I bought a laptop yesterday, it came pre-installed with Windows 11. I hate win 11 so I switched it down to Windows 10, but then started considering using Linux for total control over the laptop, but here’s the thing: I keep seeing memes about how complicated or fucky wucky Linux is to install and run. I love the idea of open source software and an operating system without any of the bullshit that comes with Windows, but most of the open source stuff I have is on my android and fairly easy to install. Installing and using Linux just feels like it’ll be a whole different beast that’ll eat up most of my time and I’m kind of intimidated by it.
TL;DR Linux scawy, how does a barely computer literate scrub like me who’s used nothing but windows since the dawn of their life get started with Linux?
Dont install it, yet. Make a bootable usb stick with balena etcher and put a linux distro on it (I highly recommend mint, pop_os or ubuntu (standard version) as ISO on it.
Ubuntu is very controversial in the more advanced sphere but I learned on it and its great for beginners.
If you want to go a little bit over the top download ventoy and put it on the usb instead. You can then put as many ISOs on there as you can fit and just select one of them at boot.
The most important part for beginners is the desktop environment anyway so gnome should be fine. If you have tried it for more than an hour and still feel like this could be fun, click install and give it a go.
You could also dual boot but windows might fuck you over since they‘re not great neighbors as an OS.
Feel free to ask if you want to know more. Good luck.
Try out [distro based on Ubuntu], [distro based on Ubuntu], or Ubuntu? These are largely on in the same. Either test drive something with a non-.deb base & a different package manager, or suggest what a lot of folks really notice when discussing the feel which is the alternative DEs (desktop environments) on offer. Fedora & other big names usually offer ISO varieties with the major DEs. I think finding a DE is a better starting point since most DEs will be offered by most distros.
No. Thats exactly the reason why folks get frustrated with linux. Because folks cant fathom how much handholding a user needs in the beginning.
apt and systemd based distro is great for beginners, so is gnome. They‘re very popular and a lot of folks know how to troubleshoot if possible.
I suggest you make your own suggestions instead of trying to „correct“ others‘.
If the person is supposed to test out a distro, the stuff they will remark on is the default apps & layout of their DE first & foremost that it’s disingenuous to the larger landscape to make 67% of your recommendations are GNOME & all are the same base. GNOME’s UX sucks. Others might like it, but a lot like me probably won’t so why not include an option with KDE Plasma, Cinnamon (listed), XFCE, & maybe a tiling manager if you know the target audience well enough for your short list is a better take. Who new to Linux is going to be able to tell you the difference between Pop_OS & Ubuntu? …This is why your list of 3 is a bad suggestion–too much of the same that leads a new user into thinking there isn’t a world of possibilities.
The frustrating part at the beginning is all the under-the-hood stuff that isn’t visual like the DE. I never suggested talking about systemd, musl, pipewire, Wayland/X11, GNU coreutils, or any of that other stuff that is harder to understand.
Ubuntu is very controversial in the more advanced sphere
I would argue only turbonerds really complain about it. But in my experience, for professionals who just need to get things done it works perfectly fine 99% of the time. Same for Windows or OSX to be honest.
Of course there’s going to be those one or two guys from the vocal minority with some esoteric hardware that didn’t work chiming in shortly I’m sure.
I think its an outdated recommendation. They keep making weird choices and one of only two friends that was willing to try Linux went and tried Ubuntu without my input and decided to go back to windows for a bunch of mostly mundane reasons that could have either been configured away or been preempted by using a different distro. The other guy will be back but on bazzite after trying my steam deck he only left for shitty rootkit anticheat games that he’s now sick of. He started on one of the arch easy install methods and was already a power user on both windows and Mac.
In fact I used ubuntu until version 23.10 iirc so no, its not an outdated recommendation. Actually I still use it on my servers because it doesnt need a desktop there and I‘m not changing OSs unless I have to. 22.04 is still perfectly fine on there.
The issue with power users (I‘m an admin myself) is that we‘re used to being in control and some new OS feels weird as we might get stuck for a bit. Not everyone likes to deal with that.
Still valid opinion I think. Have a good one.
I’m using Nix and it’s basically the same as every other Linux distro except settings and packages are managed slightly differently. It’s the DE that really makes a difference for people I think.
In fact, I dont use ubuntu on my desktop anymore because of their snap craze. I also think talking down to people shows lack of character btw. Have a good one anyway.
There are ways to remove snap and prevent it from (even accidentally) being installed again, that’s what I do. https://www.baeldung.com/linux/snap-remove-disable
But you can tell me how you think I was talking down to people? I’d like to know so I can correct my behavior if necessary.
Was it the word turbonerd? Sure not everyone may agree with that, it was said jokingly and I really just meant non-professional users who are passionate about Linux, wasn’t trying to make fun of anyone.
If someone is leaving windows for privacy reasons, it doesn’t make sense to go to Ubuntu.
Ubuntu is a great gateway distro to Linux. It ressemble Windows a lot, stable and straight forward to install and use.
So a new user is not too lost when switching over.
And, yeah, privacy is not that great, but having installed windows 11 on a new PC, Ubuntu is a lot better than windows
Try Linux Mint. You set it up on a USB drive, and you can try using it before you install it. So load it up, and try doing a few things you’d normally do (check email, etc.). This way, you can get your feet wet without committing fully. If you find you like it, you can do an installation (and it doesn’t require any fancy terminal stuff).
If the disk is not encrypted you can go wubi, it’s a windows app that will install Ubuntu in a virtual disk. You can use it forever without touching windows and also upgrade it with newer Ubuntu version: Check under assets here https://github.com/hakuna-m/wubiuefi/releases
You don’t have to install Linux if you are not ready for it. You can test it without installing by using Linux live distributions. With Ventoy you can have 10 or 20 different Linux distributions on one USB stick and test them to see how well your laptop works with it and which flavors you would prefer.
Did you install Windows 10 yourself from scratch? If you managed to do that you should be able to handle most Linux installs as well. I would go so far to say that generally Linux is easier to install than Windows nowadays. Go with Mint or OpenSUSE or Ubuntu and you should be all right.
If you have nvidia graphics that might give you trouble in the form of one extra package to install. If you have Intel or AMD graphics you shouldn’t expect any trouble at all.
The biggest difference between Windows and Linux is that you generally don’t download apps and drivers from websites but use your package manager to install stuff. Similar to app stores on smartphones. And unless it’s nvidia all drivers are already built in.
You can download live Linux images that boot directly from USB to try them out without installing. Often the live image is the same one you can then use to install Linux, if you want to.
Mint
I definitely found Linux Mint the easiest version to switch to, coming from Windows. All the menus and icons were basically where I expected to find them. I couldn’t have cared less about Wayland support, I just wanted to do basic tasks and for my printer to work, and Mint did that out of the box.
Linux is easier to install than Windows nowadays.
This.
Go with Mint or OpenSUSE or Ubuntu
Not this. Mint maybe, even though their Desktop looks dated and is not Wayland ready. But OpenSUSE is strange (what to use, Leap? Good luck with outdated packages; Tumbleweed? Well you are now rolling) and Ubuntu is basically dead.
I was once like you. You can do it. I like Linux mint. Here’s how to install it: Go to https://www.linuxmint.com/ and see what it’s about. It’s friendly, it’s very Windows like, it just works. Go here for the install guide: https://linuxmint-installation-guide.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ Pick an .iso file and download it. Go to https://etcher.balena.io/#download-etcher To download the program that puts .iso files on USB drives. Use the Balena Etcher program to burn the .iso onto a USB thumb drive. Put your non-redownloadable files with sentimental value in another drive and remove the drive from your computer. Do not skip this step, order another drive if you have to (INB4 new laptop, but don’t forget this with your other machines). Plug in the USB drive that has Linux Mint on it. Power off your computer. Wait 20 seconds. Power on your computer. Mash the F2, F10, F12, and F5 keys until you get to the bios screen, or get to the bios screen if you know some other way. Find the setting that says something like “boot priority” and put USB drive above your C drive. Save and power off. Wait 20 seconds. Power on. Press F12 or whatever key you need to to get to the boot selection screen. Choose the option to boot from the Linux Mint USB drive. This is where you can test drive Linux before installing. Try ctl-alt-t to bust open a terminal. The terminal is your friend, but not required for the install. Close terminal with the command ‘exit’ or ctl-d or ctl-c ctl-d. Double click the install icon on the desktop. Follow instructions. Choose to delete windows forever from your life and put Linux on the hard drive. Follow instructions, they are no harder than any other wizard you have seen to install software. Reboot. Enjoy. Here are some tips: The terminal is your friend. Commands for learning the terminal, because the terminal can teach you to use the terminal (man is short for manual): man man man apt man ls man cd man vi man nano man less man pipe man mkfifo man rm apt search game —> searches for the keyword 'game" apt update ----> this is how to update your cache. Use it to pull your software updates apt upgrade ----> this is how to apply the updates to your machine.
—End terminal stuff— You can use your machine in the normal way too, same as any windows machine. Look around and explore. All the stuff in the software center is free (gratis). There’s lots of stuff. No more .exes to get software. Look at www.fsf.org to discover why free software is important.
If you have trouble you can DM me. I will help if I can. Good luck, you got this.
Some more info on what exactly the BIOS is, since you don’t usually run into it while using Windows: It’s a tiny, low-level program that comes with your computer’s motherboard that controls all the fundamental stuff about your system. It can enable/disable wifi, USB ports, CD drives, etc.; set your system’s time; allow or disable weird stuff like CPU overclocking or Virtual Machine support; change power management settings (like whether to use the computer’s battery); and importantly, decide which operating system to use. Your computer actually always goes through the BIOS before starting Windows, it just won’t show you any of these settings unless you ask it to. That’s why you need to go to the BIOS after installing Linux, you need to tell it to use Linux from the USB stick instead of Windows like it usually does. The icon on Linux Mint that installs it to your computer just copies Linux from the USB to your computer and tells the BIOS to boot into Linux instead of Windows from now on. This is also what lets you “dual-boot”: you can have both Windows and Linux on your computer, and the BIOS chooses which use, or you can ask it to switch to the other one.
