My laptop's mic seems to have some contact issues. It never worked for a second on windows. I put Linux on it, and it usually just works. When it doesn't, some percussive maintenance does a quick job of fixing it. I guess I was dealt the opposite hand than usual.
I figure this is a halfway decent place to ask, and it's on my mind. If there's a better place to ask, I'd love a point in the right direction, cause navigating lemmy well still eludes me.
Looking to test out linux for the first time and I know fuck-all about the basics, and I have a couple of questions:
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gaming is my main use for my pc, and I've seen Bazzite and Pop_OS as recommendations, are these good starting points? Relevant system specs (I assume):
CPU: Intel i5-9600K (overclocked in BIOS)
GPU: NVIDIA RTX 2060 (overclocked with MSI afterburner)
2 monitors setup, with my main setup for gsync ('adaptive-sync/freesync'). Both are ASUS monitors
I almost universally don't play games with anticheat, so I'm not concerned on that front (I've heard that's a big wall for linux gaming)
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I plan on using an SSD for testing linux because I have a spare available, but I'd like to eventually use my NVME that my current windows install is on for linux (after swapping windows to a different drive of course). Could I expect any issues by doing that, or should I set up NVME for linux before starting the dive?
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I'd like to be able to boot into windows or linux regularly (at least until I get my bearings and settle into it), but I've heard windows like to fuck with boot processes in some way? Any tips for avoiding boot issues?
Again, if there's a better place to ask (I'm sure there is lol), I'd appreciate a mention for that too.
I'd recommend pop os over bazzite because it's a more standard distro, bazzite is immutible (update entire system at once instead of individual apps, and part of the filesystem are read only. It's harder to break stuff on an immutible distro, but they're less common and most resources online are for normal distros). It isn't hard to get nvdia drivers working on pop os, so I'd just google it after you get it set up.
I'd make sure your windows drive is unplugged before installing, so you don't accidentally wipe it! I've never dealt with swapping what drive the os is on, but I'd expect some stuff to break because the filesystem is pointing to unique IDs that no longer match. That shouldn't be hard to fix by googling the errors, but I'd watch out for it.
Windows updates like to mess up bootloaders sometimes, I've never had that happen, so I don't have any advice there. Unplugging the windows drive when you instsl should help, and just make sure the default is to boot into linux, that way any auto restarts won't get into windows to mess stuff up unless you let it.
Hell yeah, thanks. I'll likely not use bazzite then (I'm less concerned with breakage if it means I have more options). Is there any other distros that you might recommend? I don't know what's out there, and it seems like a lot.
Also, thanks for the links! I'll check around there too.
The basic recomendations I'd give for distro is something popular based off Ubuntu or fedora. Both are pretty friendly distros, and most things based off them aren't going to make too many changes to how core systems work.
If it's based off one of those I'd argue the more important question is what user interface (called a desktop environment) you like. Watch a few videos of each distro in action and pick what you think looks best.
A lot of big distros have "spins" or varieties that have different desktop environments. So if you
Some specifics I'd recommend:
Linux mint: a distro based on Ubuntu that's designed to be easy to use, without much setup. Most stuff will just work, but being based on Ubuntu, it's a stable distro, so updates will be a bit slower, and there won't be any major changes in the same version. (I would reccomend this over standard Ubuntu personally because the company behind Ubuntu has made decisions I don't like (like prioritizing their own way of installing programs that, in my opinion, is a inferior to other methods))
Slightly less highly recomended:
Fedora: takes a quicker approach to updates, but isn't as focused on being friendly to new users. It has a variety of spins: https://fedoraproject.org/spins/ if you go with fedora, I'd recommend GNOME (the default, more similar to Mac), KDE (similar to windows), or cinnamon (what linux mint uses, similar to windows).
nobara: I've heard good things about nobara, but I'm not super familiar with it. It's basically fedora KDE with some extra patches added to better support gaming. The one negative I've heard is the maintainer is very busy, so ocasionally updates will be delayed vs fedora. It's more of a hobbyist distro, but the maintainer seems pretty dedicated, and they also maintain a version of valve's proton (one of the things that lets you play windows games on linux called proton ge that includes additional patches)
In order I'd recommend pop_os, linux mint, fedora, nobara. If you look at KDE and decide you like it, then I'd go withth fedora or nobara.
The main reason I'd recommend pop_os or mint is because you have an nvdia graphics card. Nvdia drivers have tended to be worse on linux, especially under a newer protocol called Wayland, which fedora is moving over to in it's next release. Mint and pop_os slower update cycles are more likely to stay on x11 (the older protocol, but better supported by nvdia cards) until everything's very solid.
Fedora's trying to push linux forward, which is good imo, and most things should be fine with nvdia, but there will be more bugs. (I've heard it's gotten pretty good, but I have an amd card and don't want to recommend them without warning until I know for sure there aren't issues)
The only things id be concerned about is that multi monitor will work better under Wayland but nvidia may not. Nvidia and wayland is getting better while multimonitor on X isn't, but I don't know exactly how things are rn enough to say
Yeah, I've heard it's getting better, but I have an amd card, so not really sure where it's actually at. X would probably be better for nvdia for a while, especially on pop_os, but idk what the actual state is.
My only concern with nobara is that Fedora 41's dropping x11 support, and I'm not confident nvdia drivers will be in a good enough state to recommend to a beginner.
Seconded, runs like butter
Bazzite sounds good too but I don't like the idea of an immutable distro so until/unless nobara becomes broken I'm sticking with it.
I recommend downloading the latest Linux Mint .iso file and using Rufus to create a bootable, live USB drive. Also, if your computer has an internal d: drive, I would recommend using that entire drive, instead of dual-booting from c: (I had a bad experience removing Linux from a dual boot system and getting the partitions back to normal). This way, you're not touching anything on your windows (c:) drive.
If you’re really worried about messing up your c: drive, you can physically disconnect it while you’re installing Linux, so the Live installer only has one choice for installation. After you've installed Linux, change your boot order in BIOS to boot from your d: drive first. Once you’re sure Linux is working correctly, you can run “sudo update-grub” which will add your c: drive to the boot menu on the d: drive. This allows you to dual boot into either OS without touching anything on your c: drive (so the boot menu will be on d:, your linux drive). Grub will let you choose between continuing to boot from d: or to boot windows on c: without you having to change the boot order every time in BIOS.
If you use Steam to manage your games library, you're really going to like that Steam has been developing a proprietary Wine wrapper, called Proton, which lets you run all your Steam games from Linux. Steam also has a native linux client. So all the Steam games you backed up on windows, you can restore on Linux. I've run everything from Unreal Gold, to Witcher 3 to Techtonica to Fallout 4 without any problems.
I still use HDDs because my 2 PCs are very old. But they both run versions of Linux mint 21.3 (the current release) without issue.
Mint xfce on my 15 year old optiplex with 4Gb ram.(because 2 slots are fried)
My other different model optiplex (also about 15 years old) has mint xfce, mint, another mint (different purposes) a shared volume, a timeshift partition (snapshots) on a 1tb hdd and windows on its original 320mb drive.
8Gb ram, onboard video, external soundcard
things
Over clocking on Linux... Not sure if necessary? Linux uses a CPU governor which throttles or maxes CPU based on .. Things.
Same with memory.
I don't play games, but I do run other processor heavy stuff. I know nvidia has/had issues depending on certain seemingly random things. Their drivers, I believe, are mostly NOT open source.
WINE is a godsend, especially the latest version 8.
Wine gives you the ability to natively rum most windows apps. (Some run better on Linux, lol)
You could install windows as a VM, too. But wine works for what I need (fl studio basically)
booting issues
If you dual boot, windows must be installed first.
Windows (MBR) and Linux (GPT or MBR) use different partition table types. Windows stores the boot loader in the MBR (master boot record) which is usually the first 100mb of a disk.
Linux gpt can install boot record to disk (/dev/sda), to disk boot partition(/dev/sda6), and to BIOS.
Windows will often overwrite the Linux boot loader (GRUB)
Boot menus in Linux are fully customisable text files. They can be simple text menus, or fancy graphical ones.
When GRUB is.used it finds other OSs on your disks. It makes a menu. It works.
Separate drives helps. Linux isn't limited to 4 logical volumes or the need for extended partitions. Linux can see all filesystem types. Windows?
filesystem's
Linux uses a fuckton of different filesystems for different functions
(Linux is at its core -simple, but it is voluminous in the knowledge base - 15 years later and I'm still going, 'oh, that's cool, I didn't know I could do that)
Anyway, the main fs on Linux is ext4, but it can read/write/modify NTFS, fat, vfs, luks, and on and on. Windows does NTFS and fat.
don't be scared
The terminal is actually, really, truly, for real, your best friend and portal to power potential
Resources may seem overwhelming at first. Linux uses a lot of words to do things. The GUI has gotten prettier, but the real customisation comes in text files(all of Linux is text files) there's not registry that is mostly unreadable/unusable.
Linux manages resources much better
(Maybe because it doesn't try to stuff ads all over the place and spy on you)
Use the manpages man7.org or sjmilar
Use archwiki.org
Use bash.org
Use your distros site (or use Ubuntu.com or Debian.org for deb/Ubuntu variants like mint)
Learn your package manager. (Apt, pacman, whatever it is). Install apps from there. Unless trusted or you've reviewed the code, avoiding installation from websitez is good practice.
Everything is a text file.
Configuration files are usually easily readable and configurable.
Though some may be in json and some in Java and some in Matlab and some in sh and some in plaintext (the joys of not having monolithic monopolies controlling everything)
Having Mint and Windows on the same machine will end up with a completely fucked boot drive if you're not super careful.
When I installed Mint on an NVME I installed specifically for it, either it or windows decided that the boot info should be placed on my SSD with Windows and not on the same NVME as mint (as I wanted, as windows was literally just a dead data drive to me at this point that happened to be bootable), so when it came time for the wipe and swap of drives I suddenly couldn't boot anything
Minor headache to get boot repair rolling and get everything set up properly to the partition I'd made on the NVME, but the googling I did to fix this taught me that Mint and Windows Dual-Boot is a question of "when and what will fuck Up" rather than "if it will"
My advice would be to just read carefully what's happening when you do drive shit and to keep a working boot USB for mint (should do this anyway, but keep it updated) for at least as long as you're dual booting. Boot repair WILL save you, its very easy to use, and remember the words emblazoned on that amazing book: Don't Panic
Welcome, if you need any help feel free to ask! Also don't let the few bad eggs in our community ruin your time, there's plenty of us who really care about building a strong community.
(re: learning curve) I'm actually enjoying the process of learning a whole new OS that isn't constantly getting in my way. I like having software that's logically designed, like a Word Processor (Libre Writer) that actually has the "Print" button right on the main screen and hasn't buried it at the bottom of a sub-menu that's not even on the menu bar.
I remembered reading about it happening soon (?) for certain kinds of security updates (?) somewhere but it's almost 2am here and I'm having difficulty googling a reliable and thorough source but it sounds like users will have to subscribe to Ubuntu Pro to get certain kinds of update, although it might be free under certain circumstances.
I don't know, Ubuntu has treated me well the last decade but I'm willing to explore other distros if it seems like it'll be unnecessarily commericalized. Will read up more in the morning.
What is the comparison between the naming of another AI and Recall? Co-pilot and Applei (yeah, I’m proud of that) sure, Recall and iSeeU (presumed) by all means.
Malus fanboys buy anything the marketing department sets in front of them. They thank Malus for ripping them off and attack anybody who says otherwise. Malus can do no wrong on their opinion.
When I log into my Foonix system with my 110 baud teletype, both vi and Emacs are just too damn slow. They print useless messages like, C-h for help'' and "foo" File is read only''. So I use the editor that doesn't waste my VALUABLE time.
Ed, man!
!man ed
ED(1) UNIX Programmer's Manual ED(1)
NAME
ed - text editor
SYNOPSIS
ed [ - ] [ -x ] [ name ]
DESCRIPTION
Ed is the standard text editor.
Computer Scientists love ed, not just because it comes first alphabetically, but because it's the standard. Everyone else loves ed because it's ED!
"Ed is the standard text editor."
And ed doesn't waste space on my Timex Sinclair. Just look:
- -rwxr-xr-x 1 root 24 Oct 29 1929 /bin/ed
- -rwxr-xr-t 4 root 1310720 Jan 1 1970 /usr/ucb/vi
- -rwxr-xr-x 1 root 5.89824e37 Oct 22 1990 /usr/bin/emacs
Of course, on the system I administrate, vi is symlinked to ed. Emacs has been replaced by a shell script which 1) Generates a syslog message at level LOG_EMERG; 2) reduces the user's disk quota by 100K; and 3) RUNS ED!!!!!!
"Ed is the standard text editor."
Let's look at a typical novice's session with the mighty ed:
golem> ed
?
help
?
?
?
quit
?
exit
?
bye
?
hello?
?
eat flaming death
?
^C
?
^C
?
^D
?
Note the consistent user interface and error reportage. Ed is generous enough to flag errors, yet prudent enough not to overwhelm the novice with verbosity.
"Ed is the standard text editor."
Ed, the greatest WYGIWYG editor of all.
ED IS THE TRUE PATH TO NIRVANA! ED HAS BEEN THE CHOICE OF EDUCATED AND IGNORANT ALIKE FOR CENTURIES! ED WILL NOT CORRUPT YOUR PRECIOUS BODILY FLUIDS!! ED IS THE STANDARD TEXT EDITOR! ED MAKES THE SUN SHINE AND THE BIRDS SING AND THE GRASS GREEN!!
When I use an editor, I don't want eight extra KILOBYTES of worthless help screens and cursor positioning code! I just want an EDitor!! Not a "viitor". Not a "emacsitor". Those aren't even WORDS!!!! ED! ED! ED IS THE STANDARD!!!
When IBM, in its ever-present omnipotence, needed to base their "edlin" on a UNIX standard, did they mimic vi? No. Emacs? Surely you jest. They chose the most karmic editor of all. The standard.
Ed is for those who can remember what they are working on. If you are an idiot, you should use Emacs. If you are an Emacs, you should not be vi. If you use ED, you are on THE PATH TO REDEMPTION. THE SO-CALLED "VISUAL" EDITORS HAVE BEEN PLACED HERE BY ED TO TEMPT THE FAITHLESS. DO NOT GIVE IN!!! THE MIGHTY ED HAS SPOKEN!!!
Ahh, the joke is that there is an event in Germany called "fisch sucht fahrrad" (short FSF) which is a big gathering of singles to find potential partners. A bit like Tinder, but before online dating was invented.
A gathering of FSF (free software foundation) People also consists of mostly single men.
They do say they harvest data from you, and like google they say they don't sell it, but they instead sell companies the right to advertise and then apple/google will use their data to target it at you.
You can make up your own mind if that is an overstep or not. For me it is.
Depends of your view of a long history I guess, I worked with OSX 10.5 for a few years, every time I wanted to install something I had to update the OS first.
They are just another sketchy large tech company. The first release might be a little less obnoxious for PR reasons, but they don't give a fuck about anyone's digital privacy.
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