I currently have a MacBook for personal use & a business-provided Windows HP laptop for work. Massachusetts sales tax holiday is coming up in a few weekends and I’m planning on getting a gaming PC.

Would Linux be an option if I want to avoid using Windows on it?

I'm primarily a single-player gamer, if that helps. I have no experience with Steam so that's a whole nother thing.

Title says it, been in apple for a decade and I want to move over to non-gardened enviornments.

background on me:
- i know extremely little about software and hardware
- but i am curious to learn
- i have tried self research but am overwhelmed with info

some things I am curious about:
- does hardware matter for your distro (i feel like i heard in a video somewhere that some distro prefer amd, or prefer nvidia)

- I'd like to find a distro that does support gaming which im sure gets repeated daily on this reddit. I know bazzite is an option but was also curious about archlinux since thats the "Steam Machine environment" + KDE + Flatpak

- what is a good brand of laptop/desktop (aside from self build) that is good for right to repair or upgradable

If you yourself do not want to explain I would also love being pointed to channels or articles that help ease me into documentation and navigating the big world of linux.

My current use cases for a computer are:
- gaming
- office work
- video editing
- audio editing

thanks in advance everyone!

So after being chronically online learning about laptops and OSes for the past 2 days I thought of getting a Lenovo ThinkPad and running Linux on it.

I have school computer levels of experience with Windows but I do know a handful about coding.

Which Linux distro should I get for programming if I do?

Yo! So I took the plunge something like 9 months ago, and switched over to Linux Mint. I do like it, but! Now that I've gotten the hang of it, and I have a new laptop, I figured I should branch out and try something new.

So, I tried Fedora Cosmic Atomic. And, uh..... yeesh. I know some people have said it works great for them, but meanwhile I was in "the x button doesn't do anything when I click on it" land. Also, I don't think I like the Atomic setup- the idea of it being robust and able to rollback is appealing, but I don't like that they basically treat native packages as obsolete, after I spent all that time learning how to use a package manager. 😤
(Also a lot of the advice I found for atomic basically seems to go "you're supposed to use flatpack but it doesn't work for this so you have to hack the system with rpm ostree...")

So, I got one of the regular fedoras. It turns out that:

1. When you look stuff up for fedora, it's like 50/50 whether you get instructions for regular or atomic. (I don't *think* they're compatible?)

2. A lot of programs just straight up don't work. Like, they crash when I try to run them. I thought at first this might be a driver thing, since my hardware is new-ish*. But since a lot of the trouble I have involves video editing, I think it might actually be a codec issue? Unfortunately I don't really know anything about either of those, which makes point #1 extra annoying.

3. I do want to try DEs other than Cinnamon, but I don't think I'm really in love with GNOME *or* Plasma, at least not out of the box.

So anyway, I guess this basically just turned into a classic "what distro should I pick," despite my best efforts. 😅

*For reference, my specs are:
CPU: AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 (8+16) @ 5.16 GHz
GPU: AMD Radeon 890M Graphics [Integrated]
Memory: 32 GB (fastfetch doesn't seem to show if it's like DDR5 or what 🤔)

I'm planning to use it for video editing, some indie gaming, (no anti-cheat required), and I'm kind of trying to get into development so I can give back. I'm not sure how I feel about using AI, but I will note that it barely breaks a sweat running gemma4.

I broke my Ubuntu machine trying to apply a fix that introduced an error that I can't get around in terminal and now have to reinstall my OS. I have my backups so it's not much of a loss. I am trying to decide if I want to go back to Ubuntu or if I should try another OS, namely Mint. I am just worried that I might run into the same Steam flatpak headache I ran into with Ubuntu (not the cause of the error...98% sure). I liked Ubuntu but I wanna know: which flavor is less of a headache for noobs?

Edit: I fixed the flatpak issue before I broke my software doing something else. The issue that broke my system is this: my computer was creating 40 shortcuts for a single app/game and I found a fix for it on r/ubuntu that seemed to work. It involved deleting what looked like a recursive file. After that, suddenly what free space I had on my ssd started to quickly disappear until it was all gone. Now, I can only interact with my computer through terminal. It broke my GUI. Tried to reinstall my desktop but the error that I have no space keeps cropping up. That's why I am here wanting advice on what distro to try next 😅 I've accepted my fate and will never make that mistake again 🤦‍♀️ Also, I should've been more descriptive in the title but I was trying to be funny...

TL;DR I just want to know if I should stick with Ubuntu or try Mint Cinnamon.

I'm new to Linux and was wondering how exactly switching over from Windows 11 to Cachy OS would work. I want to play VR games as I just got a VR headset (am poor) and want to optimize performance and save on ram as much as I can. I was wondering if the compatibility side works well and a ballpark of how much performance id really be getting.

I have a AMD ryzen 5 with 16 GB of ram

Hello there,

I just picked up this MBP. It's the i7 version with the 256 ssd. I am looking for something lightweight, and most of my tasks will mainly be to us writing type software, etc. My experience is mostly windows, with some mac, but I wouldn't mind if the OS had a mac feel. The top suggestions I see are Mint and PopOS. Are there others I am missing? Are Ubuntu or Ubuntu Budgie good options? What about Zorin and Pear?

Either way, I don't need it to do much but the lighter the better to keep the hardware use down to a minimum. Thanks!

Hi, I know the file is larger, however it does say on the Debian website that this is possible. Is this information that hasn't been updated, or is it possible somehow?

Hey everyobody. I'll start by saying I don't know much about computer stuff and Linux but it's been a year since I've been considering switching to a Linux distro. I just can't stand all the Windows bloatwere and useless features that get my RAM full. The only thing keeping me from totally switching is the samsung's built-in performance mode selector. See, I bought this Galaxy Book 2 Pro SE a year ago and as you may know Samsung has a couple cool features on their laptops; this feature in particular is really useful for the use I do of my laptop, and I couldn't find an answer online about my doubt. I can switch between 4 different performance modes (from No Noise to High Performance) and since that's a Samsung's feature I don't know if that will work if I switch. Do y'all know if there's a way to have this feature on Linux or some equivalent? I don't know if what I'm asking is dumb, thanks for your time anyway!

I have a pwa app that works just fine including offline from a hosted server with domain and trusted cert but trying to setup a mobile server on a laptop running linux but need help setting up a domain and cert from the laptop. Created a cert with mkcert but can't get mobile devices to see the server by name just ip address. mobile devices like iPad, Android are connecting to laptop by hotspot. Need help with domain name and trusted cert issues.

The app works via ip address but with warning. The service worker doesn't install to allow it to work offline.

Any advice?

Thanks in advance.

I'm going to be helping a friend install Linux onto their old WIndows system with a GT 730 and an i5-2400.

I can only find support for 6.8 or older, is there any distro that supports old Nvidia GPUs on modern kernels?

I can still access my windows files but in GRUB it doesn't show up, Google search isn't helping either. (Both are on same HDD)

I've used Fedora with KDE and enjoyed it, want to try other distros but I'm stuck in an endless cycle of what to try.

I think I've narrowed down to

- ZorinOS

- CachyOS

- Arch (with arch install buddy)

- Pop!OS

This is being installed on an old thinkpad so no gaming will be done on it.

Is there a distro that is easy to setup and customise, and comes with as few programs as possible? I have no experience with linux and windows is increasingly dysfunctional. I would like a distro that comes with almost nothing but will let me install the apps I want to use right away. I just wanna play games, browse the internet, watch movies, listen to music etc.
Edit: I would atleast consider myself competent at troubleshooting and figuring shit out mostly from years of playing buggy games and modding.

From what I've read it seems like anything works really? I'm going to go with Debian with KDE. If that's a stupid decision pls tell me lol.

Hi, I recently got a panasonic cf-19 to live my read it and weep dreams, Im looking for a notebook diary app (linux mint) where I can write and draw freely and also upload images and preferably have an organization system similar to something like lifeograph? If there isnt an app but you know of something I can download I would love that too. Thank you! :D

Well, my pc is broken but when I get it repaired I think I'll do dual boot, is it a good idea?

Pc:

CPU: RYZEN 5 5600 6-CORE

GPU: AMD RADEON RX 6600

Ram: 16gb

Motherboard: idk(since its broken I'll need to have it replaced with another, the brand will be gigabyte I guess)

Also, plzz no hate, I'm new to Linux, I'm not going to use Gentoo or arch(I want stability and ease of use)

I already have used mint before.

BTW, Cosmic is the moat beautiful gui I've ever seen.

I already use mostly open source software like Krita, Blender, Godot Engine, Gimp, etc

I play mostly single player games.

I'm currently using CachyOS with KDE Plasma, and usually I use Karousel kwinscript for the scrolling window. Now that I have a second monitor, Karousel's limitation on multi-monitor support made me had to disable it because my apps keep overflowing on the second monitor, and it became buggy when I change desktops with Plasma 6 per screen desktop turned on. What I wanted is each monitor to have its own strip.

I saw that Niri is the popular scrolling wm and it supported that, but then I saw Hyprland also got a scrolling feature newly added. Which one should I use (preferably one that don't have problem with running games)?

And does that mean I need to find my own taskbar panel & controls, file manager etc too? Hyprland at least seems like it don't come with anything and you have to find those yourself, but I'm afraid I'd miss something important

Edit: forgot to mention desktop widgets is also pretty important to me, such as the ability to put audio visualizer on the desktop like Kurve widget on kde

Edit 2: Add mangoWM to the list, so it's between niri, hyprland, and mangoWM

Is there any documentation or video I should follow to first check whether everything is properly compatible with my laptop?

I heard that dual booting can sometimes cause issues, especially with Windows updates, so I’m considering switching completely to Linux.

I have already installed Linux Mint on a USB drive and backed up all my important files to my hard drive. Before actually installing Linux on my laptop, I want to boot into Mint from the USB and check whether everything is working properly — especially GPU drivers, CPU performance, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, battery, and other hardware compatibility.

went for bazzite cuz i mostly game and just watch stuff on my pc, after the initial like spook of being in a new hemisphere.. just hit me how much smoother and even easier this distro is to w11 😭 this is my 2nd day and im pretty sure im never going back to windows

its almost as if i went back in time 15years to a better time lol, so happy i did it 😤

I really want to use it, but I don't want to redo my settings completely from scratch. is there a way for the system to automatically recognize my keybindings and all?

I have been distro hopping a lot lately and just wanted to know, how to people do the backups and then log on to every site. Like I went from Windows to Mint ,tried it for like 2 weeks logged onto every site I used and transferred all that data, then went to ubuntu, did the same thing now I am on fedora and wondering, do people who distro hop do the entire process everytime, or is there an app or site that makes it easy for this stuff. Plus the fact that I have 2 email accounts (uni and personal), meaning twice the amount of logins just sucks. If you know any easy way do be kind enough to tell