bolt dongle and back again, because the input becomes choppy and laggy.
No issue with the straight bluetooth connection, but the high resolution scrolling doesn’t seem to work
Which mouse? HID is all but guaranteed to work on linux
My logitech G900 is plug n play on all my linux installations.
The same is true for the inexpensive logitech mouse that I have as backup (although it’s a piece of shit of a mouse and what made me decide to avoid logitech like the plague going forward).
You’ve probably figured this by now, OP, but the computers at your job are weird. Needing to install USB drivers for mouse and keyboard to work is not normal behavior for Windows. Like another person commented- check the BIOS settings.
Yea for mouse and keyboards that is very weird, the only times I had to do this when I was using adb for my google pixel
Only not normal behaviour for a pre installed system. Windows out of the box install often requires chipset drivers installing for all but usb1.1 speeds as well as drivers for many 3rd party peripherals.
What version of windows and what mouse and keyboard. 99% of them work out of the box and the drivers only add extra functions if there are special features.
Basic functions of HID should still work under windows for the same reason why they work mod-less under Linux. But when those devices are not HID-conform then you would need drivers/a kernel-mod.
Drivers are included in the kernel, you will always have them.
That’s odd. I can’t remember the last time I’ve installed USB drivers on Windows. It either works or it doesn’t (like a 75% chance of it working though).
Windows 7 lacked USB 3 drivers, and if you have a bleeding edge system windows might not have the chipset drivers which is like half of your system. (EX windows 10/11 lacked 11th Gen. chipset drivers until 22H2)
Outside of that I’ve never had the basics work. Especially a mouse and keyboard.
Because many 3rd party hardware providers are lazy, while Linux maintainers are not.
Ms provides a way to have drivers deployed over their windows update channels when needed but the hardware provider has to do it.
Linux allows basically anyone to provide a driver.
Linux has come along way, there was a time just getting Linux to run, and then to run apps on it was just unmanageable. I mean, you could do it but most people wouldn’t want to compile the kernel. Nor would they know where to start to do that, coming from Windows XP or even 7. They’d ask, what’s a kernel, and all you had was a terminal, and I assume the terminal wasn’t as user friendly as it is now back then but idk about that.
Windows use to just work out of the box, Microsoft used to care back then because in my opinion they were just trying to sell the idea of just using a computer to people. Now that they got people using computers, most with Windows on it then they go to the next phase, make money. The product is less of a concern, but they want to make money off their users.
You can expect Windows to be more modern and up to date on corporate trends, but not so what you want as a user. They aren’t trying to sell computers and operating systems any more, they already got people hooked to using their os, that’s what they probably cared about back then.
It’s always drivers with Windows. smh
Yeah, I’ve had more than a few chipsets or periphs that worked on Windows, and worked on Linux but were… quirky, especially when dealing with stuff like suspend states etc.
For USB3 in particular, I’ve found many storage devices or adaptors like to drop out partway through an longer copy process on Linux (like they’ll be fine for copying a smaller amount of data, but the controller or device would reset during longer ones). This didn’t seem to occur in Windows, but I’m pretty sure the copy process was also slower so guessing it’s some sort of buffer or heat quirk that 'nix didn’t account for in the more generic driver
This didn’t seem to occur in Windows, but I’m pretty sure the copy process was also slower so guessing it’s some sort of buffer or heat quirk that 'nix didn’t account for in the more generic driver
If the device says it’s a generic storage device (to the system that is) but actually isn’t (based on your description) then it’s 100% devices fault and not a Linux fault.
That’s not a distinction that users care about, or should need to care about.
Honestly I think it’s generally more of a bus driver issue, because it seems more tied to the motherboard than a given device
I’ve had the opposite experience - nearly everything works out of the box on Windows, yet not even a Logitech mouse works on Linux unless I go find some third party tool to make it work.
A mouse that works instantly on XP (probably on Win95).
That sounds like the dumbest bullshit ever. What kinda of mouse are we talking about that does not work with generic mouse drivers?!
If I had to guess, the programmable extra buttons on a Logitech mouses.
You need to configure them in the piece of shit Logitech software, that’s not supported on Linux
That would not work under Windows either, unless you install the extra proprietary app and he specifically talked about an out of the box experience. That implies basic functionality.
Yeah, I’m stretching it a bit
Logitech doesn’t put their software to Linux, but all my Logitech dongles and wireless devices worked fine, just couldn’t change their settings. But, there’s this software that does everything you need and actually works better than Logi Options+ imo.
Oh sweet, I refuse to download Logitech’s software so this is just what I needed
So you’re saying that this mouse can’t move the on-screen pointer or register even normal left clicks with the generic Linux HID drivers? Seems unlikely.
