cross-posted from: https://sh.itjust.works/post/16676119
I am seriously considering pulling the trigger on a switch to Linux. Looking for advice and discussion
In terms of hardware, what are some good cost effective resources and what what things might I want to consider differently than what I am used to in both the Mac and Windows worlds? I need smart home management, a plex hub, and photo editing, as well as the usual other stuff.
EDIT: When I say photo editing, I am talking about working with RAW files to optimize the image according to my taste and style. I also make use of software that has good library organization capabilites. In this case, I use CaptureOne. I do not generally do the sort of editing people do in photoshop, putting unicorns in their pictures or whatever people do these days. I’m not opposed to cool creative images or anything, I just don’t go down that route terribly often.
I don’t think you should proactively “switch to Linux”. Instead you should “play with Linux”, ideally duel boot and a day will come when you can’t remember the last time you used Windows.
duel boot
⚔️
Intel or AMD CPU, AMD GPU, any RAM, SSD/NVME, PSU, etc.
For photo editing, if you use Photoshop, you should know it doesn’t work on Linux. Your choices are:
- Adobe Creative Cloud Photoshop
- Photopea
- GIMP
- Krita (not the same but it might be of use depending on your use case)
Linux runs great on most hardware. What you described will function fine with a 4-year old laptop or desktop with integrated graphics as long as you have a decent processor (i5/i7 or ryzen 7) and enough RAM (16BG) and an ssd. Two ssds, one for OS and the other for storage is also a good idea.
I suggest ubuntu.
Side note: for photo editing, GIMP or Krita are the go-to apps but neither offer good CMYK color space of you’re printing stuff.
I would advise you get Debian + GNOME and install all software via flatpack/flathub. This way you’ll have a very solid and stable system and all the latest software that can be installed, updated and removed without polluting your base system. The other option obviously is to with those hipster of a systems like pop, mint and x-ubuntu that are perpetually “half made” and fail often.
Now I’m gonna tell you what nobody talks about when moving to Linux:
- The “what you go for it’s entirely your choice” mantra when it comes to DE is total BS. What happens is that you’ll find out while you can use any DE in fact GNOME will provide a better experience because most applications on Linux are design / depend on its components. Using KDE/XFCE is fun until you run into some GTK/libadwaita application and small issues start to pop here and there, windows that don’t pick on your theme or you just created a frankenstein of a system composed by KDE + a bunch of GTK components;
- I hope you don’t require “professional” software such as MS Office, Adobe Apps, Autodesk, NI Circuit Design and whatnot. The alternatives wont cut it if you require serious collaboration and virtualization, emulation (wine) may work but won’t be nice. Going for Linux kinda adds the same pains of going macOS but 10x. Once you open the virtualization door your productivity suffers greatly, your CPU/RAM requirements are higher and suddenly you’ve to deal with issues in two operating systems instead of just one. And… let’s face it, nothing with GPU acceleration will ever run decently unless big companies start fixing things - GPU passthroughs and getting video back into the main system are a pain and add delays;
- Proprietary/non-Linux apps provide good features, support and have tons of hours of dev time and continuous updates that the FOSS alternatives can’t just match.
- Linux was the worst track ever of supporting old software, even worse than Apple;
- Half of the success of Windows and macOS is the fact that they provide solid and stable APIs and development tools that “make it easy” to develop for those platforms and Linux is very bad at that. The major pieces of Linux are constantly and ever changing requiring large and frequent re-works of apps. There aren’t distribution “sponsored” IDEs (like Visual Studio or Xcode), userland API documentation, frameworks etc.;
- The beautiful desktop you see online are bullshit with a very few exceptions. Most are just carefully designed screenshots but once you install the theme you’ll find out visual inconsistencies all over the place, missing icons and all kinds of crap that makes Microsoft look good;
- Be ready to spend A LOT of time to make basic things work. Have coffee and alcohol (preferably strong) at your disposal all the time.
(Wine for all the greatness it delivers still sucks and it hurts because it’s true).
These are fair warnings but increasingly exaggerated toward the end. Ubuntu will work just fine with a minimum of “getting basic things to work.”
The most important item in the list is that proprietary software is often just better, and not available on Linux, and wine sucks.
I suggest Ubuntu. It’s heavily managed and takes care of basic stuff. I’ve heard the same about Fedora but I never used it.
Ubuntu will work just fine with a minimum of “getting basic things to work.” (…) I suggest Ubuntu.
I don’t disagree with you, Ubuntu may make be easier but with it you get the worst of both worlds - no “good” and “solid” proprietary apps + questionable open-source, potential spyware and other shenanigans Canonical is known for. In that case I would rather keep using Windows and have everything working out of the box.
If one lives in a bubble and doesn’t to collaborate then native Linux apps might deliver a decent workflow. Once collaboration with Windows/Mac users is required then it’s game over – the “alternatives” aren’t just up to it. Proprietary applications provide good and complex features, support, development time and continuous updates that FOSS alternatives can’t just match.
Windows licenses are cheap and things work out of the box. Software runs fine, all vendors support whatever you’re trying to do and you’re productive from day zero. Sure, there are annoyances from time to time, but they’re way fewer and simpler to deal with than the hoops you’ve to go through to get a minimal and viable/productive Linux desktop experience. It all comes down to a question of how much time (days? months?) you want to spend fixing things on Linux that simply work out of the box under Windows for a minimal fee. Buy a Windows license and spend the time you would’ve spent dealing with Linux issues doing your actual job and you’ll, most likely, get a better ROI.
You can buy a second hand computer with a decent 8th generation CPU for around 200 € and that includes a valid Windows license. Computers selling on retail stores also include a Windows license, students can get them for free etc. what else?
Debian may be good for company servers but not for many end users. It’s just too old and slow.
Not sure where you got the idea it was slow… but okay, keep using your perpetual half made Mint/Pop/Arch whatever. :P
Btw. I’m on atomic fedora. If I want I can roll back to the age of debian or the age of arch within minutes without bricking my system.
slow moving … updates … you roughly described it in your post. It stays where it is for a long time.
… which may be good for servers and companies and some people. Most people will prefer an up to date distro.
Just install your software using Flatpak and the latest with a reliable OS.
Agreed 👍🏻
You’re not wrong but …Linux is a lifestyle not an opening system.
I wouldn’t have gotten a penguin tattooed above my butt cheek if it wasn’t.
Fair enough, but I don’t want to have to battle my computer every time single I want to get anything done… and most of the Linux community forgets that the general public kind of shares that opinion.
