> Samsung stopped making drivers for their MFCs so I needed to toss a perfectly working laser MFC because it stopped working with Linux, just like that.
Erm... The old drivers stopped working with this particular device?
I had a very similar case with perfectly good HP laser printer, which doesn't
work on Window 10 anymore because... dunno? No drivers from HP, though. I'm
sure it would work just fine with generic PCL or PostScript driver under CUPS.
> Later, a HP MFC caused endless pain, seemingly every other Arch update broke one of Bluetooth / printer of MFC / scanner of MFC.
Well, that's probably self-inflicted because of your choice of Arch, not
because Linux (e.g. Debian).
> Plain Wifi eventually worked more or less (but see the endless string of bugs with 5GHz) but enterprise wifi always has been a pain.
Enterprise Wi-Fi has always been a pain, also under Windows.
> The strange F5 VPN our company used was not particularly Linux friendly
VPNs are usually that way. Very few companies can write sensibly working
software that would run under Linux.
> -- I could only get it to work by running Firefox as root (yuck!).
You get pretty much the same under Windows, though you don't see it as
clearly.
I don't get why you bash Linux. Windows has the exact same problems.
> Erm... The old drivers stopped working with this particular device?
Samsung simply stopped producing Linux drivers. Indeed if you look at https://www.bchemnet.com/suldr/index.html there is more than a few years gap here. Also, if you look at the newer drivers support page now that some models have maximum support versions https://www.bchemnet.com/suldr/supported.html where I persume you are ... if you update -- and "obviously" you can't not to update because eventually some API breaks the driver. My printer broke in 2010 with an Ubuntu update.
> Very few companies can write sensibly working software that would run under Linux.
Which is the problem itself. You got it in one.
> You get pretty much the same under Windows, though you don't see it as clearly.
It's possible I do not see it clearly but the only Bluetooth problem I had was the April Creators update mysteriously changing Chrome to use the internal soundcard which was solved in two clicks in Eartrumpet (which was new to me -- finding that software took a little time). I have yet to meet any of the problems listed: every wifi and VPN I have yet seen have Windows support (and IT is so much more prepared to help if there is a problem), the Bluetooth stack actually didn't break, nor have Windows upgrades haven't broken my MFC yet (although I guess I need to wait -- but how long? I have seen people install HP LaserJet 4 on Win 10 with some struggle). And as I mentioned, my Thunderbolt eGPU just works. Are you saying it would just work on Linux...? Come now.
I love Linux to pieces and I run it on servers and use the userspace components still but I am writing to warn people: it is still not the year of Linux on desktop and probably never will be. Or, if you so prefer, it finally is, it's just Linux on the Windows desktop.
Erm... The old drivers stopped working with this particular device?
I had a very similar case with perfectly good HP laser printer, which doesn't work on Window 10 anymore because... dunno? No drivers from HP, though. I'm sure it would work just fine with generic PCL or PostScript driver under CUPS.
> Later, a HP MFC caused endless pain, seemingly every other Arch update broke one of Bluetooth / printer of MFC / scanner of MFC.
Well, that's probably self-inflicted because of your choice of Arch, not because Linux (e.g. Debian).
> Plain Wifi eventually worked more or less (but see the endless string of bugs with 5GHz) but enterprise wifi always has been a pain.
Enterprise Wi-Fi has always been a pain, also under Windows.
> The strange F5 VPN our company used was not particularly Linux friendly
VPNs are usually that way. Very few companies can write sensibly working software that would run under Linux.
> -- I could only get it to work by running Firefox as root (yuck!).
You get pretty much the same under Windows, though you don't see it as clearly.
I don't get why you bash Linux. Windows has the exact same problems.