I have used Windows all my life, and I have some questions.
Basically the forced shift to the enshittified Windows 11 in october has me eyeing the fence a lot. But all I know about Linux is 1: it's a cantankerous beast that can smell your fear and lack of computer skills and 2: that's apparently not true any more? Making the change has slowly become a more real possibility for me, though I'm pretty much a fairly casual PC-user, I don't do much more than play games. So I wrote down some questions I had about Linux.
Will my ability to play games be significantly affected compared to Windows?
Can I mod games as freely and as easily as I do on Windows?
If a program has no Linux version, is it unusable, or are there workarounds?
Can Linux run programs that rely on frameworks like .NET or other Windows-specific libraries?
How do OS updates work in Linux? Is there a "Linux Update" program like what Windows has?
How does digital security work on Linux? Is it more vulnerable due to being open source? Is there integrated antivirus software, or will I have to source that myself?
Are GPU drivers reliable on Linux?
Can Linux (in the case of a misconfiguration or serious failure) potentially damage hardware?
And also, what distro might be best for me?
PerogiBoi
in reply to ssillyssadass • • •Your questions will have different answers depending on which flavour of Linux you choose.
A good chunk of windows programs can be run using a program called “WINE”. WINE is just a command line program but you can get a GUI version easily.
Updates depend on your flavour but Debian based Linux (like Ubuntu) you just type “sudo apt get update” and then “sudo apt get upgrade” and bam everything is updated. No restart required.
If a program doesn’t work in Linux there can be workarounds or alternatives but that really depends on what program you are talking about.
You can play almost every game that exists on steam on Linux with the exception of games that have kernel level anti cheat like some competitive multiplayer games.
You’re arguably safer security-wise on Linux. Most people are on windows so that’s the majority of all viruses. Your security updates are included in system updates. No antivirus required.
I have never heard of Linux damaging hardware. I don’t think you need to worry about this.
Recommendation: get Bazzite. It’s a special type of Linux that is closest to a windows experience than anything else. It won’t let you do dumb things and mess up your install. It has all NVIDIA drivers preinstalled as well as gamepad drivers and everything you’d need for gaming (including dock support). It’s a no configuration needed OS. Linux on easy mode. You don’t even need to use the command line ever. Updates and apps are installed through the Linux equivalent of the Microsoft App Store (except this time it is great and doesn’t suck). And I say this as someone who only used windows until 15 years ago I messed around with Ubuntu and other Debian based Linux distributions.
IHave69XiBucks
in reply to ssillyssadass • • •Will my ability to play games be significantly affected compared to Windows?
Not significantly as long as you are on the right distro for it.
Can I mod games as freely and as easily as I do on Windows?
no. mod managers can work but its definitely not as easy. If you use steam workshop it works great usually, but something like vortex is gonna be a pain in the ass.
If a program has no Linux version, is it unusable, or are there workarounds?
You can run windows programs with wine. It's not that difficult to do. Its how games work on Linux that dont have linux support.
Can Linux run programs that rely on frameworks like .NET or other Windows-specific libraries?
Usually you can get it to work. I have run across some specific programs for my job that simply wont work with wine, but they barely work on windows as it is. It may need fiddling with tho.
How do OS updates work in Linux? Is there a “Linux Update” program like what Windows has?
Sometimes. It depends on the distro. Mint has an updater where you click update and ur done basically. Others you go in and do a terminal command which changes by package manager. For like OS version jumps if your not on a rolling release distro then it can be a bit of a bigger job. I recently updated my computer from Debian Bookworm to Debian Trixie. I went into the sources replaced bookworm with trixie, and ran the full upgrade command. Then rebooted and had to ctl alt f4 into terminal nuke gnome and reinstall that. Which is expected in that case. It can be a bit techy at times for something like that but for a normal update on a distro with a GUI updater its a button click. Usually no reboot needed either.
How does digital security work on Linux? Is it more vulnerable due to being open source? Is there integrated antivirus software, or will I have to source that myself?
Dont download shit you shouldnt download. If your not sure if something has a virus or not you can get tools to scan for them, but windows is similar in that your main protection is just not doing something dumb. You can keep regular backups and if somehow you mess something up or get a virus just restore from it. PikaBackup works well.
Are GPU drivers reliable on Linux?
AMD is flawless usually. Nvidia i dont use but hear it can be more of a hassle. With AMD the drivers will come preinstalled with your distro usually. Some do Nvidia too some dont. There is an open source and proprietary nvidia driver you have to pick which one you want. Id research it for your specific card.
Can Linux (in the case of a misconfiguration or serious failure) potentially damage hardware?
No more than windows can. If you try to overclock without proper cooling or something for example. Thats BIOS stuff usually tho not an OS thing.
And also, what distro might be best for me?
Maybe Nobara since you like gaming? Or Linux Mint its beginner friendly.
gutter564
in reply to ssillyssadass • • •A lot of great questions. I think many details are already out there but I'll try to answer some to my best ability.
Answering the easier questions: Most games work check protondb.com for your specific games. There is a "Linux update" button on some popular mainstream linux distros - and it will never force you! Its also possible to update without rebooting for most updates (how great right?) No antivirus needed and it's more secure (but of course not invulnerable!)
Some of the other questions have a "It depends..up until a point" answers.
There are work arounds for non Linux programs....except for specific examples like some games. Valorant for example.
I'm not a modder or .NET expert but there's something called Wine which should help with that ...so answer is probably Yes-with caveats.
I'd recommend thinking about what are you "must work" deal breakers for work/hobbies (more specific than these more general questions) and considering if linux is for you. The distros that might work for you are Pop OS! and Linux Mint.
The neat thing is you can try these for free and hop around. I dual booted windows and Linux for a while before making the full time switch.
gutter564
in reply to gutter564 • • •On the GPU thing.
NVIDIA: stable but need to do some work to install.
AMD: don't need to do anything.
And also, you are highly unlikely to damage your hardware through misconfiguration. Imagine if it was easy to do that, I doubt Linux would be used for servers powering the Internet and phones around the world if that were the case
afk_strats
in reply to ssillyssadass • • •No. Thanks to Steam Deck, most popular windows games also work on Linux. See protondb.com/ for a complete list of 18,000 titles.. Someone already mentioned that kernel level anti-cheat is the big, obvious blocker.
~~Im guessing that most moders target Windows users therefore, don't think mods would be AS easy. Not saying modding wouldn't exist or work at all.~~ Edit: see sp3ctr4l's reply to this comment. They know more than me
There are workarounds. Linux has some great alternative software to popular paid stuff. See LibreOffice or Krita.
There are also more advanced options to run Windows apps under Linux, see Wine or Virtual Machines
Yes. Similar to the above answer/ similar to aforementioned Proton. For .NET specifically, there is a Linux runtime.
This can depend a lot on what distribution you're running, but definitely, there are ones with easy buttons for whole-system updates.
It's different and probably overall better than windows. Most distros are much better out of the box than windows.
Open source is ususually a security advantage because (long story short) security mistakes can be caught by more people.
I don't have a good answer for you on anti virus. I am very privacy and security conscious and I dont use one on linux. My personal opinion is that you don't need one and shouldn't need one if you're not downloading sketch stuff.
Totally. GPU drivers are much, much better than they used to be.
Theoretically. You would have to try really hard, but for normal use, no. More likely, you could lose data or access to the system if you misconfigure stuff (just like with Windows)
Distro recommendations. My personal opinions, don't flame me.
* Bazzite. hard to mess up, gamer focused, super simple updates, and targeted support for gamer hardware. Feels like a cross between steam deck and windows. Less support for tinkering but if you never want to touch the terminal, this is my choice.
Aedis
in reply to afk_strats • • •But in all seriousness, don't use arch as a Linux noob.
sp3ctr4l
in reply to afk_strats • • •To add in about game modding on Linux:
github.com/limo-app/limo
flathub.org/apps/io.github.lim…
Limo is a universal mod manager that is linux native.
And I do mean universal. It'll work with literally any game, you just have to take a bit of extra time to configure things for games that do not yet have a supported preset configuration out of the box... but at this point, that includes most games that are generally reliant on some kind of mod manager type program on Windows, to keep track of 10s or 100s of simultaneous mods.
It works very much along the same lines as something like Mod Organizer 2, though there are some differences, read the wiki.
It sets up a virtual file system that allows mods to be set up outside of the main game directory itself, and will override them such that the mods actually load, but they can be 'undeployed' to revert back to vanilla, you can set up different profiles of different mod configurations and deploy/undeploy what you like.
It can also manage load orders, supports formats such as fomod and similar for games like Fallout New Vegas and Skyrim, you can set up tags and category groupings, and it also shows you conflicts between mods down to the specific files, showing you a chain of overwrites to the final file from the final loaded mod.
~~It doesn't support things like LOOT, which purport to autogenerate correct load orders... but frankly, thats fine, because shit like that doesn't even work properly in situations you'd use it in on Windows 90% of the time.~~
EDIT: Wow, apparently it does support LOOT now, it did not a few updates ago.
...
I have successfully gotten FONV working using Limo to set up uh... there's a variant of the Viva New Vegas mod setup guide aimed at Steam Deck users, but it tells you to set up Mod Organizer 2 on the Deck... which you can do, but its rather input laggy and there are other inconveniences...
Here it is, Mirelurked Viva New Vegas:
ashtonqlb.github.io/mirelurked…
I had to alter a few steps from this to get it working with Limo, but they were basically just... set up Limo instead of MO2, and you have to handle NVSE a bit differently, because it literally replaces/overrides the entire main game exe.
...
I have also used Limo to mod Cyberpunk 2077, works with more in depth frameworks like CET, RedExt, etc, as well as using the Decky Framegen plugin to insert FSR 3.1 Upscaling and Framegen into CP77, which gives better quality and fps than the official FSR 2 and 3 implementations that come with the vanilla game and are vanilla supported on a Deck.
You basically just have to launch the vanilla game via the normal launcher first, check the 'enable mods' switch, fully load the game...
Then you can set up the Framegen mod, which adds a custom command in steam to the launch parameters... and then you can also setup the 'skip intro' mod, which is reliant on both the mod being present, as well as additional command line parameters...
There are a bunch of reddit posts complaining that the FrameGen mod doesn't allow other additional launch arguments, but they are wrong.
All you have to do is append those additional launch args ... at the end of the FrameGen mod's launch arg. This just doesn't seem to be explicitly documented anywhere, by anyone... I may have been the first person to figure this out?
Anyway, after that bit of silliness, setting up other mods for CP 77 using Limo is fairly straightforward.
...
... I am doing all this on Bazzite on a Deck, but you could do it on... presumably any linux distro that supports flatpaks and proton (the translation layer that allows Windows games to run on Linux).
There will always be a few 'weird' mods that are just totally reliant on a whole bunch of Windows specific things to work, or just cannot be made to work without actually overwriting some core game files in the main, real directory itself...
And, some of these mods will require a windows component dependency, like vc_2017 or vc_2022, you set those up with something like ProtonTricks or SteamTinkerLaunch to modify the proton config per game, instead of trying to install the exe system wide as 99% of the windows oriented mods will tell you to do...
But so far, I have found either my own solutions for these cases, or someone else already has, or someone has just made basically a linux compatible equivalent for such a windows reliant mod.
... You can also just choose to run MO2 on Linux, it will work, its just... buggy, and overlycomplicated, imo, you've got to set up a custom wineprefix for the MO2 UI to not do dumbshit, give it thr dependencies it needs, and then you've got to do this for each different game you want to mod with MO2.
I found that Limo is sufficiently capable and much less hassle to use once you take the time to understand its differences from MO2.
EDIT:
Also, for anti virus, ClamAV exists. I... think it is literally the only AV for linux?
Mirelurked - Viva New Vegas
MirelurkedAlligatorBlizzard
in reply to sp3ctr4l • • •oni ᓚᘏᗢ
in reply to ssillyssadass • • •The are plenty answers already, but also I will respond in order to give you more opinions, so, you can have a more open view about what users do think about linux.
Yes. In windows you put the .exe in some folder and then double click to play it, easy. Nowadays games come with a client, like Rockstar Social Club, or the Ubisoft launcher that handles your account and manages game updates. In linux, even if you had only the .exe you still had to make an uncertain number of tweaks to achieve running the game, but, with the clients, you need to do both, find the correct tweaks to run the client and do the correct tweaks to run the game next. Even with modern solutions, like Proton, we strugle with games running in Linux. See there are no silver bullets.
If you find trouble modding games on Windows, you also will have a bad time in linux.
You can use WINE to give it a shot. There is a probability that works very well. But, like games, you will need to make tweaks to work properly. I had this problem with Rufus, there is not linux version, so you can run it with WINE, the problem is that Rufus under WINE doesn't reconogize your usb pendrives. Till this day I do not know how to fix that.
Thankfully we have dotnet core now, the thing is that the library or software must have been compiled with it to work in linux. There is also Mono.
If you use a distro, like Linux Mint, there will be a job that will check for updates and then warn you. Normally, updates are done manuallly (
sudo apt-get update, for example). The other thing is doing your own update script job that runs automatically weekly or monthly.This is a computers knowledge concern, most linux distribution have this disabled by default. Your resposability as linux administrator is set up your own security metrics. I use fail2ban, ufw, clamav and openssh. Very basic, if you ask me.
With AMD hell yes. But, since I have never used Nvidia before my answer here could not be the most valuable, empirically speaking.
The most probably thing that can happen to you is break your boot system. Hardware will be fine and you can always reinstall Linux/Windows with its default boot.
As you want to play games, and, I do imagine that you also want linux as you main PC, I would recommend Linux Mint to start, all the documentation avaible for debian easily apply for Linux Mint, I mean, if you can't find some specific solution in the Linux Mint documentation.
My last two cents are the next ones: if you can, use windows just to play things and use linux for everything else. It works for me and may work with you. Cheers.
1986 paper on software project management by Fred Brooks
Contributors to Wikimedia projects (Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.)Ulrich
in reply to ssillyssadass • • •If you play competitive multiplayer online games, yes. Otherwise, no.
Depends on how you mod games. But probably yes. The NexusMods app is newly available for Linux but with very minimal support at this point.
It depends. Sometimes you can run them through WINE/Bottles. The main place you may run into problems is in peripherals.
Through WINE/Proton, yes.
Depends on your distro. I use Bazzite and updates take place seamlessly in the background so you don't need to do anything.
Kind of a vague question. Keep in mind pretty much every server on the planet runs Linux, including incredibly sensitive ones.
Quite the opposite.
Every modern OS has antivirus built in, and third party solutions should be avoided like the plague.
As long as you're not using Nvidia.
Not anymore than any other OS can.
That is an eternal argument in the space. There are 2 recommendations that come up most often for beginners: Linux Mint and Pop!_OS. Although I don't like either of those visually, so I can heartily recommend Bazzite for beginners. I won't go into too many details as to why but it comes with lots of goodies and configurations "out of the box" that enhance and simplify the experience, especially for gamers.
_____
in reply to ssillyssadass • • •All your concerns are valid and Linux handles all these well except:
If you play competitive games with kernel anti cheat it will simply not work on Linux courtesy of the game developers.
Linux is fully capable of running the game and the anti cheat but the game developers restrict it. Notable games are cod, fortnite, apex legends.
A notable competitive game that works on Linux is cs2 although you won't be able to run 3rd party anti cheat like FACEIT as far as I know.
You can use the proton site to tell you how many of your games on your steam library are playable on Linux.
I'm on my 8th month or so using Linux to game and I've had no issues, most popular games will work. Most niche games use very simple tech like SDL and will just work.
Wine essentially creates a fake windows environment and handles a lot of internal API calls by kind of redirecting them to existing Linux services, so a lot of windows stuff will just work.
As for security. You realize most of the Internet runs on Linux ? Practically the majority of the internet is hosted on Linux machines.
hperrin
in reply to ssillyssadass • • •First off, welcome to the light side.
It will be affected, but not significantly. Almost every Windows game works well on Linux. The notable exceptions are games that use anticheat software. They can detect that they are running in Linux and generally disallow it.
Many games perform better in Linux. A few perform worse. The vast majority perform exactly the same.
If you run games through Steam, everything should just work. You might need to enable the option “Enable Steam Play for all titles” in the settings. Honestly, if a game has a Linux version, I usually set the compatibility option in Steam to use Proton instead, because it just works, really well.
If you run other games, I recommend using Heroic Launcher for the game stores it supports, and Lutris for anything else. (Oh, and Prism Launcher if you play Minecraft.)
Something to note is that Windows games run through a compatibility layer called Proton, which is based on Wine. You can kind of use the terms Proton and Wine interchangeably, because Proton is just Wine + some enhancements for games. To the game’s perspective, it’s just running in Windows and making Windows system calls. Proton translates those calls to Linux system calls. It doesn’t emulate anything though, it just provides a Windows compatible API.
Maybe. Probably. If it’s running in Proton, then mods should work fine. You may need to add some launch parameters in Steam to load the mods first. You’ll also need to figure out the “Wine prefix” of the game to install the mod. The prefix is just the directory that Proton presents to the game as the C: drive, so it’s like having a specific drive for each game.
This depends. Most programs will run through Wine. You can use Lutris to install them. I do this to run WinSCP on Linux. Some programs (notably, Adobe Creative Suite) don’t work with Wine. It’s usually better to find a Linux native alternative instead, but this isn’t always an option, so it’s nice to have some Wine once in a while. ;)
Yes. Steam, Heroic, and Lutris will automatically install them for you.
OS upgrades are a lot easier in Linux. There’s one program that updates all your system software and apps at once. On Gnome, it’s Gnome Software, and on KDE, it’s Discover. This is also where you go to install apps. Don’t ever download anything from a website to install it (with the exception of Windows installers that you will be installing with Wine), just find it in these apps. It’s safer.
System software is installed through the package manager. Apps can be installed through Flatpak to make it easier.
Security is generally better than Windows. Most Linux users don’t bother with antivirus for two reasons, viruses are really uncommon in Linux, and software isn’t installed from random websites, but package managers instead. A lot of things in Linux, like Flatpaks, are run in a sandbox too, so access controls are granular and permission based.
That being said, if you’re installing Windows software with Wine, then you’re at risk of installing a Windows virus on your Linux machine. Just like most Windows programs work well in Linux through Wine, most Windows viruses work well in Linux through Wine.
Very. If you’re using an Nvidia GPU, install the Nvidia driver through your package manager. If you’re using anything else, they’re already installed.
Probably not. Technically, yes, but it’s extremely unlikely and isn’t something you should worry about. Windows can too, btw.
Fedora, Mint, or Pop OS should be your starting points. Steer clear of Ubuntu. Ubuntu used to be very user friendly, but lately it’s been atrocious. Fedora has always been awesome, and it’s very user friendly. Same with Mint.
More importantly, what desktop environment should you use. Fedora Workstation offers both Gnome and KDE, the two big ones. Either one will work great for you, but KDE is more similar to a Windows layout by default. Mint uses Cinnamon, which is very user friendly and similar to a Windows layout. Pop OS uses Cosmic, which is new, and in development. It’s promising though.
Some final thoughts I want to share with you:
Linux uses a Unix like file structure, so you don’t have drive letters. Instead, you have a root file system, and other file systems are mounted within it. Your root file system is just a slash
/. It’s like your C: drive. Directories are separated by forward slashes, not backslashes. Not something you should worry about, just something to know.Linux is a diverse field of operating systems, and some work very differently than others. They range from super easy and approachable, to wildly difficult to learn. Some are specialized for gaming, like Bazzite, while others are general purpose, like the ones I mentioned above. Technically, “Linux” is just the kernel, like “NT” on Windows, but most people mean a complete operating system when they say Linux.
You should learn about the difference between Wayland and X11. Just some basic overview of them. You don’t really need to know, but it might be worth it. Basically, Wayland is new and more secure, X11 is old and less secure. Wayland can run X11 apps just fine, so it really shouldn’t matter to you. Wayland is also the default nowadays.
You probably won’t need to use the terminal, but if you do, don’t be scared of it. It’s just a way to launch programs that generally don’t have a UI.
Lastly, Linux is free and easy to install, so don’t be afraid to try out a bunch of different distros and desktop environments and see which works best for you. Once you find one you like, you can always switch to something else in the future if it stops working for what you need. Also, backup early and often. I use Pika Backup. It’ll help if you forget to grab something before you reformat your drive.
teawrecks
in reply to ssillyssadass • • •It depends on how often you play games with aggressive anti cheat, or games on non-steam platforms. Games like Valorant and Fortnite probably won't work at all. But I do a ton of non-competative multiplayer (and single player) gaming that is not inhibited at all.
Heroic launcher is your best bet for non-steam platforms (GoG, Epic, Amazon), and lutris/bottles should probably be your 3rd option (I've used both for battle.net). But steam games
running through proton should "just work".
The actual modding should be arguably more accessible. You technically have control over the entire kernel, so nothing is going to stop you from doing whatever you want. The only problem you may run into is if you're dependent on modding tools that were only made for windows. Some of those tools are basically spyware anyway (ex. Curse), and often times the open source community has made its own alternative you should be using instead.
YMMV. Valve has done a lot of heavy lifting to get proton to be a one-stop-shop for running windows games on Linux but you can add a program as a non-steam game, launch it through steam, and it often just works.
Wine is your other option. Sometimes the community has gotten windows apps running reliably in wine or proton, other times no one has ever tried it or it's too much of a headache to get working. protondb.com has user reports for how various games run.
The short version is yes. The long version is the same as the previous answer.
Most distros come with some form of package manager that works similarly to an app store on your phone (an app store is basically a package manager with purchases). Ideally, everything you want to run can be installed through the distro's package manager, and then you use the package manager to update everything. But sometimes the software doesn't exist in the package manager, and you have to download, run, update, and sometimes even build from source, your own programs. Those programs usually have a guide on the best way to run it on popular distros.
It is actually more secure due to being open source. Source code can be audited by anyone rather than relying on "security by obscurity". There are antivirus programs, but I don't know much about them. Generally, don't run programs from shady sources, don't expose your machine to the open internet, and don't run everything as root and you should be fine.
Yes, though historically AMD has better support for the newer features asked for by Linux compositors (namely Wayland). Nvidia's drivers are still not fully open source, but otherwise work fine. Driver bugs are rare in my experience.
To the same extent that windows can, yes. But if your concern is YOU misconfiguring something to cause Linux to do that, you shouldn't have to worry about it. It is unlikely you will be interfacing directly with the kernel at all. Most distros configure the kernel in some specific way they want and you never worry about it. And still, a proper kernel-level driver should ensure that it will never send commands that could damage something, even if the config vars are incorrect.
First off, install Ventoy to a USB drive. Then take advantage of Linux's ability to "live boot" by downloading several .iso's for several different distros onto the USB. Then boot off the USB, and you should be presented with a handy menu of ISOs to pick from. This will make trying out a bunch of different options really easy, without actually installing anything to your hard drive.
I'd say try grabbing mint, fedora, Pop!Os, and opensuse to start. Maybe also try Zorin. These are all geared toward new Linux users.
shapis
in reply to ssillyssadass • • •People have answered most questions. The gaming thing is a total lie though.
Some specific games will work kinda okay. The vast majority will work worse. And a good chunk of super popular games won’t work at all. Just dual boot and keep gaming on windows.
People in here straight up lie to push for Linux when it’s really not necessary. It’s great at what it does. And it’s improving in what it doesn’t.
hperrin
in reply to shapis • • •What are you talking about? Out of the 248 games in my Steam library, 190 of them are rated as working on Linux (Steam Deck Verified and Steam Deck Playable). 21 of them are untested, which means only 37 of them are rated as unplayable. Of those most are unplayable because they’re either VR games or they have restrictive anticheat. Some of them, like Medium, say they’re unplayable but work fine for me. I’m assuming that’s because the Steam Deck isn’t powerful enough to play Medium at more than 15 fps, but on my PC, it runs around 100 fps. Others, like GTA V, say they’re unplayable, even though I’ve fully played through them with no issue, even on the Steam Deck. I’m guessing that’s because GTA Online has anticheat, but I’ve played the single player and online and both have worked fine for me. (I just looked it up. They added BattleEye to GTA Online late last year, so yeah, GTA V is rated unplayable, even though the Story Mode is fully playable.)
I’ve even gotten games that refuse to work on Windows (like the original American Mcgee’s Alice and the original Journeyman Project) running great in Linux.
After running through a few of the untested games, some of them are untested, even though they have native Linux ports that run just fine. I’m assuming that’s because they haven’t been tested specifically on the Steam Deck.
Other than the ones with restrictive anticheat, everything I’ve tried from my Epic Games library works great too.
Of the games I play, almost none of them have worked worse on Linux than they do on Windows. Most work exactly the same, and a few work better. One (exactly one) has worked worse, for about a month, then a new version of Proton fixed the missing cutscenes.
Communist
in reply to ssillyssadass • • •Note here, a lot of people are going to recommend you mint, I honestly think mint is an outdated suggestion for beginners, I think immutability is extremely important for someone who is just starting out, as well as starting on KDE since it’s by far the most developed DE that isn’t gnome and their… design decisions are unfortunate for people coming from windows.
I don’t think we should be recommending mint to beginners anymore, if mint makes an immutable, up to date KDE distro, that’ll change, but until then, I think bazzite is objectively a better starting place for beginners.
The mere fact that bazzite and other immutables generate a new system for you on update and let you switch between and rollback automatically is enough for me to say it’s better, but it also has more up to date software, and tons of guides (fedora is one of the most popular distros, and bazzite is essentially identical except with some QoL upgrades).
How common is the story of “I was new to linux and completely broke it”? that’s not a good user experience for someone who’s just starting, it’s intimidating, scary, and I just don’t think it’s the best in the modern era. There’s something to be said about learning from these mistakes, but bazzite essentially makes these mistakes impossible.
Furthermore because of the way bazzite works, package management is completely graphical and requires essentially no intervention on the users part, flathub and immutability pair excellently for this reason.
Cinnamon (the default mint environment) doesn’t and won’t support HDR, the security/performance improvements from wayland, mixed refresh rate displays, mixed DPI displays, fractional scaling, and many other things for a very very long time if at all. I don’t understand the usecase for cinnamon tbh, xfce is great if you need performance but don’t want to make major sacrifices, lxqt is great if you need A LOT of performance, cinnamon isn’t particularly performant and just a strictly worse version of kde in my eyes from the perspective of a beginner, anyway.
I have 15 years of linux experience and am willing to infinitely troubleshoot if you add me on matrix.
Fatur_New
in reply to Communist • • •Source?
Communist
in reply to Fatur_New • • •It runs x11, the wayland port is going insanely slow, x11 has the following problems every time:
It may support these someday, maybe. But progress is absurdly slow.
Support HDR (#1037) · Issues · xorg / xserver · GitLab
GitLabFatur_New
in reply to Communist • • •And Wayland isn't very well tested yet. We should only give a very well tested display server to very new users. They must not get a bad impression
Communist
in reply to Fatur_New • • •That would've been true 5 years ago. Wayland is plenty tested these days, give me some data indicating the rate of issues is significantly higher and I'll agree, elsewise I think the most secure well supported option is the best one. X11 is being deprecated left and right for a reason.
gnome is wayland by default, kde is wayland by default, even XFCE is transitioning to wayland at this point... that's just not a valid argument in the modern era.
Fatur_New
in reply to Communist • • •If it's still being tested, then it isn't for very new users
Communist
in reply to Fatur_New • • •Fatur_New
in reply to Communist • • •Testing phase, not stable phase (yet).
Communist
in reply to Fatur_New • • •Fatur_New
in reply to Communist • • •Communist
in reply to Fatur_New • • •Fatur_New
in reply to Communist • • •Oh, it is work. Good then
Yup
Communist
in reply to Fatur_New • • •Fatur_New
in reply to Communist • • •No
Communist
in reply to Fatur_New • • •I thought you were referring to having to install ancient drivers that are no longer properly supported, that is still a problem on x.org, but if we use nouveau, the problems go away for the most part.
it appears the only real issue with nvidia drivers from back then on wayland is accelerated xwayland according to the arch wiki. I don't think we shouldn't be recommending wayland because over 10 year old gpus have a relatively minor issue but still work.
Sure, if you have ancient hardware, I actually recommend XFCE, but outside of this one niche case, it's not wise to be recommending it.
Fatur_New
in reply to Communist • • •Linux is popular because it is old hardware friendly
Communist
in reply to Fatur_New • • •Fatur_New
in reply to Communist • • •Yes, it isn't weird. The problem is you want people to leave Xorg meanwhile NVK hasn't finished yet
Communist
in reply to Fatur_New • • •...the vast majority of beginners do not have 10+ year old hardware.
I want everyone except those who use 10+ year old hardware to move, and in fact, that's exactly what i've recommended in the past.
here I am making that exact recommendation:
lemmy.frozeninferno.xyz/post/5…
We shouldn't be recommending things for a tiny niche, we should be recommending what's best on average, and as we learn about the specific needs of a user, then recommend things specifically for that user.
Fatur_New
in reply to Communist • • •In western countries
Communist
in reply to Fatur_New • • •...you mean western countries where nvidia gpu's are the most common?
If we're including beginners in developing countries this is even less common of an issue, when I was in india, not a single person I helped with tech had a graphics card, why would they have a 470 series in an and not an integrated system? It's not even the cheapest choice.
store.steampowered.com/hwsurve…
i mean, look at these stats, it's such a minority it's hardly worth mention. And by the way, if they're not using steam/proton... they probably aren't using xwayland anyway so this doesn't apply to them in the first place.
nvidia.custhelp.com/app/answer…
compare that to the list on the hardware survey and you'll see how unbelievably rare this problem actually is. They don't even make the list, it's less than a 1% issue.
NVIDIA Support
nvidia.custhelp.comFatur_New
in reply to Communist • • •For you
Communist
in reply to Fatur_New • • •Fatur_New
in reply to Communist • • •Communist
in reply to Fatur_New • • •Fatur_New
in reply to Communist • • •Communist
in reply to Fatur_New • • •Fatur_New
in reply to Communist • • •Fact for you again
Communist
in reply to Fatur_New • • •No, it's a fact for everyone.
read: store.steampowered.com/hwsurve…
Steam Hardware & Software Survey
store.steampowered.comFatur_New
in reply to Communist • • •Why did you edit your comment?
NVIDIA Support
nvidia.custhelp.comCommunist
in reply to Fatur_New • • •Fatur_New
in reply to Communist • • •GoodEye8
in reply to Communist • • •I disagree. Obviously the most ideal solution would be the have immutable Mint, but beginners need stability more than they do immutability. I've used mint and my only issue with Mint was that I didn't like how it looked. I'm currently on Bazzite and these are the issues I've ran into:
Every time I start Firefox it asks to be made into the default browser. Even if I click yes it will still ask again next time I start Firefox.
When using the default audio sometimes the audio signal to my monitor cuts off which means I no audio comes from the speakers. If I tell the system to send the audio to my other monitor and back to the one I have hooked on the speakers then it instantly works again. It's almost like the system forgets it has to send out audio. I don't remember what I did to fix it but it definitely wasn't beginner friendly.
Sometimes one of the monitors freezes and only one. The second monitor keeps working just fine. So far haven't found a permanent solution for this issue.
There have also been some minor artifacting that I personally don't consider an issue but someone else might.
Overall I can put up with the issues because I've pretty much conceded that I'm going to have issues. But I don't think new users should be using a system where they're going to run into problems they're most likely not equipped to fix. That why I recommend Mint to newcomers because all the fancy bells and whistles don't matter if the system doesn't work. Mint doesn't have bells and whistles, but it just works.
Communist
in reply to GoodEye8 • • •Here's the problem: what you just did can be done with literally any distro. There are anecdotal stories of every single distro on earth being broken. Even non-linux distros, windows and macos have such stories.
Do you have any actual statistical evidence that fedora works less often than mint?
I've given it to quite a few people and nobody has had any issues. There are anecdotal stories of literally every single distro failing for somebody, them going to another distro and it just working.
here's a counter example: lemmy.frozeninferno.xyz/post/5…
"UPDATE 2: Ok, Fedora seems waaaay more stable than Ubuntu (and Mint). No strangeness like before…"
less up to date software is a double edged sword, if you don't have statistics I don't think you can really make the claim that mint just works when fedora/bazzite don't.
Then there's the things that are objectively broken in mint for everyone until cinnamon properly supports wayland:
GoodEye8
in reply to Communist • • •Communist
in reply to GoodEye8 • • •Simple, it was the best choice for a long time and hasn't done anything to piss people off.
it's no longer the best choice but mint people are still happy so they still recommend it even though it is objectively the wrong choice to start with for a beginner.
GoodEye8
in reply to Communist • • •Communist
in reply to GoodEye8 • • •GoodEye8
in reply to Communist • • •Communist
in reply to GoodEye8 • • •Back then ubuntu had pretty much all of linux cornered, the vast majority of distros were ubuntu based or ubuntu adjacent, and ubuntu was beloved, however, it came with a number of flaws, mint just rectified those flaws and was otherwise basically just ubuntu.
By being ubuntu based and getting rid of the stuff that made people angry, you ended up with a highly supported, beloved distro. These days things have changed, however, fedora is just as if not more well supported than ubuntu, same with arch based distros.
GoodEye8
in reply to Communist • • •Communist
in reply to GoodEye8 • • •That does NOT have very little to do with beginners, being a highly supported distro is one of the most important things for beginners, having guides for how to do things written specifically for your distro is fantastic for new people.
It being beloved is why it's recommended, yes, and that doesn't benefit new people, but that's an obvious reason why one might recommend it...
There's also the fact that it's designed to be easy to use, but that also applies to fedora, and fedora is significantly more well-developed, so it's not really relevant here.
GoodEye8
in reply to Communist • • •Beingly highly supported is a prerequisite to being a good beginner distro, but it's not a reason to recommend a distro. If we take it as a reason then Mint having a GUI is also a reason to recommend to beginners.
This is where we're going to completely disagree. Guides in general are good, but I doubt any beginner actually cares about guides, unless it's a guide telling you what to click where on the GUI. A good beginner distro has to work for the user without the need of any guides.
Instead of playing the prying game where I keep prying until you give straight answers (because people don't love Mint just because it's an Ubuntu fork) I'm just going to conclude that either you deliberately don't want to say why people recommend Mint to beginners or you actually don't know why people recommend Mint. I don't care which it is because both invalidate your opinion of the Mint suggestion being outdated.
Somehow you think the ease of use isn't relevant because it also applies to Fedora, but support is relevant despite it also applying to Fedora? How about some consistency in your arguments.
Communist
in reply to GoodEye8 • • •Mint having a GUI IS a good reason to recommend it to beginners... Arch for example has terrible GUI support, which is why it's not a good choice for beginners (don't get me started on manjaro...)
This is simply not true, i've given linux to countless people, people always google how to do things and end up with guides for a different distro, i've seen this happen countless times because I specialize in giving beginners linux. They absolutely do care about this, and it's extremely commonly cited as one of the reasons to go with mint.
I think it's a bad recommendation mainly made for legacy reasons rather than current ones, that was very clear. Give me reasons it's a good one, I used to use mint, I gave plenty of reasons for why it's a bad choice.
Are you deliberately misinterpreting me? Are you actually trolling here?
My point was obvious, fedora and mint are both equally easy to use, so, ease of use is not a factor when deciding between them... in fact, fedora is EASIER to use (flatpak meaning completely gui updates, kde being hugely standardized and well-developed), so, if it is a factor, it makes fedora a better choice than mint.
It's obvious that ease of use is a massive factor for recommending a distro to a beginner, it's just that ease of use doesn't favor mint.
GoodEye8
in reply to Communist • • •Communist
in reply to GoodEye8 • • •GoodEye8
in reply to Communist • • •The arguments are super simple.
Mint focuses on stability as evident from its decision to use Ubuntu LTS versions as it's base. In case I need to spell it out, LTS versions are generally more stable and reliable.
And you brought up X11 as a negative, but there's a good reason Mint is staying on X11. Yes, Wayland is the future and eventually Mint will adopt Wayland as well, when Wayland becomes more stable. I'm the mean time Mint stays on X11 because X11 is very stable, extremely stable compared to Wayland if you have an Nvidia card.
Mint also has better out the box support. For example to my knowledge for Nvidia Fedora comes with Nouvuea drivers which means for gaming you need to go through an extra process to get proprietary drivers. Mint has out the box support for Nvidia drivers. This is less of a thing when compared to Bazzite, but still a reason why to pick Mint as a beginner distro.
And the reason people recommend Mint is in those first two points. Mint deliberately sacrifices fancy bells and whistles to be as stable as possible. You not knowing that shows how little you know about Mint.
Communist
in reply to GoodEye8 • • •Stability is essential for industry applications, but is actually TERRIBLE for beginners, especially ones that want to game. I could go into the reasons why, but I doubt you care. I don't agree that this is a selling point for beginners in the first place, which is why I didn't mention it. Stability does not mean "does not crash" in a linux context, it means UNCHANGING. Extremely old software is not good for beginners who want things to just work.
Give me evidence that there are more issues with wayland than X11 and i'll believe you.
Bazzite fixes this and is why I recommend it over fedora kinoite. Irrelevant point, not actually true.
Wellp, those are bad points, sorry!
GoodEye8
in reply to Communist • • •Communist
in reply to GoodEye8 • • •I did not invent these definitions, they are industry standard...
bitdepth.thomasrutter.com/2010…
you're very confident and not well informed.
Stable vs stable: what ‘stable’ means in software – The Bit Depth Blog
bitdepth.thomasrutter.comGoodEye8
in reply to Communist • • •From your own article
I'm sorry that English is not my first language and I'm not aware of the subtle difference in meaning you're after, but really all you've proven is that you're a pedantic little troll who understood what I said and still chose to be obtuse about it. Another example how of this discussion is a waste of time.
Communist
in reply to GoodEye8 • • •...but that still means everything I said is correct and you were a jerk to me for being correct, no?
is it my fault you don't know these things and instead of having a learning attitude, you say I have no idea what I'm talking about and am a flat earther when you don't even know what defines a stable distro?
even if I use your uninformed definition it's still wrong... there is no evidence fedora crashes more than mint, or is less reliable...
GoodEye8
in reply to Communist • • •FTFY you little grammar nazi.
Communist
in reply to GoodEye8 • • •This is false, they're just less likely to change. They can crash more frequently.
There's no evidence that X11 is less reliable than wayland, and the reason mint stays on x11 has NOTHING to do with this, and everything to do with cinnamon not yet supporting it...
This is still false, stable distros have worse support out of the box because they use an older kernel version and the kernel ships the drivers.
That set of fixes still left everything being wrong or unsupported by any evidence.
GoodEye8
in reply to Communist • • •Where are your stats for this.
source?
At this point I don't even know what that means because maybe you have some other weird definition to pull out of your ass. Give me that in 5th grader level.
Communist
in reply to GoodEye8 • • •bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.c…
discuss.getsol.us/d/6564-cant-…
discuss.getsol.us/d/4899-let-s…
lts kernels should not be used with newer hardware... because they don't have modern software support, anyone that uses modern hardware risks being unable to boot with them. I shouldn't have said crashes but the issues are numerous.
The second thing doesn't require a source, they don't have the manpower to implement it in cinnamon, look at the github pulse: github.com/linuxmint/cinnamon/…
wiki.debian.org/Wayland debian, notorious for being the most stable distro by far already uses it by default...
i have only used industry standard terminology and what I said is straightforward... kernel has drivers, old kernel no has new drivers, new drivers needed for hardware support, lts kernel old.
Pulse · linuxmint/cinnamon
GitHubGoodEye8
in reply to Communist • • •So you don't have stats you have anecdotal evidence.
It clearly requires a source because Cinnamon 6.0 has Wayland as an experimental support and Mint team has said they are planning to eventually move to Wayland.
For Gnome. You've been pretty much talking about KDE (unless you're now magically going to do a 180 and start saying how Windows users would have a better time learning GNOME), which if you bothered to actually check what you're saying would have noticed the
Clearly implying you should expect running into issues.
Somehow the things you say are straight-forward seem to be nothing but.
In theory. Except in practice we're not talking about kernels that are 5+ years old. Latest Mint version is running on Ubuntu Noble which is using Kernel version 6.8 which supports all the latest CPU-s and GPU-s. Just because it's not using the very latest kernel version doesn't mean it's not capable of supporting the latest hardware.
Pulse · linuxmint/cinnamon
GitHubCommunist
in reply to GoodEye8 • • •Actually, these are appeals to authority, a major distro is telling you not to use LTS kernel versions... people who y'know, have stats
"Recently we have had a number of issues with hardware regressions on the LTS kernels, rendering systems with newer hardware unbootable."
Directly from the source of a major distro... I don't think you actually read my sources.
that's exactly what i've said... nothing i've said contradicts that, just that it's going to take forever for that to get good. Gnome and KDE already have full proper support and have for ages. Cinnamon will take FOREVER.
The hilarity of this is that those issues are BECAUSE of their choice to be insanely stable... modern KDE versions have minimal such issues.
Actually, the problem is more fundamental: lwn.net/Articles/700530/
And maybe it supports the hardware, but there are performance and instability issues that can't or haven't been backported... honestly, don't you think all stable distros would only be using LTS kernels if there weren't issues with them?
Backports and long-term stable kernels [LWN.net]
lwn.netpineapple
in reply to GoodEye8 • • •Communist
in reply to pineapple • • •this is false, rpm-ostree exists and works for this exactly. There's nothing you can't do on bazzite that you can do on a non-immutable distro.
Even if that wasn't true... package management is just done through flatpak, it's just an abstraction layer, I don't see why that would be important to you at all, and comes with numerous benefits:
It not having packages you may need applies to any package management solution, other distros do not package everything either. In fact, the distro with the most packages is an immutable one, nixos.
HiddenLayer555
in reply to ssillyssadass • • •Isn't .NET open source and cross platform now? Isn't there an official Linux runtime? Or is it just the most basic subset of .NET without any of the GUI libraries or other things Windows .NET apps routinely depend on?
mdk_
in reply to HiddenLayer555 • • •There are differences. Most modern apps use .NET Core, which in itself is cross platform. Most of the time, they use a UI framework that is be cross platform as well (AvaloniaUI).
Of course newer apps and older apps made with .Net-Framework that may use Windows specific libraries (eg. System.Windows.Forms, System.Drawing) and lose their cross platform compatibility. They might work with Wine.
rapchee
in reply to ssillyssadass • • •just get an extra ssd, install mint or pop (or both on separate partitions) and try
there is a learning curve, and there's always new stuff, more depth, but imo the above two are fairly easy to understand. pop is more osx-like both in looks but also, it's somewhat locked down, which can feel limiting but it keeps things simple. i've been using it in the last few years daily. i was using mint before that, i started daily driving linux with it, but i managed to mess it up enough that every game was struggling to run lol, but i played hl:alyx on there without an issue for example
nvidia doesn't make the best linux drivers, but some think they are completely unusable but actually it just means that there are some games that are glitchy or slow, for instance forza horizon runs better on my steam deck than my rtx 2080. although recently it went from 20-30 fps to 30-40, so it will get better at some point
edit: actually, the above was last week, there were some updates and it's a sputtery 60 fps now
next build will have an amd card for sure, but nvidia is mostly usable too. the "anti-cheat" blockade is more frustrating imo
Pop!_OS by System76
system76.comSusurrus
in reply to ssillyssadass • • •It is indeed not true anymore. In the year 2025 Linux is easier to use than Windows, and even not too tech savvy 60-year-olds manage just fine. Though you should know 'Linux' is not an operating system. When saying 'Linux', people most often refer to it as a family of operating systems. Many of which are incredibly user friendly and ready out of the box. And many of which aren't.
Short answer: no.
Long answer: only for a handful of online games, e.g. League. If using Steam, there's virtually nothing you have to do. Epic and GOG are easy to use, but theough third party launchers. Other storefronts/launchers are harder to set up, but all of them work. It should be noted Steam is the only platform with official Linux support.
Here is a database of Steam games with info on Linux and Steam Deck compatibility.
Depends on the game. Overall definitely not 'as freely and as easily' as on Windows. For Steam Workshop games, it works just as it does on Windows. For the rest sometimes you need to do a little work, sometimes a lot. Bethesda titles seem to be the most problematic on Linux when it comes to modding.
Most of the time it is fairly straightforward and works nicely. Some are particularly difficult to get working on Linux, e.g. MS Office, so you might as well forget that.
Yes. There is software specifically for compatibility with Windows' libraries. While .NET framework you can simply install like you would on Windows. This is in fact needed in order to mod some games.
As mentioned at the start, Linux isn't a single OS, so it highly depends on the specific distribution (OS from the Linux family, in simple terms). Usually you just go to your app store and click on updates. Of course, there are other ways of updating the system and the choice is yours.
Linux is extremely more secure than Windows. The whole 'open source leads to vulnerability' is a myth. There are antiviruses for Linux, but nobody uses them. There is barely any malware targetting Linux, and when you encounter it, most of the time you'll have to mess up and run it yourself giving it permissions. There are also more security-focused Linux distributions.
Nvidia: not really.
AMD and Intel: yes, incredibly reliable.
For AMD and Intel you don't need any additional drivers, other than the generic drivers that come with the OS. They work perfectly and you can play games right away. For Nvidia you would have to go through the not-so-pleasant process of installing their drivers.
No. This sounds like something somebody who's never used Linux would say on Reddit. While technically it is possible, just as it is possible on Windows, this is not something you will likely encounter at any point.
Personally I'd go with Fedora. It's very easy to use. It looks nice too, kind of like MacOS. By default, that is, since you always have complete freedom to customize how your system looks. My gf, who doesn't know what a Shift key is, is able to use Fedora just fine. For both gaming and web browsing. This is how simple Linux has gotten in the last years.
Most people will probably recommend Linux Mint. Another great choice for beginners. The UI/UX is very similar to that of Windows. Personally it's not my favorite, but it's up to user preference. You definitely can't go wrong with it.
There is also Pop!_OS, which is similar to Fedora. However, it does include an ISO for systems with Nvidia GPUs, so you don't have to go through the trouble of installing the drivers.
I'd highly recommend trying one of these. If you like any of them, then just stick to it, and you'll have a great experience.
chaoticnumber
in reply to ssillyssadass • • •I wont reply point by point because others have already done a fantastic job at that.
Install virtualbox, get some linux images from mint, bazzite or what ever other distro you might want or was recomended and install them as VMs in windows.
Set up a list of things in 3 tiers:
Then in the installed VMs, test out this list, something like "can I change the volume per app, can I change the audio device per app" or what ever is important to you, according to your list.
This way you can test out if its for you or not, you wouldn't even have to leave windows for it.
One thing regarding gaming, as I game quite a bit too - games with intrusive anticheats dont work, most of everything else works with steam proton. Check potondb.com for your games, you will see what works and what not.
Xanza
in reply to ssillyssadass • • •This can either be true, or not true. It depends on which distro you go with, IMO. There are linux distros specifically designed for new user experiences, and then there are "basic" distros which don't do unnecessary hand-holding for those who are used to the *nix desktop experience.
There has never been a better time to try linux.
If you do light computing, then linux is the best case scenario for you. You won't be changing much about the OS, so not much can go wrong. I installed linux for my 65 year old mother 12 years ago or so, and it's never had an issue. So frankly, I wouldn't worry too much about it.
As with all things when it comes to linux, it depends. Some of my favorite games have anti-cheat which has no linux client, so therefore even if you can get the game to work in theory, it won't function because no anti-cheat.
You would be hard pressed to find something which is windows only these days, but even if you do there are virtualization options like WINE or bottles which simulate a windows environment for the application and force it to run under linux anyways.
Sure.
Generally, most people use the command line for updating the system itself, but a lot of distributions come with a "Microsoft Store" type application to give you a GUI to update your OS and applications.
Linux works off a multi-user environment which lends security to the OS. You have a root user, which is your super administrative user, and then normal user accounts which can be added as "administrators" which can then run commands and edit files/settings which are reserved for administrative accounts.
The security is stronger because we know what's in it. Security through obscurity is generally frowned upon, even by NIST.
Generally no, but there still are anti-virus available, like ClamWin.
My heart says yes, but my fingers won't let me type it.
It's technically possible, but you would have to meet a laundry list of conditions for that to happen.
New users seem to really like Mint. But it's exceptionally easy to test different distributions, even directly under Windows using Hyper-V. Test a few out and see if you like em.
Install .NET on Linux distributions - .NET
learn.microsoft.comEarlGrey
in reply to ssillyssadass • • •Depends. Single player games are basically a non-issue. Multiplayer games however? The major anti-cheat systems support linux but it's up to the Devs. They can (and many do) disable support for it regardless if it runs well on linux.
I'm not going to say "yes", because modding can be dodgy, but in my experience I have never had any difference.
Could you narrow it down to some programs? The only answer here is "It depends".
Depends on the framework, but .NET is open source and supported on Linux
Ehhhhhh.....yes but no. OpenSource does mean you loose security through obscurity. But it also means you have a large community of people auditing the code for said vulnerabilities. The decentralized nature of the Linux ecosystem also means bugs can be fixed faster.
Ultimately it doesn't matter. The same rules apply as Windows. Keep your system updated, don't be an idiot, and you've solved most security issues.
AMD? Generally yes.
NVIDIA? .....better than it was a few years ago. Best to ask around about your specific model
Theoretically but that's true of all software (including windows). You'll be fine, don't sweat this.
You click the "Update" button in your Distros "App Store" (it's not an app store but....essentially the same thing) or type in the upgrade command into a Command Line. Then you walk away for a few minutes, brew a cuppa, comment on the weather, and then get back to it. Occasionally you might need to restart but it's not too common.
Now....there's a lot more complexity here that I almost wrote up, but for someone new? This is all you need to know.
"Just tell me what to use": That would be Linux Mint Cinnamon Edition. It's simple, it has everything you'll want, it looks nice.
If you want some other options that are popular with beginners you can look at:
Watch some videos on them and decide which one looks like the one you would like to use. Just focus on the UI because that's the only real important thing you'd need to worry about right now. You can go into the more advanced options when you have a good foundation.
ilinamorato
in reply to ssillyssadass • • •I'm a newcomer to Linux (only about a year in), but here's what I've got so far:
Mine wasn't at all. Valve has done a lot of work to make this seamless so that more games can be played on the Steam Deck. Check the Proton DB to see what your games look like.
I have very little experience with this, but probably. Linux users tend to be tinkerers.
Same answer for both: There's Wine, and a whole bunch of setup scripts that can get even stuff like Adobe Creative Suite working with it. Worst case scenario, there's VirtualBox for the one or two apps you might need to run Windows for. But I find that the open source options, while they might have a learning curve, tend to be substantially better than either of those options.
More or less, but you can pick and choose what updates you want to install and when. Most distros have a package manager that'll let you update the kernel, the drivers, the middleware, the desktop environment, all your apps, and even the package manager itself on your schedule, from one interface. You can also just ignore it and never update anything, though I wouldn't recommend that.
Very well. It's much more locked-down by default, for one thing.
Quite the opposite. Open source projects are well known for being less vulnerable out of the box; Linux in particular is used by huge companies as a lightweight server OS, so it has a lot of highly-paid people committing security fixes back down to the open source project.
Antivirus is a bandaid on Windows, provided because the OS was written with certain naive assumptions that let attackers get access they shouldn't have. On Linux, those assumptions were not made. No application can be installed without your root password, for instance; downloaded files can't even be executed without specifically making them executable; and access to edit system files is restricted by a very robust permissions system.
All of that, plus Linux's much lower market share, also means that no malware authors are really wasting their time trying to write Linux malware. The attack vector just isn't worth the extra effort.
So no, there's no integrated antivirus; but for most users in most situations, it's not needed at all.
Your mileage may vary significantly, but anecdotally it seems like most architectures from AMD and Nvidia have good support.
Maybe, but like with Windows, I assume you have to really go out of your way to do so.
I've only used Ubuntu and Mint. Mint has so far been the easiest and most user-friendly of the two. It's also regularly touted as the best for newcomers.