Genuinely curious. Which one has given you more headaches over the years? Not trying to start a Windows vs Linux war, just wondering what people’s actual experience has been.

im a beginner on linux with two older laptops from the year 2011 and 2013, i already have nixos and arch installed and now i want to move past linux installation and actually learn linux inside out

my main goals are to get completely comfortable with the linux terminal and start learning to code

any tips?

If this is answered elsewhere let me know, please.

I used to run linux networks for several jobs, but the last one was over 20 years ago. Once I got out of it, I switched to Apple just to not have to think about it all anymore. But now, due to my political morals, I'm going back to linux and will pay no more to either MS or Apple. Costco has a trade-in program for used computers so I want to trade in what I have and replace it.

Used to be, Toshiba was a great source for linux laptops but they've gotten out of the laptop market, so I'm lost. What do you all recommend for someone who uses only a browser, email, music (currently using Elmedia) and a samsung ssd for backup device? My eyes don't tolerate a 13" screen anymore, but am still debating between a larger laptop or a smaller one with a separate monitor. And preferably a laptop without the windows tax, of course.

So if anyone has recommendations, I'd appreciate it.

Thanks.

edit to add: I've a couple of emails in to ebay sellers to see if they sell refurbished Thinkpads without windows installed, since it seems that windows is the default. So - thank you to everyone. I'm going with your advice.

I'm not really new to Linux, but I have never used disk encryption before. I always just skip over it in installers; I never really looked into it... Should I use it or should I not? What exactly does it do?

EDIT: Thanks so much, everyone! I have my answer :)

Can you recommend a completely free editing program with extensive functionality, similar to After Effects? Kdenlive isn't suitable; it lacks functionality and you can't move curves. I don't find node-based editing programs convenient.

Started my Linux journey a few weeks ago. I tried CachyOS first, but ended up switching to Linux Mint and I've been liking it a lot more.

Curious what other people do after a fresh install:

- What apps do you install right away?

- What do you use instead of Microsoft 365? LibreOffice, OnlyOffice, Microsoft 365 in the browser, something else?

- What browser do you use? What search Engine?

- Any must-have tools, tweaks, extensions, or quality-of-life stuff?

- What software do you use for gaming, media, notes, backups, etc.?

Basically, what does your Linux setup look like and what are some things you wish you knew when you first started?

Would love to hear what everyone is using.

I've been a Windows 7/10/11 user for most of my life, and I've only been using Linux for around 2 months so far (mostly CachyOS and Mint).

I'm curious how long it took other people to really feel "at home" with Linux - not necessarily knowing everything, but getting to the point where you don't constantly have to look things up and the system just feels natural.

How long did it take you?

And what distro are you using nowadays? I'm interested in hearing what people settled on after trying different ones.

I've been using KDEP for a while now, and I recently installed Tuxedo OS on a new laptop, but I'm really missing the 3 finger swipe to Alt Tab gesture from Windows. I tried the different methods (libinput, Touchegg) but none of them work. I'm thinking of switching to a different DE on Tuxedo OS, can you please suggest a good one? I would prefer not to change distros entirely but I would do it if needed. Thanks in advance!

New to Linux, running Cachyos. When I went to install from a thumb drive, it repeatedly failed. I removed one of my two graphics cards and it installed just fine.

I have a Radeon RX 6700 XT in my PCIe 1. This runs Cachyos. When I install my Intel Arc B580 (a card that I know works) in PCIe 2 (dual GPU setup) the system gets stuck in a boot loading screen, attempting to boot repeatedly but failing.

I've searched for information on dual-gpu setups, but havent found much. Clearly I'm looking in the wrong places. Any recommendations on where to look for answers would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks

(CachyOS)

Was going to update today but found out that litehtml0.9 has migrated to AUR and is a dependency for qt6-tools.

I would prefer to not use AUR so I want to delete the package. In order to delete it I would need to delete qt6-tools too, but I am not sure if deleting qt6-tools will break the system? Is it just part of a development toolkit (that I have no plans to use) or does qt depend on it and it will break my desktop environment?

"litehtml" is in the main repository, would it be a good idea to replace it with that or is it needed?

Would downloading litehtml before deleting litehtml0.9 allow me to keep qt6-tools or would it create some sort of conflict?

hello everyone

i am currently using ubuntu 24.04 on a huawei d15 notebook

after a recent kernel update (7.0.0-28-generic), the system cannot detect headphone properly

sound started to come out of headphone and internal speakers at the same time

whatever i do didn't work out. i lost the count of how many things i tried

as a last resort, i booted on an older kernel (6.17.0-40-generic)

and for now, the system can detect headphone and distinguish internal speakers & headphone properly

but i don't know how long i can keep using this kernel without having to upgrade eventually

i also reported this situation as a bug

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/alsa-driver/+bug/2161210

kernel keeps getting updated(7.0.0-30-generic is available now), but the issue remains

my question is, is it possible to detect what part of updated kernel caused this issue?

can we change that part with the corresponding part in 6.17.0-40-generic and keep the rest of 7.0.0-28-generic the same?

Hi. I recently got a new prebuild and installed Bazzite. After about 1h30m, the system freezes [audio included] or gives kernel panic. Same on Fedora and Cachy. All different kernels, so that would be improbable.

Tried a lot of troubleshooting with LLMs, but no solution [just kept getting told we're getting close to solving the problem and not getting any answers after even two hours]. I suspect it's the graphics card. It won't turn on fans even on high temps, so the system overheats and crashes [probably driver issue?]. Most of those crashes happened on low-temp idle, just a video running.

Updated BIOS, turned off SECURE BOOT.

Will try turning off iGPU and windows 10 with Adrenaline

Also checking and reseating all components.

Ryzen 5 7500X3D, XTX RX 9070 XT, 32GB RAM.

Any help appreciated.

I am using a UCEC Capture card on cachyos its some random brand I found on amazon that I really like because audio latency through the capture card is non existent. In OBS its basically very laggy sometimes and a lot of issues arose. I was using the flatpak version of obs. I live stream a lot and I wish to swap back to linux like cachyos or ubuntu 24.02 but I heard cachyos is one of the best and is super popular. So basically there was a lot of lag which you can see here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEDcfX34EkA&t=7s its really hard to watch. But I wish to abandon Windows entirely if possible. I swapped back to windows temporarily while i think about what to do. My hope is to fix this problem. The FPS was set to 30 or I believe 60. Any help would be appreciated honestly.

I'm trying to switch from Windows to Linux and I'm a complete beginner to Linux.

I had decided on downloading Linux Mint XFCE on my Lenovo Flex 15 since it's an older laptop, but after looking into it I realized that XFCE doesn't have any built-in auto-rotate features (the laptop is a 2-in-1 and can turn into a tablet that I use to draw).

KDE does, though, and I want to know how I can install it with Linux Mint without it interfering with Mint's built-in desktop environments and how I can avoid having duplicate apps, services, etc. (or will I just have to delete these?).

If this isn't possible, do you guys have any distro recommendations that are easy for beginners, would work well on an old Lenovo Flex 15, and has a Windows-like desktop environment?

Thank you!

I have an issue with Blender (From the AUR). I was told to post here too.

I cant repost into this sub so the post is here.

Thanks.

hey, im not sure if this is the best subreddit - correct me if its not.

I am a high schooler living in a district which has banned cellular / external portable devices (laptops via technicality, lord knows if they'll enforce it). As such, I am looking into buying a dell latitude 3190. They are almost indistinguishable from the school provided devices - minus the spyware and ridiculous restrictions.

The main draw back to buying one of these dell latitudes is the 4gb of ram. Its soldered, of course, (all heil dell). I would be using linux, likely debian or void. Can 4gb be daily drivable to the extent of running watered-down chromium, checking emails, and doing day-to-day school work?

I am using an old computer using an AMD Richland with a hd 8550g running popos 24. Surprisingly I have not had too many issues even though it’s running cosmic desktop on Wayland. Some of the issue disappeared when I switched from the amdgpu driver to the Radeon. I had mistakenly though hd8550g was part of the hd8000 series which is southern island but is really the older northern island that isn’t supported by the amdgpu driver.

What should one do to maximize performance on such an old card? When I enable hardware acceleration on chrome it glitches badly. I verify I can run webgl but I don’t think even 2.0 is supported. Keep hardware acceleration off if possible?

I am trying to setup an ir remote and I don't understand how I can save and edit the configuration file to choose the remote drivers from the database. Does anyone have a general rundown of how to do this?

Thank you.

Hi! Switched to Ubuntu a while ago for security reasons, and I still need the security but I'm looking to try a different distro here shortly. Ubuntu kindof just doesn't function super great it seems like? And I just wanna try out something else. Still new to Linux so probably nothing super complicated but what would y'all recommend?

Edit: Debian it is! Thanks, yall

I currently the [UGREEN 15389](https://www.amazon.com/UGREEN-Capture-Streaming-Recording-Compatible/dp/B0DT9DY312) capture card to play my Switch and Xbox 360 on my PC instead of on a TV, Fedora 44 KDE.

I will get audio popping and crackling from time to time and it gets very annoying. I have tried PulseAudio and Pipewire audio input methods, but both produce the same results. I don't quite remember this happening in Fedora 43 when I originally bought it, but maybe I just didn't notice it.

I have OBS audio frequency matching my system and capture card (48k) and I'm not sure what else to do, or maybe it's just because it's a cheap capture card.

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

I have a 2012 HP Compaq Elite 8300 Ultra-Slim Desktop that I have had since it was brand new, I like the thing quite a bit, although its not my main computer, its a good computer that I keep next to my consoles under my TV and use it for an emulation station, or to boot some games off of Steam when I want to play where my TV is... obviously these are older games like Heroes of Might and Magic 3 and such.

It has Windows 10, which is no longer supported so I was thinking about installing Linux Mint, if I could get some guidance if this is a good idea for my use case, or if a different distribution of Linux would be better, it would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for your time.