All-In-One PC Choice

CoastingHatbox

I'm not sure Microsoft are that bothered by the desktop PC market anymore. Provision of cloud computing services is where the new battle lines are drawn. I wouldn't be surprised if Windows becomes a reskin on top of a Linux Kernel over the next five to ten years, so they can leverage the labour of the opensource community and concentrate their man power on Azure.

Linux does have some backing from major companies. IBM bought RedHat. Most of the big players are on the Linux Foundation. In fact, if you look at server and cloud market share, Linux is absolutely dominating.

In fact, saying that "It's very ethos (open source, free etc) has worked against it" is entirely missing the point of Linux and Open Source Software. When it is running on everything from washing machines to in-car entertainment systems, I'd say that the open source ethos had worked very well, if the only metric of success is how widespread an operating system is.

As for ease of use, that is very subjective. However there have been Linux distributions around for a while now wihch I'd consider easy to use, in as much as anything you are not familiar with is easy to use. MacOS for instance, is very difficult for people who have exclusively used Windows, but effortless for those that are used to it. Pretty much every operating system is the same in that respect.

Mickey666

Fair points.  I've worked with many Unix systems back in the day and know how pivotal they have been, and still are in the 'backroom' world of servers that run the internet and web.  But it's interesting that you mention IBM buying Red Hat after all the millions they poured into their own AIX that ultimately failed.  DEC did something similar with their own Ultrix, but where are they now? 
I agree that Linux has been very successful, based on being very widespread, but your examples are excellent examples of how invisible a 'proper' OS should be.  Nobody 'uses' Linux on their washing machine or ICE system or their smartTV etc - and that's the way it should be.  Such systems are hand-crafted by software professionals and consumers never 'see' any of it.  But when Linux is 'exposed' to PC users then it starts to fall down - not because of its functionality, performance or stability but because it is more difficult for the average user to get to grips with.  Unlike MS-Windows or MacOS.  After all, why would anyone pay £100-ish for MS-windows when they can have, say, Ubuntu for free? 
Linux fans will tell the world it is just as good, if not better, than Windows, and they'd be right . . . up to the point where the typical PC user is exposed to it.  Which is why, I think, it hasn't made the in-roads into the WinTel and Apple markets that might be expected on paper.  I'd say that's because it has no big-company champion, or at least not an effective one, despite all the vast effort that has gone into creating the many Distro's available.
Compare that with Google's backing for Android and the contrast is clear.

oh_really

https://www.dellrefurbished.co.uk/item/dell-optiplex-7440-aio-5f6b1c5b/dell-optiplex-7440/1.html

Dellboxing code -£277.85

TCA

Thanks, but for an extra £100 or so I'd get a brand-new machine with a 6-core 10th generation Intel processor. I'd be more inclined towards that over a refurbished computer, but the replies above have put me off an AIO, so looking at alternative options.

Mickey666

PCs are a funny old business.
20 years ago I was using photoshop for my photos, converting my vinyl collection to uncompressed digital files, ripping my CDs for the same reason and editing digital video from my camcorder and burning them onto DVDs, all in addition to all the standard 'office' applications and web browsing.
I can't remember the exact spec of the PC I was using at the time but it was probably some sort of Pentium III CPU  running at around 600MHz and using Win95.  The idea of running those applications on such a machine would be laughable and most pundits would say it would need a pretty high end PC.  Software 'bloat' has a lot to answer for!

forgotmyname

Mickey666 said:

PCs are a funny old business.
20 years ago I was using photoshop for my photos, converting my vinyl collection to uncompressed digital files, ripping my CDs for the same reason and editing digital video from my camcorder and burning them onto DVDs, all in addition to all the standard 'office' applications and web browsing.
I can't remember the exact spec of the PC I was using at the time but it was probably some sort of Pentium III CPU  running at around 600MHz and using Win95.  The idea of running those applications on such a machine would be laughable and most pundits would say it would need a pretty high end PC.  Software 'bloat' has a lot to answer for!

Windows 95 on a PIII, that would have been a treat. 

Well into Windows 98 at that time and close to 98se.  I remember when XP launched and the update was over 100MB everyone

complaining saying 100MB is an OS not an update. How times have changed.  Antivirus was less than 10MB to download, last

time I used AVG the download was over 100MB.

I have a nice dual P3 motherboard with the riser card CPU's and massive aluminium heatsinks that are passively

cooled, no fans.  I was going to melt the heatsinks down but think it maybe worth something to someone one day.