Linux

Honestly the modern Linux experience is largely easy to start these days, but there are pitfalls and traps.

A little more than a year ago I was a complete Linux nooby, but I researched and asked questions before jumping in. Then I jumped in (my first distro was endeavour). I asked questions, read forums, tinkered, then broke my shit.

Then I distro hopped between the popular ones (mint, buntu, etc.) before finally settling on Cachy. There were pains along the way but for my use cases the main learning hurdles were learning the compatibility layers and FOSS software alternatives.

I implore you to tread the beaten path, on a tried and tested distro with an active community. Think about your use case, and which flavor of Linux distro better supports your intentions.

The problem with Linux is that most distributions suck for beginners. People recommend Debian/Ubuntu because they're stable but that just means they don't get updated, not that they won't break. The obvious solution is to use Arch, which has the latest version of software and therefore does not break on new hardware. But that sucks too because Arch's goal is not that your setup works either, it's that you have the latest versions of software installed no matter the cost. OK, so I guess Fedora will be good because it's somewhere in the middle. Fedora is better but their non-free codec stuff is not great for noobs either.

I think the best recommendation is Pop! OS because it has none of the above issues. You will still have outdated software but at least not outdated drivers. Just use the defaults, don't change the desktop environment etc. If you install third party software in the .deb format, expect breakage when you eventually upgrade to a new release. Try to use flathub for that. Be aware that software on Flathub is user-submitted and may contain a virus. Check that it's verified by a trusted source, not just some random person's github website.

Then there is OpenSUSE Tumbleweed which I guess is pretty good too but it's hard to recommend to noobs because it's sort of esoteric and because you cannot install .deb packages from the internet on it. Finally there are the atomic distros which have the same issues but at least they should break less likely. If you only need software from flathub and what's available in the app store, they're fine.

idk why I wrote this but yes most distros don't "just work"

Bought a Tuxedo laptop with Linux preinstalled. Literally flawless experience. Zero glitches. Sounds like an exaggeration but my work issued macbook pro has issues here and there.

Every OS sucks. Linux sucks wayyy less tho

Not at all, but the benefits are worth it.

I do but im not gaming on my linux setup and im using zorin although I just installed kde. Installed a few other things as I have needed them but for my day to day it was pretty good right out of the box (ok there is no box anymore but I don't know of a new phrase for this). If I was gaming I would likely do a separate gaming distro.

I run Kubuntu and it isn't that bad, but it's definitely less reliable than Windows. Often KDE seems to completely crash, requiring a force restart of my system. I also have a bunch of monitors that turn off via a smart plug when I leave the house, and it sometimes doesn't like that.

Perhaps a more minimalist setup? There was a post recently about one that uses zero RAM and zero CPU. That might not suit your use case though.

I experience the same thing every time I decide to try KDE on any distro.

Windows just worked.

Excuse me while I laugh hysterically while remembering the sorts of Windows issues I've troubleshot for family or coworkers. The one where the combination of a particular Windows version + a particular MS Office version + document previews being activated would cause Office to crash randomly on operations that had nothing to do with document previews was particularly memorable and difficult to figure out. The various Linux snafus I've had to deal with were pretty easy to handle by comparison.

In general, yes.. I used Ubuntu years ago but for almost 10 years now it's MX Linux (Debian based), only problem I had was on my brand new PC the wifi card was new and not well supported by the kernel, but with new kernel/driver it improved and now I have 0 problem.

The best thing I ever did was use Nvidia prime offloading to move everything to my integrated GPU and have only select GPU intensive applications (like games, video editing) interact with Nvidia.

Never had to deal with weird graphics bugs after that.

More or less,

Arch gave me some issues on install getting steam games to run on my main graphics card but since fixing then it's been maintenance free. There were some other issues that resolved with system updates, e.g. HDR on Wayland/KDE but Plasma update fixed it almost a year ago.

I'm running AMD/AMD/ASUS RoG.

My windows dual bout however takes 5min for all the bootup apps to launch and explorer is unstable. Probably because of local account and some policies I've been locking AI and metrics down with. Also Office clock to run burns my cpu when at idle and it ignores the manual start setting in services as well as startup-apps menu. It's just there for work.

Edit given below comments: I am NOT suggesting Arch for a beginner who wants simple and easy. Plenty of more beginner friendly distros will need even less maintenance.

I am waiting for SteamOS 3 Desktop to be released, so that I don't have to worry about this sort of thing, and have support from an 800lb gorilla. When I tried Mint back in January, my games weren't working right - Lutris, Hero Launcher, ect. Considering the amount of retro and Japanese games I play, having broken GOG installations wasn't a good start.

For now I am just sticking to Windows 11 IoT, but sooner or latter Microsoft's issues will be too much. Hopefully, SteamOS will be out by then.

I had a lot of problems with mint. Difficult fir a new user like me. Had to reinstall once i noticed i did not set a su/sudo password so could not do anything :(

Each Distro is effectively a different OS, so depending on what you run you will have a different experience.

I started out on OpenSUSE because a CAD software for work only was supported on RedHat or SUSE. NVidia hosts a repo specifically for OpenSUSE so I added that and it figured out the driver. So all those nVidia complaints I read about just never happened for me. No tearing or flickering.

My wife's old laptop couldn't run W10 so we put Linux on it. Every Debian based distro I tried would crash on install, or hardware error during boot. But Fedora or OpenSUSE worked fine (warned of error but worked around it). Eventually moved her machine to NixOS, and its been stable for years.

Just because a distro gives you pain, dont give up if you still enjoy the idea of Linux, there are so many distros that one will work better for your needs

I began writing this comment with the intention of answering your question, but it actually ended up mainly being me venting myself.

Obviously no, it's never been a flawless experience, but a few months back I decided I wanted to try gaming so I put an nvidia card in my pc and reinstalled linux to start fresh. All of the examples you've given sound like the sort of problems I've had since then, but never in the ten years before when I was using intel integrated graphics. I was aware going in that nvidia is massively more problematic than AMD, but this card was a spare from someone I know.

Obviously there are games I can run well now that were unrealistic before, but there are also a couple 2D games with SNES-quality graphics that I've tried which spike my CPU to 100% and lag like crap in spite of working perfectly before I installed the card. I've had two experiences where a game suddenly has issues immediately after an update to the nvidia-utils package. I'm not new to linux, but I am new to gaming on it and I've kind of given up on troubleshooting this stuff in favor of "maybe there will be an update tomorrow that fixes this".

There's reason for optimism, everyone is saying the situation is steadily improving because nvidia has been much more cooperative in the past couple years. It's not realistic to say you won't find annoyances regardless, but it wouldn't surprise me if over half of your struggles are a direct result of decades of one company's deliberate decision to ignore pleas to stop making life as hard as they possibly can on software developers trying to support their hardware.

The issue is you installed Ubuntu with an RTX 3060 and you intend to game, heh.

You need a distro optimized for gaming on Nvidia out of the box, and Ubuntu Studio is not it. Not unless you want to DIY overhaul the whole system and maintain it forever.

You need Bazzite, probably. Or CachyOS.

You could fix Ubuntu temporarily, eventually, but it will always be like a boat once you start configuring stuff yourself. But use a gaming distro, and gaming fixes and setups come down the pipe for you.

TBH I have made this mistake more than once. Now I run don’t a distro that focuses on this and have never looked back.

I have been using Linux for a long time and it's only been in the post chrome os era that I've really seen updates and maintenance begin to turn the corner.

A lot of Linux users will tell you their system is perfect but it kinda reminds me of that documentary where all these inventors came to show off their sex robots at a sex robot convention. Its obvious how absurd it is when you're on the outside looking in at a bunch of people who are like "I know she's rough lookin' but just check out this feature".

ChromeOS was really a first class experience on third rate garbage hardware. It did however really spark the potential for a new paradigm that projects like ChimeraOS, universalBlue, vanillaOS, blendOS, and even steamOS are tackling.

Ubuntu is a bit "dated" in its design. (For lack of a better description even though they keep trying to re-invent the wheel). There is a reason why everyone is rushing to make Linux usable now and that's namely because it's become valves chosen desktop platform moving forward. Immutable/atomic distributions are set to fix the problems the average user deals with when it comes to Linux.

I'm actually using bazzite-dx with Nvidia and gnome right now. Its been an overall success with some kinks due to the average jank you get with Nvidia drivers. For instance, Bambu studio flatpak was busted for a week but I just checked tonight and it looks like it's been fixed.

Its ok to be frustrated about this. You're not alone.There are dozens of us! Dozens!

Lol no. I've been using Linux for 10 years and it's been a continuous dumpster fire. Constant issues l, especially with Nvidia, across many different machines. Issues with wine, no X11 (or Wayland) after updates, games not starting, etc, etc. Across Ubuntu, Fedora, Arch (and derivatives).

Yet I almost exclusively use Linux nowadays. Why? Because it's a dumpster fire I can influence. Windows is going to shit, they were taking my PC hostage, installing spyware, ads, forcing updated without my consent. On Linux I have to invest hours to fix shit, on Windows I can get fucked whenever something happens that I don't want.

With proton advancing, Wayland working somewhat usable even with Nvidia,my threshold was passed. I'd rather fix the fixable Linux issues that cost me time than deal with Windows any longer. But for the layman I'm not sure I'd recommend it. I'm a computer scientist. I can fixodt issues, it's just a question of time and energy. But that doesn't go for everyone.

For me yes, I have a laptop with Nvidia GPU and AMD CPU with hybrid graphics and both can change depending on what I'm doing (on Wayland BTW)

It’s the same on windows Android iOS.. Stuff happens the beauty of Linux is your always learning.. it will help if you want to get a devops job.. will help you with stability.. will help you brag to your friends.. you will learn more about your computer what’s good bad whatever.. takes time. almost everyone was born using windows.. it’s a learning process..

In the end it will all come together and make sense.. choose a distro you like and stick with it