So all I know that the Linux mascot is a penguin and Arch users meme about using Arch. Jokes aside I’m planning on making to the jump to Linux as I’m planning on getting a tower PC. I recently got a steam deck and that kinda demystified the (unrealistic) expectation I had of Linux was all command line stuff and techno babble. This all very future oriented questions* as I haven’t even picked out hardware (probably gonna go prebuilt since I do not trust me) and there’s also the matter of saving up the money for a new PC.

As for my use case (cus I know some software is wonky on Linux compared to windows) it’s mostly between games running on steam, which most of my games play fine on the steam deck, and essays and note taking for my college classes, which I use libre office and obsidian (with excalidraw to hand write my notes) saved to my proton drive and also sync those documents between my surface laptop and home laptop

My ideal OS would be plug it in, let it do… things… and it’s ready to be a PC to install steam and stuff

But first question, as someone who isn’t tech inclined and tinkering is pretty much just a few VERY basic settings in the settings app on windows, so is there a Linux… idk what to call it, type? OS? Thing??? that runs out of the box without me having to install additional software manually or at least automatic setup wizards because like hardware, I do not trust me with setting it up. As for installing it after I wipe whatever computer I choose I assume I’m gonna have some OS installer on a USB and let it work its magic.

Second question, is there any specific hardware that works easier with Linux, I can’t really think of any examples cus with installers and updaters I just the computer handle it, like updating Nvidia stuff in the GeForce app for all I know it’s genuinely performing dark magic during the automated updates

Anyways I probably have way more questions that I have no idea I had, but to wrap up I’m not super tech inclined since I let automated stuff do its thang on windows (if the computer can manage and install it I’m gonna let it do that) and my pc mostly just plays games and do documents on libre office and obsidian

  • The_Sasswagon@beehaw.org
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    13 hours ago

    I’d just recommend against NVIDIA GPUs if you don’t want to tinker, I’m sure it’s not as bad as it was back when I had NVIDIA cards, but faffing around trying to get NVIDIA drivers to play nice was the bane of my existence (and where I was forced to learn the most about Linux).

    Oh and the screen tearing was a nuisance too that went away as soon as I got an AMD card.

    Looks like you got lots of great advice on the OS. Good luck, and enjoy whatever you end up doing!

    • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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      13 hours ago

      Yeah I was probably gonna go with bazzite and it sounds like there’s some demo installer I can play around with but yeah definitely gonna break my nvidia streak (past 2 and my only gaming laptops) to finally get a proper tower with an amd gpu

    • j4yt33@feddit.org
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      12 hours ago

      NVIDIA is trash anyway so no reason to buy one regardless of OS

      AMD gang!

      In all honesty, I think it has gotten better over the last few years and it should be less of a headache now to use NVIDIA cards, I guess that depends on the OS though

      • kusivittula@sopuli.xyz
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        11 hours ago

        there still is a reason to buy nvidia and it’s HDMI 2.1.

        I want to keep using an OLED TV as my monitor, 4k and 120hz. TVs still don’t have displayport for some reason… and there aren’t any >50" OLED monitors in 16:9 available, at least where I live. and AMD didn’t get permission to use HDMI 2.1 driver in their open source driver. there is a dp > HDMI 2.1 converter, which sucks according to reviews.

    • endeavor@sopuli.xyz
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      13 hours ago

      I have nvidia 4 series and my linux skill is low enough that I think its insane gnome doesn’t have right click-create file by default and I have had 0 issues. You just need to disable secureboot or enroll keys.

    • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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      20 hours ago

      Yeah mint and bazzite are gonna be the ones I check out and I was leaning towards bazzite at first but now I just need to do a bit more research and figure out what the heck it what but at least I have a starting point now

      • themadcodger@kbin.earth
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        19 hours ago

        Go with Bazzite (if you end up liking it, you can install it on your steam deck, which will be the same process you use to install it in your laptop… but that’s for the future.)

        Mint is okay, but it’s a bit behind and you have a greater chance of something going wrong than with one of the atomic distros (Bazzite). With atomic distros all the important stuff you can’t really touch and the only things you can change are your personal files that are important to you but don’t affect the system at all.

        As long as you reboot your computer from time to time, it’ll always be the latest everything. And if something goes wrong with an update, you just choose to boot into the previous version you were just using and everything is back to how it was. Non-atomics you can affect files that are important and you have to stay on top of updating.

        Between that and being built for gamers it’ll have everything already installed for you, though if something is missing, just click to install from the “app store”.

        When you go to bazzite.gg to download it, you answer a few questions about your hardware, and pick a desktop environment. Some others have touched on Gnome and KDE for desktop environments, the choice is yours. Do you want a desktop that looks more like windows (or desktop mode on your steamdeck) or do you want it to look more like a Mac? Windows and highly customizable is KDE, Mac and just use it as is but still able to customize through extensions, is Gnome.

        Really the hardest part is going to be installing it, but it’s really not too bad. There are plenty of guides, but it’s use a software to get the downloaded Bazzite file onto a flash drive, boot your laptop from that flash drive, follow the prompts and wait. Don’t try to dual boot (keep part for windows part for Linux). It’s possible, but from how you described yourself, not worth the headache.

        • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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          18 hours ago

          Thanks for the write up, based on the information from all the comments and this I might go with bazzite then but I still have to do some research

          I might make a follow up post eventually with a little more specifics now that I have some vague ideas

          As for the survey thing is that something I do on my current windows laptop or is it during the install process?

          As for constantly restarting I always press shutdown every night before I go to bed

          • themadcodger@kbin.earth
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            17 hours ago

            You can do it right now and see what happens. Go to Bazzite.gg and go to the download section. It just wants to know where you’re installing it so it knows what version to give you to download. Installing to a laptop will be a different file than installing to your steamdeck.

            And since you shut down nightly you’d always have the most current version when you boot up the next day. But that only applies to atomic (formerly called immutable) distros like Bazzite. If you go Mint, which isn’t atomic/immutable, that won’t be the case and you’ll have to stay on top of updating.

            It’s early still, so you have plenty of time to do some research and when you’re ready ask the questions you still don’t understand and generally we’re pretty helpful around here. 😁

            • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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              15 hours ago

              Yeah I definitely have a lot of info here, feeling a little overwhelmed but I just need time to sift through the nitty gritty and digest this

              But I’m super early in the process haven’t even thought about what hardware I’m gonna get get (at least from this post I know need something AMD probably so that’s a start lol)

              Also if I swap out to bazzite on my steam deck will I have to reinstall stuff like emudeck (only thing I’ve installed in desktop mode)

              • themadcodger@kbin.earth
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                3 hours ago

                I guess in case no one else mentioned anywhere, when you install Bazzite (or any distro) it will wipe everything and you will start from scratch, so make sure your important stuff is saved elsewhere before you begin. Same with steamdeck. But one nice thing about Bazzite is that since it’s made by gamers for gamers, it has a lot of the things you’ll need preinstalled, or like emudeck you can just click to install it through their portal, so it should be minimal hassle.

                • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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                  3 hours ago

                  Alright I’ll probably stick to whatever’s on my steam deck then since it ain’t broke

                  As for whatever new (prebuilt) PC I was gonna get I was gonna get Linux going first thing after I finish booting up the computer and speed running through the first time set up on windows (skip sign in, one drive all that)

      • Telorand@reddthat.com
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        20 hours ago

        Practice in a VM. Go from the base install to setting up all the apps to customizing the look of everything (commonly called “ricing”). That should give you a sense of what to expect.

        When you think you’re ready, maybe give a few Live ISO’s a demo to see if there’s any immediate glaring issues when it’s running on bare metal. If not, then proceed to install when you’ve picked the one you like the most!

        • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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          19 hours ago

          Yeah once I got a bit more research I was gonna get some vms and play around a bit but that’s a thing for future me

          • Telorand@reddthat.com
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            19 hours ago

            I know people have recommended Bazzite already, and I would too, but be sure to give PikaOS a look as well.

            It’s a gaming distro, but it’s not immutable/atomic, though it uses a similar build process. Definitely one to consider if gaming is your goal.

            • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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              15 hours ago

              I’m probably gonna go with bazzite first then mint if that doesn’t shake out but hey the more names I can look at the better

              • melroy@kbin.melroy.org
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                8 hours ago

                The reason why I would choose linux mint. Is the stability of the whole distro. It’s pretty solid. You can still upgrade kernels. Or even install mainline kernel tool if you wish.

                Furthermore, Linux mint provide an easy tool to install drivers, in case you’re running a Nvidia card. And Mint is just basically Ubuntu under the hood,without the crap of Ubuntu. Meaning mint also support PPAs (personal package repositories). If you wish to get some updated package.

              • Telorand@reddthat.com
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                7 hours ago

                Excellent choice. I have Bazzite on a laptop, and it’s rock solid.

                Feel free to DM me if you have questions. There’s also a Discord, where people are quite helpful.

  • asap@lemmy.world
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    1 day ago

    Try Bazzite:

    https://bazzite.gg/

    It will give you an experience that’s familiar compared to the Steam Deck, and everything will “just work” out of the box.

    It already has Steam installed and is a great desktop for general use.

    • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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      1 day ago

      Yeah I’ve seen bazzite pop in a few steam deck discussions, some other comments recommend Mint how do they compare/differ

      But like I said in another comment I’m not looking to tweak much, if anything at all, so I think it might be a good fit, definitely gonna take a look at that link when I’m off work

    • funkajunk@lemm.ee
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      24 hours ago

      Bazzite is probably the best recommendation out of everything I’ve seen so far. It is meant to be like the Steam Deck experience on any machine, and if OP is already familiar with that, why not transition easily?

      Couple the familiarity along with Bazzite being an immutable distro, OP can just roll back if they break something.

      • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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        23 hours ago

        So what does immutable mean?

        But I’ve seen it’s similar to the decks desktop mode from some other comments as well so that seems nice

        I haven’t really interacted with desktop mode outside setting up emudeck (mostly DS and switch games)

        • jamesbunagna@discuss.online
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          21 hours ago

          what does immutable mean?

          Strictly speaking, ‘immutable’ means unchanging. For Linux distros, this means that (at least some part of) the OS is read-only.

          On any distro, you could invoke the chattr +i path/to/file_or_directory command to make a file or directory of your choosing immutable. Thus preventing you or anyone else from changing that until it’s revoked.

          The so-called ‘immutable’ distros employ this at the OS-level. However, their implementations (and the implications thereof) may vary significantly amongst them, unless they share some ‘heritage’.

          Going over the many different implementations and their implications is out of scope for what this comment intends. Especially as the ‘immutable Linux landscape’ is fast moving. Thus, potentially making it outdated the very next landscape-defining change.

        • asap@lemmy.world
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          22 hours ago

          So what does immutable mean?

          The easiest explanation is: You can’t screw it up :)

          That’s the reason I use it. It means that the system areas are read-only, and as a user you can’t “wreck” anything by mistake.

          • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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            21 hours ago

            Ok cool so that’s probably a positive thing in my case since I don’t plan to tweak things and have no idea what I’m doing

            • dreadbeef@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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              12 hours ago

              Yeah, on immutable distros, you can’t just “delete system32” (rm -rf /* in Linux parlance), it is read-only (changes on restart with updates applied)

          • jamesbunagna@discuss.online
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            22 hours ago

            While it could be functional as a cursory watch, it doesn’t seem that Michael Horn has done a good job investigating the subject matter. So, no, I actually disagree with it offering a good explanation. Granted, I couldn’t find any video that does this subject any justice; more often than not, they just tend to overgeneralize or oversimplify.

            • funkajunk@lemm.ee
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              22 hours ago

              I was just going for a very high level explanation. If you feel like offering a more in depth definition, feel free to do so here.

              • jamesbunagna@discuss.online
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                21 hours ago

                I was intending to, but it got very unwieldy real fast. I did provide some very basic pointers, but nothing earth-shattering. I suppose this is a decent read with the acknowledgement that the author has primarily read up on Fedora Atomic (and not the other 'immutable distros). Which ain’t bad for our use as Bazzite is derived from Fedora Atomic anyways.

    • nationaldjuret@lemmy.zip
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      1 day ago

      I completely agree, cannot recommend Bazzite enough. Installed it a year ago, first time linux, has been just smooth sailing

      • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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        21 hours ago

        Alright good to hear. I was gonna try bazzite first then mint if I couldn’t get it going

  • aMockTie@lemmy.world
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    1 day ago

    is there a Linux… idk what to call it, type? OS? Thing??? that runs out of the box without me having to install additional software manually or at least automatic setup wizards

    The word you are looking for is called a distribution, or distro for short.

    I’m surprised no one else has mentioned Bazzite, which should be exactly what you’re looking for.

    is there any specific hardware that works easier with Linux

    An AMD GPU for sure. Nvidia drivers have come a long way, but they don’t generally behave as well out of the box like AMD.

    • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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      23 hours ago

      Yeah bazzite seems like a recurring topic here so I think I’ll check it out first since others have all said it’s similar to the steam decks setup (which has been limited to me installing emudeck but seeing familiar stuff might help me

  • Dil@is.hardlywork.ing
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    8 hours ago

    Just deleted my windows parition and grew my cachyos one, im never going back after a week with it, I like cachyos/arch since I can use gnome and plasma at the same time easily (i like swapping looks a lot), idk if its as easy with others since they reccomend you rebase for different des like bazzite, aurora, bluefin. cachyos is straightforward with a gui installer, easier and much faster than windows to install and use, I used ventoy so I can keep using my usb for data.

  • Ulrich@feddit.org
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    23 hours ago

    I recently got a steam deck and that kinda demystified the (unrealistic) expectation I had of Linux was all command line stuff and techno babble.

    Outside of gaming, browsing and flatpaks it still very much is. People here will lie and tell you it’s not. It is. But as long it’s just Steam gaming, it’s very simple.

    so is there a Linux… idk what to call it, type? OS? Thing??? that runs out of the box without me having to install additional software manually or at least automatic setup wizards

    Not really sure what you’re asking here but I think it’s a “package manager”. Basically an app store for Linux. Discover store in KDE or “software” in GNOME. Open it, search for your software, click the “install” button and be done.

    Outside of the package manager, installations become complex quickly.

    is there any specific hardware that works easier with Linux

    Yes, generally new hardware won’t work as well. Linux drivers are a second class citizen. Also you’ll likely experience lower performance and extra difficulties with Nvidia vs. Windows.

  • flatbield@beehaw.org
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    1 day ago

    You can just buy a system with Linux preinstalled. My laptop is from System76. I usually build desktops/towers from scratch but they sell those too.

    Installing apps has always been easier on Linux then on Windows as Linux has had large free app stores back 30 years. The question is more are the apps you want in the app store. If not things get harder. I like Debian based distros like Ubuntu or Linux Mint as they have large app stores.

    You might want to look at distrowatch.com. Mint is currently at the top.

  • catboat@sopuli.xyz
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    1 day ago

    I also recommend Linux Mint. It’s been hands down the best experience of all the Linux distros I’ve tried.

    The installation is done with a USB stick. In short, you download the Linux iso image and create a bootable USB stick with a software. In Windows I have always used Rufus for that.

    The Linux installer gives you a choise to wipe everything and install Linux. Installing Mint has always been very straight forward.

    I can’t comment on hardware since I’ve only used Linux on +5 year old laptops. They seem to work fine.

    There most likely will be many new things that can feel confusing in the beginning, but I’m sure you’ll get the hang of it. There also are tons of good tutorials of everything.

    Best of luck to your Linux project!

    • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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      21 hours ago

      Oh nice, so I just boot windows as normal then “run” the installer from a usb. As for whatever an iso image that makes no sense to me is that just the “program” that the installer is?

      A lot of people have recommended bazzite so i might try that first but mint definitely sounds like a good “I have no idea what I’m doing just start working distro”

      • themadcodger@kbin.earth
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        19 hours ago

        I touched on this elsewhere, but seeing your comment here… sort of.

        iso image is like a .zip it’s a specific type of file… one that opens into a larger image, namely your entire distro. So you could install windows with an iso file. In order to be useful though, you need to get it onto a flash drive, but not just dragging and dropping. Programs like Rufus, mentioned elsewhere, will take that iso of Bazzite and open it onto the flash drive in a way that the computer will be able to read it later and do something with it.

        After you have a working flash drive, you do not boot windows like normal and run the installer from a USB. You’ll have to figure out how to tell your laptop (different but similar for each brand of laptop) to boot from the USB. This usually involves having the USB in the drive, restarting your computer and hitting a specific key to tell it not to boot normally to windows, but instead boot from the flash drive.

        I haven’t used Windows in a while and I think there’s also a way to restart windows and tell it to boot from USB as you’re exiting. But that’s what you’ll have to figure out for your specific device. That’ll be true no matter what you end up installing.

        • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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          15 hours ago

          Thanks for the info, I’ll probably get more information when I’ve actually chosen hardware and do some big brain research of my own

  • Fanmion@discuss.tchncs.de
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    1 day ago

    If you have time to learn how your distro works: Archlinux. If you just want to easily install a distro and everything just works: Linux Mint.

    • funkajunk@lemm.ee
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      24 hours ago

      If you want to really learn Linux, then absolutely Arch is the way to go. But OP is looking for something polished out of the box and probably doesn’t want to know much more than that. Some people just want a box that does the thing - and that’s totally fine.

      I say all of this as a diehard Arch user (BTW)

      • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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        20 hours ago

        Yeah I’ve peeked into some Linux threads from time to time to see if I can even understand what’s happening (spoiler alert: I could not) and I’ve gotten the impression Arch is great for tinkering and experimenting and tweaking which is great, just not the entry point I want lol

    • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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      1 day ago

      Yeah I’m kinda looking for a “it just works” since I’m not big on tweaking every little thing and I just really wanna play games and work on my documents

      • Fanmion@discuss.tchncs.de
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        1 day ago

        But keep in mind Mint is a non rolling distro, it means you have to upgrade to a newer Version in a periodic time (like win XP to win vista). Rolling release distro (like Arch) doesnt have a Version.

        • infeeeee@lemm.ee
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          XP to Vista is a wrong comparison, as Vista changed the driver system, and on a lot computers it was impossible to upgrade, as drivers for a lot of stuffs wasn’t updated for Vista. Non rolling upgrades similar to the recent windows big updates: it take some time, changes the wallpaper, but not something very complex…

    • infeeeee@lemm.ee
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      1 day ago

      From the post:

      But first question, as someone who isn’t tech inclined and tinkering […] that runs out of the box without me having to install additional software manually or at least automatic setup wizards because like hardware

      Don’t recommend Arch to users who doesn’t want to tinker please. I know, I use Arch. Arch regularly requires user intervention, you should see them on the news: https://archlinux.org/news/ You can see, 3-4 times a year you have to fiddle with some settings, otherwise you can get an unbootable system.

      And that’s how we get “the (unrealistic) expectation I had of Linux was all command line stuff and techno babble.”

  • kittenzrulz123@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    14 hours ago

    Imo you should get a System76 computer, it comes with a gaming focused Distro and its the most well respected Linux brand (in the US, for EU I would reccomend Tuxedo). Their mini PCs cost $799 and for a decent full sized PC (with a GPU) prepare to pay over $1.5k.

        • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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          3 hours ago

          Ooooooooo that sounds nice

          I might just go from Amazon depending on hardware and price but I’m definitely gonna add this to my list

      • kittenzrulz123@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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        10 hours ago

        It was explicitly specified that no tinkering should be required, also even if you custom build a PC you wont have several advantages of just going with system76. For example the mini PC uses their fork of coreboot and intigrates with Pop_OS, meanwhile on other systems you would need to manually install coreboot (if its even supported) and bios updates are still an absolute mess (even if you dont care about the privacy benefits of coreboot the extremely fast start up speed alone makes it valuable).

  • ocean@lemmy.selfhostcat.com
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    1 day ago

    I really like fedora out of the box but if you’re used to windows some will recommend Linux mint. In fedora there are a lot of packages installable via the software store as well as downloading app images and RPM files.

    • enemenemu@lemm.ee
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      Mint vs fedora is completely irrelevant here. GNOME vs KDE is more important and fedora supports both.

      Which packages can be installed is also completely irrelevant since you can use nix and distrobox and flatpaks on all distros. Package availability is no reason to choose one distro over another.

      • Meldrik@lemmy.wtf
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        1 day ago

        Some distro’s still require you to setup those things yourself and in the terminal.

        • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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          23 hours ago

          So bazzite and mint seem to be recurring themes here for my needs of something that works out of the box, do those need any set up or stuff? I don’t really know exactly what I’m asking here :/

              • someacnt@sh.itjust.works
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                17 hours ago

                Flatpak (flathub) is a universal app store. You can install pretty much any app from it, but you do need to be careful of what you install, as always.

                Usually software centers have it enabled (supported) by default, so that you can install app from flatpak within the center.

                There are other options of install source, like the distro’s own installer - you can think of them as another “app store”, one which is more restricted and more secure.

        • enemenemu@lemm.ee
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          1 day ago

          The difference between distros are the package manager and choice of default software and settings.

          E.g. Debian has no wifi enabled. Hence, ubuntu (which is like debian) is much easier because it’s user friendly. Ubuntu uses a disliked packaging format, snap, which is not used by mint. That’s why people love mint, becaus it’s as easy as ubuntu and has no snaps. Blablabla

          Whenever you want to know some linux thing, read the arch wiki and you’ll know more about it.

          Distrobox is like a vm, you spin up a distro within your OS with no overhead and can use arch on debian. Or ubuntu on arch. Or fedora on opensuse, or all at the same time because why not?

          I’d try https://fedoraproject.org/atomic-desktops/ or https://vanillaos.org/ and install most apps as flatpaks. Vanilla is like ubuntu but you don’t mess with the underlying system. Atomic fedora is “the same” but with fedora style. Problems arise at the dev level, not the user level. It should be good to go on your system

        • 332@feddit.nu
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          1 day ago

          Distro - System level stuff. A “type” of linux. Mint, Fedora, Arch, Ubuntu etc.

          DE (Desktop environment) - Surface level stuff, i.e. how it looks, behaves, and often what default apps you use for basic stuff like text editing. Gnome, KDE, etc.

          Distros have a default DE but often provide different versions using others for people who prefer them.

          You likely won’t need to interact with any of that other stuff except flatpaks. Just think of it as a form of distributing and running software.

    • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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      1 day ago

      So I think I’ll look at mint then considering I have no idea what you mean by RPM files but app images ring a bell when I was getting yuzu set up on my steam deck

    • Kidplayer_666@lemm.ee
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      1 day ago

      Agreed here. On CPU side, don’t go with Intel 13th or 14 th gen, mostly due to the manufacturing defects, check gamers nexus on YouTube if you want to catch back up to speed, the new Intel stuff is fine manufacturing wise, terrible performance, check if the prices are good. GPU, NVIDIA usually has kinkier/ more annoying drivers, but if you want to play with AI or anything like that, NVIDIA is still better.

  • JustFudgnWork@sh.itjust.works
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    14 hours ago

    Seems like you’ve got a lot of distro recommendations haha which is good - go for one of those and you should be ok (I’m on mint for the record). My suggestion if you have a bit if extra money and less time is to buy a prebuilt system with linux already installed, tuxedo and system76 are two big names but I can’t comment on what to go with there.

    However the advantage with buying an integrated system like that is that the hardware is all guaranteed and you can ring them for support if needed.

    My other suggestion is to BACKUP your files!

  • j4yt33@feddit.org
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    12 hours ago

    I recently made the switch back to Linux, to Pop! OS, and I’ve never had such a smooth experience before. It’s currently using GNOME as its desktop environment, which I find a bit shit in general, but they’ve modified it enough so that it’s user friendly and intuitive. It has an “app store” as well that you can use to check for and run updates, search software etc. If you have a big screen, the window tiling function is awesome. Highly recommend you have a look at it!

  • Captain Aggravated@sh.itjust.works
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    20 hours ago
    1. The various versions or flavors of Linux are called “distributions” or “distros.” There are several that are intended to be ready to go out of the box. Linux Mint is a pretty good one for general desktop use though they’re kinda behind the times with Wayland and such. I see a lot of folks recommend Bazzite but I personally know nothing about it. I’m using Fedora KDE, Fedora is meh, KDE is pretty good.

    2. If you’re building a gaming desktop specifically for Linux, I recommend going with AMD GPU and an Intel wi-fi adapter. There are some Wi-Fi adapters that don’t play nice with Linux but Intel’s drivers are pretty good. AMD releases their drivers right into the kernel, there’s nothing you need to do at all to get AMD GPUs working on Linux, Nvidia is a bit more of a pain. Also, with desktop peripherals, avoid anything that needs one of those configuration utilities, they tend not to be available for Linux. I use a Coolermaster MasterKeys Pro M keyboard which all configuration happens on the board, they don’t offer any software for it. Highly recommended.

    Oh also: Asrock’s RGB lighting weird and non-standard. If you want to use open source stuff to control your RGB lighting and that’s important to you, I recommend against Asrock. Just so happens my build’s RGB is controlled via a controller built into my case.

    • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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      20 hours ago

      Thanks for the info good to see another point for point mint haha. But I was gonna get a prebuilt rather than build my own

      But some other comments and my own y point towards getting a Pre-built with an AMD, as for the WiFi thing is there anything in specific I should be looking for while shopping

      • Captain Aggravated@sh.itjust.works
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        20 hours ago

        I just make sure that the word “Intel” is used somewhere in the bullet point about the Wi-Fi. If it’s built into the motherboard or on a separate card.

        • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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          19 hours ago

          So basically look for intel when talking about WiFi

          I’ll probably make a follow up post specifically for hardware once I saved up some money and decided on a distro

  • penguin202124 (he/him)@sh.itjust.works
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    10 hours ago

    Bazzite would be a great choice in my opinion. It’s meant for gaming, has drivers preinstalled and is immutable (basically impossible to break). I’d suggest using KDE because it’s Windows-like and is the default for desktop mode on SteamOS.

    • RadDevon@lemmy.zip
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      4 hours ago

      I feel it’s important to note for new people that, while an immutable OS is great at keeping you from breaking your system, the way it achieves this can make some things you would want to do more difficult. In Bazzite, installing software, for example, works differently than under a typical distribution.

      I’ll give the example of two pieces of software that I use regularly: 1Password and Espanso. It took a fair bit of digging to figure out how to install 1Password in a way that would preserve its tight system integration… and it still doesn’t quite work — copying a password in particular contexts just doesn’t put that password on the clipboard, while it works fine in other contexts. Espanso on the other hand just won’t work under Bazzite best I can tell. I haven’t found a way to install it at all so I’m just doing without. Oh My ZSH was also quite tricky, and I got yelled at in the Bazzite Discord for doing it the wrong way. 😅

      Plenty of the software I use works fine and was easy to install: FreeTube, Kdenlive, VLC, Zen Browser… unless you count the fact that the 1Password browser integration just won’t work with Zen Browser, presumably because I haven’t found the exact right combination of Flatpak permissions plus settings that will allow it to.

      All this to say, I love Bazzite for gaming and use it every day, but the moment you step outside that world and want your computer to do something a little bit differently, it’s a major headache. In the context of gaming, it’s much closer to “just works” than any other distro I’ve tried.

    • FlihpFlorp@lemm.eeOP
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      3 hours ago

      Ah nice, yeah I was thinking bazzite since it looks hard to break based on what you’ve all been saying and KDE so I have some vague sense of familiarity between windows and my steam deck

      • EarlGrey@discuss.tchncs.de
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        33 minutes ago

        Bit of warning about KDE:

        It is very customizable, but as a by product is also really easy to completely fuck up. The first time I used it (eons ago) I ended up removing the task bar and couldn’t figure out how to bring it back or launch programs.

        Just spend a bit of time reading up on it and you’ll be fine though.