Thx in advice.
Mint, it just works.
EndeavorOs, just works, like Mint, but Arch Based so much better
Well, I just use arch, btw. 💁🏻♀️
Not exactly the hassle free experience op is looking for
Yea, that is why I recommended Mint in top comment.
With the statement about Arch I wanted to say, that I have no experience with endeavourOS 😂😅
Edit after reading endeavourOS web page: what is even the difference between endeavourOS vs. Installing arch using the archinstall python script and using yay as package manager?
Only the installation is harder for Arch, EndeavorOS is easier to use then Mint, and installation is same thanks to the gui installer.
The difference between Arch with archinstall vs Endeavor is still the ease of installation.
So, the only difference to arch is, that you have a gui for installation? In that case, I like archinstall script more. Mostly because I think it’s faster.
What you think and what is the reality to casual users are two different things
Could you explain a bit about what makes it better?
If you need secure boot on current (like intel gen 10+), Fedora Workstation. If you don’t need secure boot, Linux Mint.
Fedora has the easiest way to make secure boot just work, it will even dual boot fine on the same disk although you should still backup the m$ partition if you actually need it. Fedora can do secure boot even with Nvidia.
Ubuntu can do some of the secure boot stuff like Fedora does, and there is the advantage of the stable kernel if you have Nvidia.
Note that “stable” as a label has nothing to do with its intuitive meaning like alpha/beta/testing/crashing etc. It is a term for servers and people that want to run very specific setups that will not require human intervention on embedded devices and servers. If you want to game or use the latest sw “stable” might be a pain. However, if what you are running is not kept up to date with the latest packages and libraries, a stable release may be the only way to run your stuff.
Overall these are the biggest factors on current hardware; secure boot yes/no, and up-to-date software needs yes/no.
Which of these would you suggest: Debian, Ubuntu, Pop!_OS or Linux Mint?
Mint is easy mode, but has no secure boot shim implemented. It makes gaming accessible.
Pop is made for System76 and does some stuff funny IMO, and is like Mint with no secure boot if you are not running 76’s proprietary bootloader on their hardware
Ubuntu is easy but has its quirks (most are fixed by Mint which is based on Debian/Ubuntu)
Debian is hard mode and is an advanced distro. There are a ton of tools that are unique to Debian. It is used mostly for people running their own servers and custom purpose machines from home or work. It is also the primary distro for hacking hardware and reverse engineering stuff that has no other way to create Linux kernel support.
Every distro has some things that they are specialized for. You can do almost anything with any of them, but it will depend on your skill level. Something to keep in mind here is that Linux is not a consumerism branding contest. We are not choosing our frivolous teams. This is the place where everyone can learn. While beginners and users are welcome, you will find many aspects of Linux are the study and thesis projects for many computer science students. All levels are present here. This is why so many options exist.
Debian is hard mode and is an advanced distro. There are a ton of tools that are unique to Debian. It is used mostly for people running their own servers and custom purpose machines from home or work. It is also the primary distro for hacking hardware and reverse engineering stuff that has no other way to create Linux kernel support.
While I get it I don’t agree with the first part. If you install Debian out of the box with GNOME it will work out just fine for the majority of people, usually it will work out better than Mint, Arch and whatnot because it is a finished and very reliable OS, not something targeted for experimentation.
I wouldn’t recommend Debian to a noob if they’re installing themselves and have no-one to help, because depending ln their hardware, wifi might not work out of the box, and maybe even not ethernet either. Of course it can all be worked out, but I don’t think having to solve that would make a good first Linux experience. If it’s the iso version with the proprietary firmware already in it’s maybe…
because depending ln their hardware, wifi might not work out of the box, and maybe even not ethernet either
I never experienced this with tons of machines, besides Debian now comes with proprietary blobs for that kind of hardware out of the box as well.
. If it’s the iso version with the proprietary firmware already in it’s maybe…
That ISO no longer exists. It’s all now on the base image.
UPDATE 10 Jun 2023: As of Debian 12 (Bookworm), firmware is included in the normal Debian installer images. Source: https://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/unofficial/non-free/cd-including-firmware/
“The Debian official media may include firmware that is otherwise not part of the Debian system to enable use of Debian with hardware that requires such firmware.” Source: https://www.tomshardware.com/news/debian-includes-proprietary-code
Strange, because I installed Debian on a laptop just about a month ago, and the ethernet worked, but not the wifi. I had to follow the advice from this thread to get it working. So either this specific driver is too rare for Debian to have bothered putting it in their default non-free repo, or I somehow downloaded an outdated iso by mistake…
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It is not really a complete experience. It is ugly, and for the type of person that wants to play in the weeds
Wtf are you even talking about? Setup Debian with all the defaults, it’s easier than Windows and you’ll get GNOME out of the box. Ugly?
or figuring out flatpaks
Running 2 commands to get all the flatpak software into the GNOME GUI store is very hard :P
Debian provides a solid out of the box experience, a system that won’t break and will be compatible with most of the decent hardware out there. It won’t complain and bitch, it won’t be an half finished product like Arch. If it’s too complicated just get Ubuntu and enjoy it’s mangled kernel.
Arch / Gentoo are the real “base installs” here, nobody can run those things out of the box without tweaks. Arch doesn’t even have an installer, just a bunch of scripts and 3rd party attempts and making something usable and you’re recommending over Debian that has a full GUI with sane defaults?
I’d go with Mint. They have thought out 99% of the things a user might ask for in a DE, along some basic admin configuration stuff you might need. It’s the best out of the box distro.
Fedora
Linux Mint Cinnamon
Linux mint cinnamon simplex users unite!
I love how simple it is to install and use.
I really wanted to like Mint cinnamon but it didn’t like my dual screen+built in screen on my pc case.
It would try and smush the display for the pc case screen into the monitor displays pushing everything over and making mouse clicks widely inaccurate (the click was half a screens away from the actual cursor).
Only ever had that issue on Mint
I think your best bet for this is one of the spinoffs of enterprise Linux: fedora or openSUSE. both are very solid ootb, and have starting configurations that are generally good.
The microos or silverblue variants respectively are really promising as well, but still have some caveats.
Linux Mint. It’s THE best distro hands down. Those who know, know.
Thx mate 👍👍
Thx cinammon 👍👍
Thx honey 👍👍
Fedora atomic GNOME or KDE.
You don’t mess with the system at all. If you look for something specific, you may find something here https://universal-blue.org/images/ .
I use fedora for the nice OOTB experience, but if there’s issues with parts of the hardware - I try Ubuntu. And if it works, I just install it.
Life’s too short to deal with hardware blobs.
Mint, it’s not the shiniest toy but it really does just work
Linux Mint. Always.
Everytime I want a distro that just works I just roll with Linux Mint.
Being one of the most popular distro if something goes wrong is really easy to find how to fix it .
Debian.
agreed with debian, it’s by far the most stable and no bullshit system i’ve ever used. however, BIG condition: do NOT install .deb files manually. that’s an extremely easy way to break your system. use what’s in the repos, and if it’s not in the repos, use something like flatpak (not sure how well it works for debian since i haven’t used it).
in general though, if you want a stable linux system, just don’t try to install stuff that isn’t packaged in official repos.
Yes, Debian + Flatpak is a good way to have a very reliable system with all the latest software.
If you have Nvidia, pop os has all that built in. My go-to is usually popos, or mint
What do you think about Ubuntu over Mint?
Mint is Ubuntu without snaps.
👍👍
I have an Nvidia GPU and have had a few issues with crashes on Mint even after manually installing the latest drivers. Is PopOS noticeably more stable? Have you by chance played Helldivers on it?
Also it seems like it’s pretty tightly coupled with Gnome and tweaks, is it still adventageous if you use, say, KDE?
I didn’t play helldiver’s, but other games were stable on pop os.
Do live images not exist anymore? Pick a distro, burn an iso to a USB drive and boot it. See if you like it.
You’re just going to get a bunch of personal preferences with such an open ended question.
And for 100% of distros someone will come and say: “except for this where you gotta do this and that but then it works fine”.
That’s the problem I’m looking for something it just works, stable WO errors with updates and simple, just to get things done and not messing entire weeks fixing and searching solutions online for something what didn’t work correctly.
That’s just the nature of linux though. Most common distros run without issue. But people have such a wide variety of hardware and software needs that someone somewhere will tell you they had issues with that distro.
Much easier to boot them and get a feel for the one you like, you are not likely to have an issue, and if you do it will take minutes to fix on a common distro.
openSUSE Tumbleweed is pretty comfy. Btrfs snapshots enabled by default so it’s really hard to break it. I’ve been using it for about 8 months now and haven’t had any big issues.
I tested out Ubuntu, Fedora, and Mint before landing on openSUSE. It by far has been the most stable. Especially when dealing with my Nvidia GPU and getting CUDA working.
