Oh man. I began using Linux a little over a year ago by installing Ubuntu (then switching to Mint) on old Macs–a 2011 iMac and a 2015 MacBook Pro. The MacBook had a logic board failure and I decided to grab a super cheap Lenovo IdeaPad from Costco a few months back. Getting a bootable USB for the first Mac was really the only challenge I ever had, otherwise the installs were extremely straightforward (especially when I went to Mint). But for the IdeaPad (which has a CoPilot key on the keyboard and was “optimized for Windows 11”), while there weren’t any real gymnastics involved, the process of removing Windows 11 took substantially longer than MacOS and I got the feeling that it was all the “AI” nonsense trying to avoid being deleted. It was clear that this laptop did NOT want something other than Windows on it.
Of course I was successful. And I managed to remap that Copilot key to bring up the Linux Mint menu when I hit it, as an extra layer of dominance.
x86 iMacs, yes. I was not talking about them. I was talking about Apple Silicon.
I am not sure what makes removing Windows 11 so difficult, can’t you simply install over it, the disk is being formatted before the installation anyway. And once Windows 11 is gone so is copilot.
That said, your mileage with laptops varies, regarding hardware support. Often touchpad support or whatever is making some fuss.
Oh man. I began using Linux a little over a year ago by installing Ubuntu (then switching to Mint) on old Macs–a 2011 iMac and a 2015 MacBook Pro. The MacBook had a logic board failure and I decided to grab a super cheap Lenovo IdeaPad from Costco a few months back. Getting a bootable USB for the first Mac was really the only challenge I ever had, otherwise the installs were extremely straightforward (especially when I went to Mint). But for the IdeaPad (which has a CoPilot key on the keyboard and was “optimized for Windows 11”), while there weren’t any real gymnastics involved, the process of removing Windows 11 took substantially longer than MacOS and I got the feeling that it was all the “AI” nonsense trying to avoid being deleted. It was clear that this laptop did NOT want something other than Windows on it.
Of course I was successful. And I managed to remap that Copilot key to bring up the Linux Mint menu when I hit it, as an extra layer of dominance.
x86 iMacs, yes. I was not talking about them. I was talking about Apple Silicon. I am not sure what makes removing Windows 11 so difficult, can’t you simply install over it, the disk is being formatted before the installation anyway. And once Windows 11 is gone so is copilot.
That said, your mileage with laptops varies, regarding hardware support. Often touchpad support or whatever is making some fuss.