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Stability and an open hardware platform is always going to be a difficult combination to achieve, I'm afraid.
Apple has it easy - they control the hardware (boy, do they ever control the hardware!) and they produce the software, so they have a much easier job of it: though even then bugs get through, like a battery saving measure being mistaken for a "slow down the old kit before the new stuff launches" feature.
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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I won't buy apple because they're overpriced, they have the same lack of software problem linux does, and they screwed my family over in 1986 because we were conned into buying an Apple ][gs. Six months after it cost $2000 new (in 1986 money) apple wasn't supporting it and nobody was writing new software for it.
Never again
Real programmers use butterflies
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That's a long time to bear a grudge!
But no, I don't buy Apple either: overpriced, overhyped, and (if you're honest) not very good. The people who complain how Windows monitors them and won't let them near their own machine should try setting foot outside the Apple ecosystem and see how hard they make it to do anything ...
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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I'd get over the grudge if they changed their behavior.
Real programmers use butterflies
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OriginalGriff wrote: ...the Apple ecosystem and see how hard they make it to do anything ..
That is 100% factual right there.
"One man's wage rise is another man's price increase." - Harold Wilson
"Fireproof doesn't mean the fire will never come. It means when the fire comes that you will be able to withstand it." - Michael Simmons
"You can easily judge the character of a man by how he treats those who can do nothing for him." - James D. Miles
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OriginalGriff wrote: The people who complain how Windows monitors them and won't let them near their own machine should try setting foot outside the Apple ecosystem and see how hard they make it to do anything ...
Tell me about it. I'm suffering through that right now. I've just bought a refurbished Mac mini with Catalina installed. Just tried compiling my software that uses the Tk toolkit, and have discovered that the Cocoa calls that extract a CGGraphics from an NSWindow no just return nil. No reason. Code compiled on a High Sierra works just fine on Catalina, but the same code compiled on Catalina returns nil. Same dynamic libs employed. Tk code is identical versions. 
Now attempting to install High Sierra in a Virtual machine. Had to jump through hoops just to get VirtualBox installed (need to allow Oracle to install stuff your computer, but the notifcation is hidden in preferences panel, so you don't see it). Now trying to get High Sierra installed on the VM, more hoops to jump, which are sufficiently different from the case under High Sierra that its a case of googling to work out what hacks are required. Why, oh why does Apple make it difficult to install their stuff on a virtual machine? It just gets in the way of actually producing the software that runs on their machines.
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honey the codewitch wrote: a nice, stable, OS without all the garbage, that just worked
I have two of them: Ubuntu 18 and Windows 10, dual booted on my PC; both nice and stable. I cannot remember when I last had a Windows hang or crash, probably Windows 7 or even XP.
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The problems i mention are with Win10 and Ubuntu 18.04 LTS. I've run into the GRUB installation issues with 18.04 on my two most recent PCs. Hardware issues on the latter as well in terms of supporting my wifi dongle. Also desktop/window manager issues.
Real programmers use butterflies
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Just like in Richard case (adding my note for mere statistica purposes...), the two of them give a sane feeling of stability here (well Windows 10 actively refuse to handle my old HP scanner, but that's a minor flaw).
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CPallini wrote: Windows 10 actively refuse to handle my old HP scanner
Alas, old scanners are a problem in Win64 ad the TWAIN support is very poor.
There are software as VueScan that could permit to use very old obsolete scanner with Windows x64 versions.
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Plus 1 for VueScan, has kept my $$$ slide/negative scanner going quite nicely.
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I too, thanks to VueScan, was able to reuse an old Epson scanner with negative film scanning capability. 
I wrote some applications in windows that use scanners, and I discovered very early that most scanners, both old and new, do not have native 64-bit twain support. Only WIA. If I remember correctly there is a layer inside twain to access wia scanners but not vice versa, at least that I know of. VueScan probably accesses old scanners "directly" bypassing the wia or twain layers of the operating system.
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I'm currently using Linux Mint (based on Ubuntu 18.04) and the scanner support is the best I've ever had on an OS. I was blown away by how easy it was to use the network scanner.
In terms of general hardware support - I've found Linus to be very good. It seems that only the special gear is a problem. So far the only thing I've not got to work is the Guitar USB integration for a game I bought a while back.
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Now that's interesting. Thank you.
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honey the codewitch wrote: Is it really too much to ask?
Ah, that is why I am working in embedded -> Only the necessary and sometimes even less.
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But do you run your IDE on an embedded system? That would show real commitment.
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I can of expected that question, you're the winner.
Yes, I use embedded linux in a VM running on a hitex, remote-controlled by window 95 on a Mac. But I often omit that part and only mention the embedded thing.
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honey the codewitch wrote: What I wouldn't give for a nice, stable, OS without all the garbage, that just worked, and was close looped dev enough that it all worked together consistently, and supported my hardware.
I'm a big fan of virtualization as, for me, it solves a lot of problems. I've got one beefy system, and the key to running things smoothly lies in dedicating separate VMs to separate tasks. If you load everything on one system (whether physical or virtual), sooner or later you risk getting into a situation where you have "too much to lose" if it goes down. So it helps to keep tasks segregated. If my VM host dies, I don't care, I know firsthand that moving VMs to another host, while not trivial, is absolutely feasible. I've gone through that experience years ago with one of the original Sandybridge motherboards that had SATA ports that would die randomly. I have nothing installed on the VM host OS, other than motherboard-specific drivers and that sort of thing. I practically live in RDP, remotely connecting to the individual VMs as needed.
Any hardware that doesn't work in a VM gets hooked up to a separate physical machine, which can be a lot cheaper. You could use that one for your MIDI hardware, and RDP into your VMs.
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Yeah, I mean, Ideally I'd have a separate machine for my digital audio workstation but the trouble is that
A) I develop audio stuff, and I need functioning MIDI and audio
B) I don't have the money or space to maintain two desktops.
Real programmers use butterflies
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Then it sounds to me like you might need to try different hypervisors - and settle on one that will let you tinker with your MIDI hardware within a VM, despite the hardware being abstracted.
Or use only your MIDI stuff on the host, and have it serve double duty in also running VMs. Not quite as segregated, but if you can only have a single system, that might be your best alternative.
Do you have a need for both the host and some software running in a VM accessing the MIDI interface? That's where things might break down - if you can't run that software outside of a VM, then you're placing more and more on the host.
Beyond this, I'm just talking out of my a$$ as I don't know your specific requirements.
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I hear you and have come to the same conclusion. Currently I can't run all my DAW gear in the host because its linux. the next host will be win10
Real programmers use butterflies
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The only problem I have with running everything on Win10 (Enterprise, because that's how I roll) is Sonar grabs exclusive control of the sound. Is that how ASIO works? No idea, don't care. A minor inconvenience.
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Yes, that's how ASIO works. It's the price you pay for low latency. Some DAWs, like FL Studio (my DAW of choice) have the option of either ASIO or the DirectSound driver. With DirectSound it doesn't lock out your sound for other apps. It's not as low latency as ASIO technically, but with a modern computer it almost doesn't matter anymore. Bottom line is you can use DirectSound if your DAW will let you and you'll probably be fine.
Real programmers use butterflies
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Quote: Registry bloat is the most likely culprit, but series of service packs and patches can't help.
Guess who's the biggest culprit regarding registry? 
honey the codewitch wrote: What I wouldn't give for a nice, stable, OS without all the garbage, that just worked, and was close looped dev enough that it all worked together consistently, and supported my hardware.
Windows 7 used to be that, until they started adding telemetry spyware via automatic (optional) updates, and then forcing it on every machine with cumulative updates. While the cumulative updates did help regarding the registry (it still grew, but not as fast as it used to), I hate MS for rolling optional telemetry updates into these. I got so tired of removing that crap over and over again that i finally decided to set my boxes to manual update only. Unfortunately, this only delayed the actual problem, because there was no way to only apply security updates without installing previous cumulative updates 
GOTOs are a bit like wire coat hangers: they tend to breed in the darkness, such that where there once were few, eventually there are many, and the program's architecture collapses beneath them. (Fran Poretto)
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You need to use PCI pass-through, I think that would fix your midi problem, unless your hardware is not Linux compatible. The whole USB controller needs to be passed to the VM. I got a PCI USB card for that purpose in my rig.
I am running Xubuntu host with Xubuntu guest (safe web browsing) and Windows 10 guest (gaming only). The three are isolated from each other (AMD cpu, memory, most hardware, only the keyboard, mouse, and monitor are shared) by the kernel. The Win 10 VM has it's own AMD GPU / Samsung NVME for gaming.
My setup has been very stable, more so than most Win 10 installs. I think the key is being very picky on the hardware choices. I built this rig over a year ago.
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