I never used a spin-off of a unique distribution of GNU/Linux on my own computer, except the dark Ubuntu times. It seemed right at the time.
Now, I don’t see why I should recommend a distro that tries to be easier on new users when the original has sane defaults and is closer to upstream regarding all the tools and software bundled with it.
Here are my recommendations for new users in that order (regardless of their computer knowledge): Debian, Fedora, Gentoo, Arch, Slackware, LFS. Friends can help with the installation and should consider easy maintainability when dealing with users who just want to use it.
I haven’t used Mint in years, but back in the day downstream distros from Debian often worked better for desktop users than Debian itself.
This is because of Debian’s ‘stability’ philosophy. This meant that bugs could stick around for years in Debian stable after being fixed upstream.
Of course, with each new stable release, there should be fewer bugs so this problem should become less over time.
I’ve considered switching from Manjaro to Debian on my laptop, but then I think about how great the AUR is. That’s pretty much the main appeal for Manjaro over Debian, for me.
Before switching to LMDE, I did try just using Debian with Cinnamon, thinking it would be pretty much the same experience. I did not really enjoy the experience. There were too many niceties missing that I had taken for granted with Mint. I wasn’t interested in spending my time hunting down all the tweaks and packages to make those changes.
Brave is worse than Chrome. Affiliate link auto injection, unauthorised selling is copyrighted data, their own unblockable ad network, etc. Use Firefox.
Their business-practices sure do leave a lot to desire, which actually does hurt their trustworthiness; arguably their most valuable asset as a privacy-first browser. Hmm…, good food for thought, thank you!
Use Firefox.
I mostly do already 😅, from OP: “at times I have to rely on a Chromium-based browser if a website decides to misbehave on a Firefox-based browser”.
Thank you for mentioning that! I had dismissed it due to alleged shortcomings of its security features. While the allegations are (still) there, I’ve never heard any rebuttal or anything else of that matter. Would you happen to know anything in this regard?
I want to support pharonix but damn, chill out ob the ads. Especially the video overlays on mobile. It is unusable without an ad blocker, while at the same time saying they are ad supported.
For near-guaranteed compatibility, there are dedicated manufacturers like System76 and Tuxedo. Framework also claims Linux compatibility but for set tested distros (Ubuntu and Fedora).
Generally, anything with Intel/AMD graphics and Intel Wifi is pretty much guaranteed to work in my experience. For laptops, high-DPI displays can be problematic but the fixes are on Wayland which is getting higher priority now.
Begin small, end big. That works for everything when learning something new. So, with that said, go for Linux Mint Cinnamon.
I begun my Linux journey with elementary OS which is more for macOS users. I was a Windows user so I switched to Linux Mint Cinnamon. After a few years of exploring and learning, I am now using EndeavourOS.
Generally it doesnt really matter but if you can it’s best to avoid using nvidia gpus although they will work under Linux they don’t have as good support doesn’t mean you can’t use a nvidia gpu under linux if you want or have to I mean I’ve got a nvidia gpu in my gaming laptop and while it’s a pain to setup it works somewhat well for gaming
You’ll be fine just get whatever has best price to performance nvidia intel or amd generally amd gpus are best for linux because of there driver support but its still shit a good exanple of this is the r7 370s last drivers being made in 2015
Honestly people over do it with the Nvidia complaints.
Nvidia provides a rock solid driver for Linux. If you are a general consumer it works really really well and it’s easy to install.
Here’s the actual historical issue people have with Nvidia on Linux: it’s a closed source binary which is contradictory to the ethos of Linux.
But he’s the rub, Nvidia open sourced some shit this year, not all of it, but they’re becoming more open about the GPU drivers. But shitting on Nvidia is a hard habit to break lol
I've been using nVidia cards on laptops with Ubuntu much exclusively for ~15 years . Only problem I've ever had was once when I accidentally uninstalled something using apt-get and it took the nvidia drivers with it (because I'm was stupid).
Yeah I also had that “issue” with it. That and the fact that it kinda makes minimized applications transparent for no reason, but when I’m running xfce4 is to have performance and I’m not sure I want to install another extension. Btw, how does Docklike Taskbar play with having the clock, and the status tray on the right? Can it do it?
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