I am not bad with computers and have a beginner+, maybe intermediate level knowledge of Linux and I kept running into some problems here and there with different distros. Most claimed to work out of the box (which may be the case for some users, but I have a shit ass Nvidia 1060 and that was not at all the case, until I installed Nobara KDE/Nvidia.
Just came here to potentially save someone time, this shit is actually working out of the box, closest experience to this was with Arch, but that’s definitely not out of the box.
Nice job! If you can get the nvidia driver installed properly, any distro should work in theory.
On Ubuntu: https://ubuntu.com/server/docs/nvidia-drivers-installation
On Pop!_OS it should be already installed by default
I’ve been hearing good things about Nobara, Ill have to try it out!
Yeah, POP has its nvidia version that comes with it installed. I was using that til I switched to AMD and just reinstalled the OS instead of dealing with removing the nvidia stuff.
My dude. “apt purge nvidia-*” is much quicker.
You would think so but that didn’t work
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I’ve had very good luck with Linux Mint and a GTX-1080. It does require opening the Driver Manager and clicking the button with “Recommended” next to it.
PopOS is, in my opinion, the easiest distro to use to get Nvidia cards working without a sweat (as long as you install the Nvidia ISO). I don’t use PopOS anymore, been on Fedora now for almost 2 years, and have had 0 issues with my 3050 after installing the drivers, but it does take a bit of configuring to get there.
Yeah IIRC with Pop!OS it just asks you if you have an Nvidia card during install, and then it takes care of it all for you. I run it on my desktop machine and have had no issues so far.
Although word of caution, they’re supposed to be transitioning to the brand new COSMIC desktop environment sometime this year, so I don’t know if that will cause any instability.
Those are wise words of caution. Anyone planning on getting or staying on PopOS should heed those words.
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Mint handled my 1060 really well and it’s really good on arch too with the newer driver. Still just running Xorg with cinnamon, though. I guess mileage still varies with this stuff.
From my experience, it might be better to try gaming on a stable distro rather than a gaming distro to get a better feel for Linux first. Seems you already have some experience of that already, so here are the gaming distros I’ve tried and some thoughts about them. Keep in mind I’ve been using AMD stuff for my latest computers, but I do have an Nvidia laptop that I don’t game much on but often run the same distro on.
Solous was the first gaming distro I’ve tried, might be close to ten years ago, so memory is kinda fuzzy. But it had support for most of the things you needed for gaming out of the box back then, which was rare. Development on it kinda went into a standstill or something, which made me go distro jumping.
Manjaro was where I ended up. Most everything worked out of the box. I ran it for a long time, but there are some problems in how it’s being managed. The Arch but not Arch approach made it feel unstable sometimes. So when I made a new computer, I distro jumped again.
Nobara which build on Fedora was much more stable than Manjaro had been for me. I had no real problems with it. Lots of patches and tweaks to make gaming a smoother experience build in. But I’ve stated eyeing the atomic OS that had been pooping up. The benefit of not having to run a custom-made updater every time you wanted to update made me do the latest jump.
Bazzite is built on an atomic Fedora, so some settings and tweaks are a bit harder to do. But the benefit is that updates are automatic, and it comes with a lot of good tools and guides on how to work with an atomic OS. As a power user, you will have to familiarize yourself with containers to get full use of it. I’m not gonna lie, the out-of-the-box experience was a bit smother on Nobara, but I don’t really see me going back.
Pop!_OS I’ve never really given it a good chance. I did try it for shorter periods, a couple of years apart. One time I just did not like its default windows manager and another it did not have support for my GPU.
6 for gaming? There are only a few real serious Distros: Fedora, Opensuse, Debian, Ubuntu and MX/Mint/Arch(all in the same category). From what Ive seen there is only 1 serious distro: Nobara. That comes with Kernel Patches.
1060 3gb here, worked fine on all distros i tried when i switched and hopped a little. Used mint, mx, debian, manjaro, artix, void and arch.
I’m thinking this is where my lack of experience really shows, fixing some things, like audio issues was a bit rough for me on certain distros, or understanding how to install/remove drivers on certain distros. Out of the box is I think and important step for newcomers, but I also like being forced in a way to learn the environments a little more. It can be frustrating when you’re just ready to play something right now and haven’t resolved it.
That said I celebrated as if I had just beat my first Dark souls boss, a lot of hype involved.
How dare you not use the same distro as me. Just kidding. Glad you found one that works for you. :)
I’m using a 2060 with Mint with no problems. Well, short of the game I’m playing (Enshrouded) needing to validate its install every single time I open Steam, but I suspect that’s on Steam.
Honestly I never expect any system to work out-of-the-box, not even Windows.
Most of the time if I see something JustWorks™ I suspect it is using some general ass drivers that may work, but with functions lost.
Probably this isn’t the case anymore, but it still gives me a lot of work to verify everything is REALLY fine and dandy.
Seconding nobara. Garuda also worked out of the box for me and also mint. (Except that I had to force update the kernel for mint because some stuff wasn’t working with the recommended one)
MX Linux was nearly effortless
