Most here will recommend Linux Mint and it’s what I use now after trying many different versions over the years. There’s a simplicity to Mint that just works especially well for those just surfing and doing office tasks. I’ve given away old work laptops with just mint installed as most people just need a web browser and it works great for that.
MS office can be used in your web browser or you can switch to Libre Office which should open most of your office files.
If you have a old laptop or computer I recommend trying to install Mint there first to try it out. It’s pretty easy to start out there first before trying dual boot. You might be surprised at how quick your older laptop works with Mint in the process.
I use dual boot on my machines but most of the use these days is to get to a web browser so I find I rarely boot into windows now.
You will find Firefox is the default web browser but you can add Chrome to Mint if that’s your browser of choice.
Many will say what about the privacy issues with Chrome but many still use it. I’ve switched back to Firefox myself and I like it better for my Android phone.
Yes, there is always something that won’t work. This often happens with Windows (not too often, but it happens), but most often with Macs. Linux is quite buggy in the userspace area, I usually find bugs or crashes within an hour of using any linux distro. The one with the FEWER bugs is definitely Debian. But it does that by not using hacks or beta drivers or software. This creates a rock solid architecture, but some hardware won’t work (in my case, it was the sound chip for an intel J-series cpu that required a third party patch to work and recompile the kernel – while Ubuntu ships with that patch by default, but ubuntu has way more other bugs all around).
So at the end, you will have to ask yourself if you want Linux because it’s the right thing to do and use, or you just don’t want to be bothered with ideology, and just use Windows and be done with it. I’ve asked myself that question and the answer is two fold: as a daily browser laptop, that doesn’t depend on third party hardware, I just use my Macbook Air. It’s a great laptop to have around in front of the TV, or traveling. For third party hardware dependency, and video editing, I use Windows with an nvidia card. For everything else, I use Linux. I have 8-9 computers, most run Linux. I create databases with it, I do some photo editing, financials etc.
MX Linux only because I have it on some very old 32 bit laptops and it supports 32 bit. I don’t really know why I keep those laptops around but they are functional.
I’ll second the Pop!_OS recommendation that others have been posting. Don’t get me wrong, Linux Mint is great, though I personally prefer Linux Mint Debian Edition over the Ubuntu-based one, but I think Pop!_OS is just as easy to use while presenting a different look & feel. Pop tends to support newer hardware as well: despite being stuck on an Ubuntu 22.04 LTS base until Cosmic is finished, System76 releases new kernels to support the hardware they sell. They’re currently running kernel version 6.6.6, as opposed to Ubuntu’s 6.2.0 (I think – that’s what server’s on, at least).
I gave my wife, who “hates computers,” a laptop running Pop!_OS when her Windows 10 one failed and, apart from the standard new PC complaints, I haven’t heard anything Linux-specific. She runs two businesses on the thing; the only changes I made to the standard Pop!_OS software were to replace LibreOffice with OnlyOffice, and to replace Geary with Thunderbird.
Your experience with FreeBSD compared to OpenBSD is very similar to mine 5 years ago. Didn’t manage to get FreeBSD working but OpenBSD install was pretty easy. Although the performance still sucked compared to Linux.
Just in case*, I’m just the middle-man that connects this specific article by Solène to the audience on Lemmy 😅. I’m sure you’re aware of this, but I just wanted to make sure.
linux
Oldest
This magazine is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.