A Virus Called Windows

I know this is not what I usually post, but after what happened this week, I need to vent.

A few days ago, Windows decided it was time for one of its mandatory updates. You know, the kind that appears when you're trying to do literally anything else.

"Don't worry," it says. "We're making your PC better."

What followed was a series of events that felt less like a software update and more like a malware infection.

After the update, Windows somehow managed to mess with my setup, create boot issues, and even cause problems with a secondary drive that had been working perfectly fine before. Suddenly I was spending hours troubleshooting instead of doing actual work.

The funniest part is that whenever something breaks on Windows, you're immediately sent on a treasure hunt through registry entries, startup settings, recovery menus, BIOS screens, command prompts, obscure forum posts from 2014, and a YouTube video recorded with a microphone that sounds like it survived a war.

At some point, I had to ask myself a simple question:

Why am I doing this?

I already spend enough time debugging code.

I don't need to debug my operating system too.

For years I've kept a dual-boot setup because it felt like the safe option. Windows for compatibility. Linux for development.

But after spending hours trying to fix issues that shouldn't have existed in the first place, I started thinking about my setup.

The funny thing is that whenever I sat down to actually build something, I almost always booted into Linux.

That's where my projects were.

That's where my tools were.

That's where I felt productive.

Meanwhile, Windows mostly stayed around as a safety net. Something I kept telling myself I might need one day.

So while I was troubleshooting the latest mess, I realized I was spending more time maintaining Windows than actually using it.

At that point the decision became pretty easy.

Instead of fixing the dual boot yet again, I removed it.

Windows is gone.

Linux is now the only operating system on the machine.

Will everything be perfect? Probably not. Linux has plenty of quirks of its own, and I'm sure future me will discover some of them at the worst possible moment.

But at least it feels like an environment I chose, not one I'm constantly negotiating with.

Anyway, that's the story of how a Windows update finally convinced me to stop treating Linux as the secondary operating system.

If this post suddenly disappears, assume Windows found a way back in.