Nonsense. It has always been listed on the box if there is support. Same as all the other OSes. How many times have you bought random used Windows hardware to see if you could install MacOS on it? Nobody buys random Mac hardware to see if they can install Windows on it. There were Hackintosh’s but when some didn’t work out, nobody blamed MacOS. Back when Windows ran poorly on Intel Macs because of poor support, Nobody blamed Windows. It’s a double standard.

Shocker, you bought hardware with a compatible OS. That’s the dudes problem. He didn’t buy hardware compatible for Linux. 1984, so I know you are well aware, you have to buy hardware that is compatible with your OS.

Make Local LUGs Great Again.

No source to compile it yourself?

You have a OnePlus device? You can go to EDL mode to unbrick.

With WINE you wouldn’t need USB pass-through. Only if you are passing the hardware into a Virtual Machine. The pass-through just tells the Host system not handle the device. But you actually want the HOST system to handle the device. WINE is just translation, not virtualization. (or Emulation, haha)

P.S. USB pass-through does work really well in VM’s. If WINE doesn’t work for you. You could always keep around a Windows VM for the occasion you need the msm flash tool.

Msm flash tool

If that’s all you need. I bet you could just run it from WINE. I updated my PS5 controller using the PlayStation flash tool or whatever it’s called. I used Bottles to do all the WINE stuff. Just installed the flash tool and it worked like it was Windows. Pretty shocked if I’m being honest.

Observations.

I’m convinced they all live in the moms’ basement eating chicken tendies.

Negative. Windows on Desktop uses vendor lock-in to maintain it’s user base. It’s been that way for nearly 30 years. People only think they are choosing Windows themselves. Anywhere Microsoft can not enforce vendor lock-in, Linux dominates. Even IoT, a brand new market (well it was brand new ten years ago), 80% dominated by Linux. Microsoft had to make Windows free for IoT and 9" or less devices just to try and be competitive. People only think everything is made for Windows, because OEMs are forced to sell a Windows license with every PC or lose their volume licensing deals. That means every OEM has to spend engineering dollars on Windows drivers, software, and testing. When your business has very thin margins, you can’t afford to have second or even third engineering efforts for competitor OSes. Imagine how Linux would be if PC companies were spending engineering dollars on Linux for the last 30 years. Right now the money comes primarily from server sales money. If there was demand for Linux on Desktop in the workplace, there would be tons of competing FOSS Group Policy implementations.

I’m sure the OS doesn’t have schizophrenia.

More like the “Tech Wizards” like Linus from LTT have the elitist attitude of being good with Windows means they should automagically be “Tech Wizards” with every other OS. Or the elitist attitude of just expecting the hardware you bought that’s Windows compatible should be Linux compatible or it’s a failure of Linux. No body does that when switching from Windows to Mac or Mac to Windows. When upgrading to the latest version of Windows and suddenly your hardware is not compatible anymore, nobody says, OMG all of Windows is a failure. It’s Microsoft’s vendor lock-in strategy that has forced companies to spend their engineering dollars primarily on Windows.

I think people are pretty lucky today, that there is a high probability that their hardware will be supported out of the box with Linux. It never used to be that way. You just bought Linux compatible hardware, just like people bought Windows compatible hardware and Mac compatible hardware. If it wasn’t for the BSOD situation in Windows caused by crappy Windows drivers that forced Microsoft to develop and enforce WHQL certification. OEM manufacturers wouldn’t have all unified around the same IP’s for the components in their machines. This allowed the IP vendor to do the Windows and Linux driver support. With out that, all these Windows users would be stuck with Windows10.

So how about a these “tech wizards” take a bite of humble pie, learn the Linux way of doing things and go to their local LUG and get help, so it is “that easy”. So they spend 20 minutes getting setup and learning the ropes instead of assuming they know everything and expecting everything to be done the Windows way. That’s what we did, twenty and thirty years ago.

I might be there with you. Going to try avoiding the distros that attract the mental-illness crowd first. Maybe I have to go back to Slackware.

lol, 25+ years for me. Fortunately it looks like I just have to avoid certain distros. Hopefully mental-illness will go out of vogue soon, so we can move past all this garbage and get back to computing.

Day 1 title on Linux. Give it a go.

I have a good inverse example. I started a new job as a government contractor. The machine I get is Windows. I need docker-desktop. I have a basic user account. They install docker-desktop. But it doesn’t work for me because I don’t have permissions. I tell them, hey docker says I don’t have the right permissions. They say, oh you have to apply for an elevated Developer account. Which I wont get because I’m a contractor. This is what you are asking about. The Windows way is just to increase the user’s permissions over the entire system. Which is utter bullshit coming from Linux. Anyways, I know the person helping me is just ignorant. And all they did was, next next next accept. But if you look at docker install instructions, for Linux and Windows, they create a docker user group and you just add your account to it. Super easy, and it’s one line in the terminal if you are on Windows or Linux. Windows admins just assume power user for everybody. No concept of localized security. Anyways, round and round with the back and forth, he finally adds me to the docker user group. And it worked, and I didn’t need to have elevated security or apply for a Developer account, wait two weeks doing nothing on the tax payer dime to only get denied.

The goal posts keep moving. I remember when it was the Year of Linux. Linux dominates every market except Desktop and Console. The Year of “Desktop” Linux is what we’ve shifted too. The only thing that’s kept Windows the dominant OS on Desktop is vendor lockin. Windows isn’t even the dominant OS on Azure. How pathetic. Without vendor lockin, Linux would have seen all kinds of money for engineering efforts from PC manufacturers for Desktop. Sad part is, so many people actually think they chose Windows.

“You can have any color car you want, as long as it’s green.” - Comrade Car Salesman