I’ve been meaning to make the leap for some time, but I had a hiccup with Mint a little while ago, and my key reason for choosing Mint above all others has disappeared. My Windows machine is doing the usual “you’ve had this installed for a while so it’s just going to keep getting slower unless you do a fresh re-install” thing that Windows seems to do, and I’ve got more time on my hands than last time I tried, so I figure why not put that time to use.
The first thing is that I’ve got an nVidia card. I’m not allergic to having to play around with settings and download drivers, but it’d be nice to have something that just works with that card and which is designed to work with that card, rather than having to bodge something together out of sellotape & string.
I also have 3 monitors. And they don’t all connect with the same kind of socket/lead. I believe that both nVidia & multiple monitors, and especially nVidia and multiple monitors is a bit of a sticky point with many distros.
I am something of a gamer, but I don’t tend to play stuff which is resource-intensive. No AAA titles. Think more “games which cost £20 or under on Steam”. So I don’t think I need a distro which is optimised for gaming, but I would like one where I’m likely to be able to play most things I own with a minimal amount of fudging.
I do have some utilities that I use. I’d like to avoid dual-booting, if possible, but I understand that it might be necessary. Reaper has a native Linux version, so that’s not a problem, but if I understand correctly using vst & clap plug-ins might need some attention? Again, if that can be done with as little difficulty as possible, then that’d be great. I also have a usb keyboard/controller (piano, not typing), so if there’s any potential issues with that, it’d be nice if the distro had been built with something like that in mind.
I also do some video/photo stuff, which don’t have Linux-native versions. I use Affinity (v2 and the newly-released version), Magix Vegas, and Wondershare Filmora. I don’t know if it’d be possible to run any of them in a virtual machine or something. I have tried the Linux-native alternatives, and while they have their merits, I won’t be able to use them as full replacements.
Now, perhaps unusually for a newbie, when it comes to wanting something I’m familiar with, I’m actually not bothered by having an envirnment which resembles Windows. In fact, I think it’d probably be a plus if the distro does things differently. It’s fun to try different things, and if someone’s genuinely thought “this is a better way of doing this”, then I’m happy to give it a go. As long as there’s decent documentation. I’m not allergic to the idea of the terminal or otherwise having to use typed commands (I have a Raycast-ish-like app on Windows which I use to launch apps and search for files, for example), but I’m also not very experienced with that and would need very good, very newbie-friendly documentation.
And for customisation, I’d like to be able to be able to make it look pretty. Juxtopposed’s recent Linux video was very cool, and I could see myself wanting to do something like that but, unlike her, I’ve got very little coding experience and if there were any coding involved I’d need even better documentation than I would for the command line stuff. And, this really isn’t important, but ATM I run an app called Lively Wallpaper, which allows me to make it look like the glass looking onto the desktop has rain running down it. If there just happens to be a reasonably simple and non-resource-hogging way to have animated wallpapers, then that’d be a lovely bonus.
So that’s it. Sorry for the long, rambly wall of text, but I feel like for responses to be truly helpful, people should know exactly what it is I’m looking for. Please ask any follow-up questions if that’ll help with suggestions. I think I’ve said everything which could be important, but I don’t know what I don’t know.
Others have answered your question but nobody’s explicitly mentioned GNOME so I think I should.
Most distros have the option to install with GNOME or KDE (or a different one). Never pick GNOME. GNOME is very “my way or the highway” desktop and it’s way is to emulate an iPhone.
Well GNOME can be recommended for new coming macOS users tho
Bazzite.
nVidia? Check.
Gaming? Check.
Customization? Yes…ish*
If you want a bit more tradition (by that i mean it works like a typical linux system) and a good base, choose CachyOS.
nVidia? Check.
Gaming? Check.
Customization? Check.
(extra) The AUR? (the second biggest software repo in the entirety of linux) Check.
.
If you aren’t much focused towards gaming, choose Pop!_OS.
NoVidea**? Check.
Gaming? No.
Customization? Check.
*Jux customized KDE Plasma using Kvantum (an extra package, not preinstalled), Panel Colorizer, System Settings and RTFM. Some of those packages may be hard to install or unavailable on Bazzite due to it’s atomic (something either happens or not) and immutable (you are phohibited to touch system directories) nature.
**=joke
+1 for Bazzite, it’s working perfectly with Nvidia for me. Only have one monitor, so don’t know about multi-monitor setup (might be a desktop environment thing, as well?)
Bazzite on AMD with ultra-wide and 1440p dual-monitor setup here, zero problems
I have been using pop 24.04 with cosmic DE since alpha and it’s great. I use it for all desktop needs but also have had no issues gaming with it.
I am aware you can game on Pop. But, it’s not focused towards gaming. You can game on every distro nowadays.
I don’t know why there’s so much nvidia hate going on here. It’s MUCH better than it used to be. Lots of distros mentioned work out of the box with nvidia cards, and if you pick something else - it’s just a matter of installing the right driver. On fedora for example you just go to the rpm fusion site and follow the very easy directions.
Normally I’d say go Bazzite if you want easy NVidia support.
Since you’ve got some “other things” then an immutable distro might not be the way you want to go. In which case I’d check out Nobara or CachyOS. I really like CachyOS
The first thing is that I’ve got an nVidia card.
This can well cost you a lot of extra frustration and time. You have been warned.
I use Manjaro, an Arch flavor. Manjaro is amazing at identifying and installing the proper drivers. I can’t imagine I’d ever switch to another distro. I use gnome desktop and I like to customize it every so often, keep things interesting. The community is very supportive. It seems like people prefer KDE for aesthetics.
I also do some video/photo stuff, which don’t have Linux-native versions. I use Affinity (v2 and the newly-released version), Magix Vegas, and Wondershare Filmora. I don’t know if it’d be possible to run any of them in a virtual machine or something. I have tried the Linux-native alternatives, and while they have their merits, I won’t be able to use them as full replacements.
The unfortunate thing is if this is non-negotiable, I think this will kill your Linux dreams at the moment. At the moment, the only ways I know how to run these well is on a VM with GPU pass through which is a pain for people who have tinkered with Linux for ages and damn near system breaking for the average user.
Now, perhaps unusually for a newbie, when it comes to wanting something I’m familiar with, I’m actually not bothered by having an envirnment which resembles Windows. In fact, I think it’d probably be a plus if the distro does things differently. It’s fun to try different things, and if someone’s genuinely thought “this is a better way of doing this”, then I’m happy to give it a go. As long as there’s decent documentation. I’m not allergic to the idea of the terminal or otherwise having to use typed commands (I have a Raycast-ish-like app on Windows which I use to launch apps and search for files, for example), but I’m also not very experienced with that and would need very good, very newbie-friendly documentation.
If the previous part isn’t a deal breaker, based upon this part of your post, I would highly recommend running endeavor os or cachy os which are both run on an arch base. My preferred of the two is endeavor since it is essentially just a base arch install without the hassle that is installing arch. Using one of these distros will require you to familiarize yourself with the package manager pacman and the aur wrapper that they use, but that is the extent of CLI interaction that is needed. This will allow you to have a hassle free install while having the tinkering capabilities that arch is known for, just don’t touch anything that requires sudo without making sure you understand what it is doing.
Have you checked out zorinOS? Zorin, popOs! And mint are all great distros. I think anyone trying to switch would be very comfortable with any, but especially zorin as you can make it look like and feel like any os, https://zorin.com/os/
If your into something arch based you and try Garuda Linux. https://garudalinux.org/
I’ve not tried any fedora distros yet.
Do you hate yourself? Since NVidia probably needs workarounds for it, Void Linux. It works splendid on my very low-end laptop, though.
So that’s it. Sorry for the long, rambly wall of text, but I feel like for responses to be truly helpful, people should know exactly what it is I’m looking for.
absolutely! no reason to apologize
Not really sure why you want to switch from mint. Mint is a nice distribution to test out Linux because it comes with many things readily installed and with decent defaults. Since you’re worried about compatibility with several peripherals I’d stick with that.
If you want to switch to something else to learn something new, then pretty much any other distribution is fine. Given enough customisation every distribution is just the same as any other. The only real difference is the repository updates schedule.
ah yes, the millionth person recommending mint as a beginner distro because they used it 10 years ago, ignoring the fact that it completely bricks your system if you DON’T REMOVE AND REINSTALL YOUR GRAPHICS DRIVERS WITH EVERY UPDATE
use something with a sane and easy to use package manager that just works like nobara, fedora, endeavor, literally anything else
I remember using mint at some point. That was indeed a long time ago. Didn’t know about the problems.
Also have to mention mint looks like shit compared to other distros
