what distro to start?
what distro to start?
hi,
I have had to use windows for a long time because of school (word and excel, the ms version, was like mandatory, tho free), and I have been interested in trying or at least learning linux more.
I tried once before on Manjaro but I messed up the install and I was having annoying issues with the graphics drivers with an nvidia card (having to manually change the settings for two monitors and the refresh rate every time i rebooted, for instance). That was around 4 years ago now though.
My main question was what distro I should try? I am fairly experienced so I know my way around things but not in linux, and I am okay with learning curves.
It seems like everyone has a different answer for this so I wanted to hear suggestions. Thank you
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Stay with one of the big boys: Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora, openSUSE, then you're golden. For NVIDIA users I guess I'd still recommend something Ubuntu based: Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Pop_OS!, etc because the drivers can be preinstalled.
On Fedora you need to install the NVIDIA drivers from rpmfusion, and on openSUSE you need an additional repo. It's an extra step, but otherwise I'd strongly recommend one of these two.
OpenSuse Tumbleweed really is amazing. If I ever get tired of Pop, Tumbleweed is absolutely what I would consider as an alternative.
This actually makes me wonder if I made a mistake installing Arch for a machine of mine, or if I should go back to something like Debian. I know basic Linux knowledge but I don't know if I should stay with Arch.
Arch is fine, it doesn't take as much to maintain it as it seems. Just be sure to read the System Maintenance (especially "Upgrading your system") and General Recommendations pages.
To be clear, Arch is also one of the big boys, just not my personal recommendation for beginners.
If arch isn't getting in your way you should be fine. Arch is better suited for experts because to set it up, you'll have to have some opinions on what internals you prefer, how you like things configured, and you'll sometimes need to troubleshoot bleeding edge bugs that sneak in. Once you have it configured and rolling, it's actually quite easy to maintain. The AUR is great for newbies as well - trying to compile random things off github is a good way to mess something up.