Last week my parents asked me to install Linux on both of their new Vista laptops. When they first got the laptops we all noticed that they were slower than they should be. (Both the laptops had dual core Intel CPUs (T7300 and T5250). Each laptop had 2 gigs of RAM.) When the laptops were new I offered to put Linux on them, but my parents refused. After a few months of using Vista they had changed their minds. They were sick of the long boot times, the slowness, and the general irritation that came with Vista.

A big part of the reason they switched is that I had given up on Windows 3 years ago. Here's how that works...

I know something about computers and I had become the default tech support guy for my relatives. I know how to read tech and work out any issues they might have with any operating system. If it was Windows 2000 or 98 that was giving them fits I would have been able to scour the net and find fixes for the slowness. But in this day and age I didn't have to work that hard. I knew that a relatively pain-free computing experience is only a LiveCD away. Instead of searching for whatever is wrong with the default installation of Vista and correcting it, I just pointed them in the direction of Linux.

This process reminds me of a comment someone made on the Internet a few months ago. The commenter was a Windows user who was irritated with the Linux fanboys who were constantly suggesting that anyone with Windows problems just switch to Linux. The commenter mentioned that a few years ago these same areas of the web would be filled with tips and tricks to get Windows working right. Now these pages were useless, because no one was giving good Windows help anymore.

While I can understand the commenter's frustration, the situation he describes does make sense. As a tech person, why would I want to massage a closed, proprietary system into doing what it claimed to do out of the box? It's not worth my time. Linux is better. No, Linux isn't perfect, but it's more perfect than Windows.

Let's illustrate. Assume that both Vista and Linux don't work correctly on an initial installation. We'll call that state A. Assume that both require a certain amount of work to get the point where the average computer user can use the system productively. Also assume that both require regular maintenance to stay in this productive state. We'll call the productive state, B. Linux takes less work to get from A to B than Windows does. Linux also takes less work to keep the machine in state B than Windows does. When something bad does happen that forces Linux out of state B, it's a LOT easier to get the machine going again.

As more people switch to Linux, Windows' market share is reduced. Reduced market share increases the benefits to Linux users. Now you have more tech people and sites out there giving Linux tips and tricks. As a result, it's easier to get help with a Linux problem than it is to get help with a Windows problem.

As long as the above situation remains in place we're going to see more people switching to Linux. By the time Windows 7 is released in 2010 it will already be too late. My parents aren't going to switch back to Windows, they love Linux.