Hi there,
25 years ago I have dedicated some IRQ’s in Windows but as it is a long time ago and I am really lazy today (or better say I need to spend my time on other stuff) so I consider myself as a non-tech person. I like the idea of open-source, non-trackable and safety etc, and I am therefore thinking of switching from Windows to PureOS. Here in the forum I have read some scaring issues of non-working hard- or software, time consuming installation and adjustments of settings. So if I would buy the latest Librem with pre-installed PureOS… what do I have to expect…? Any thought from You experienced forum users? 
…or should I stick to a Dell with Ubuntu? There are no kill switches and other security feaures though…
Thanks in advance.
Greetings from Sweden
LL
I have not received my Librem just yet, but have been using PureOS on my Windows 10 machine for a bout a month and half now. The beauty of the PureOS is that it is a debian Linux, and Purism has curated an app store, which is to say a GUI based access to repositories. This is just like the Apple App Store or the Windows Store.
If the things that Purism stands for are important to you, then you’d be well served by getting one of their products.
Hi @LackiLok,
I don’t yet own a Librem, but I have played around with PureOS in virtual machines. From what I can tell, it looks just as usable as Ubuntu and others (since it is based on Debian, much like Ubuntu). So as far as software goes, I think there isn’t much barrier, as long as you’re willing to do things just a bit differently from Windows. The only caveat I can really think of is that installing proprietary software won’t be as easy as looking it up in the Software center, because PureOS won’t keep it in the software repositories, but then you can usually find a .deb file from the offical website of the software (as long as they support Linux), which is pretty similar to how you’d find a .exe on Windows.
You can certainly test PureOS in a virtual machine on Windows to get a feel for it.
From perusing the forums, I don’t think most of the potential hardware issues are very critical. The main one right now seems to be CPU spikes which cause the fans to go berserk, but I think this will be fixable via future Coreboot updates (though I don’t know how long it might be before the fix appears)
Hi @LackiLok,
quite frankly, it’s not there, yet. Let me explain.
I totally get your too-lazy-attitude. That’s me. I’m a developer, but I grew out of fiddling with my machine for the heck of it. In the old days, I did Gentoo. Then I settled down and used Kubuntu LTS. Yes, only the long-time-stable ones were usually on my disk. PureOS is between those extremes. I can not remember one instance where installing updates on (K)Ubuntu LTS ever broke something (naturally, as you only get small bug-fixes).
But with PureOS, that happened a few times to me. Some of the (update) problems were KDE-specific, as it does not get as much attention/love as Gnome. The others I have are these:
- blowing fan after standby - workaround: close/open lid again
- USB mouse not working after boot - workaround: unplug/plug
- fix for US-keyboard breaks non-US layouts - workaround: manually edit a config file
If you played with IRQs (like I did 22 years ago), you can surely handle that.
I also really hope that such issues will eventually vanish as Purism works on PureOS and coreboot.
While such issues are a bit annoying, I have a more general question about PureOS: Is it a good thing that it’s a rolling release? I don’t want hundreds of package updates every month. Especially, as these are not just bug-fixes, but really feature-updates that can break things every now and then, as everything is subject to change.
Therefore, I’d really appreciate it Purism would offer “stable” in addition to “unstable”/rolling. Maybe when they grow a bit more
Purism targets two audiences for which a stable distro is more beneficial than a rolling one: Businesses and you (non-techy people). So, while they envision non-techy persons to be their customers, I have to say the experience is not there yet 100%.
That being said, if your choice is between Dell and Purism, choose Purism. If you spend that much money, don’t fill Michael Dell’s pockets, but rather advance the noble cause of FOSS. If you’re not pleased with PureOS, you can still put Ubuntu on it. You invest in a future where, maybe in a few years, you can hand that PureOS laptop to your non-techy mother and know she’ll be safe and sound (not only on the Internet, but also with blowing fans and auto-installing updates etc).
Thank You very very much @2disbetter, @wctaylor and Caliga for this usefull information and Your valuation
I will follow Your recommendation and try to get familiar with the OS on my Win-PC, and when I finalized my studies and have a little bit more time again, I am going to order a Librem. Maybe they have managed to fix the minor problems that You have been mentioned here by then 
And I agree that I would also prefer a system where there would just be smaller bug fixes in the updates rather than changes in the system, so I will give them a little more time to finalize the development of the system. On the other hand I will maybe already have a little bit to do with their mobile phone which I have ordered some months ago 
I hope it will work. Never bought a phone before that did not exist :-
…and regarding my mother …is there a word for somebody who is less the “non-techy”
Thanks again for Your helpful answers.