Here's the thing. When I talk to friends interested in Linux, it's always Debian or Fedora that I suggest. I think they draw a good line for what the average user wants and needs and they're stable. In fact, I used Fedora for a long time, and all my homelab stuff runs Debian. It wasn't until computers themselves became a hobby that I switched to Arch. And I think that's likely the cutoff. If you're a computer user, stable distros are great. If you're more a hobbiest... Well, the Arch wiki can own your free time.
Everything is declared exactly how I want it. If something would break, it just bails on the update. If I want to set up a new machine, I just clone my config and build it.
I'm not sure what could be more "just works" than that.
When I went 24.11 it exploded in some fantastic manner. None of my boot menu rollbacks worked. I spent a long ass time trying to recover the upgrade. I eventually realized it would be a lot faster to wipe, reinstall, re-import my old home and configuration.nix and I was back up.
25.05 didn't even flinch, just worked.
Now I'm patiently waiting for postmarket to sort out LTE modems on phones before I buy an old pixel and install nixos on it :)
In my experience that means packages from this century. Eventually you do need a new software for something. Trying to get software from 10 years ago to agree with software released in the last 6 months leads to breaking things or finding myself doing Linux From Scratch on top of debian or ubuntu.
It turns out if everything is new everything really does just work. That's why I use Artix (child of Arch). It's less pain. You just have to ignore the myth that these systems are "hard." Graphics cards and Steam work out of the gait. There is a reason why StreamOS is built on Arch.
No more compile hell in the rare case you need to compile because the AUR does the same thing, but in a single command line resolving all dependencies. It's like compiling without the experience of compiling.
Just make sure you always pacman -Syu before pacman -S {package}. No exceptions. Or in rare cases you may have to chroot from a live disk and pacman -S linux to fix your initramfs. If you do that one thing nothing ever breaks.
The zoomers and gen-alpha aren't doing much better. Just ask the average teen what a filesystem is and how to find a file without it being organized in some sort of media gallery app.
As a millennial, I often feel like I'm surrounded by tech illiterates on both the upper AND lower sides of my age bracket.
It's dumb as hell to most here, but ordinary users their own ideas on what a desktop should look like that often doesn't agree with the intelligentsia. Just let them have it.
Unpopular opinion: install community distros, not corporate ones. That way you can support the developers for their hardwork. Redhat doesn't need our money, they already make enough of it. I use CachyOS, btw.
I just switched to CachyOS and I’m really enjoying it so far. My journey so far has been Mint > Bazzite > Kubuntu > back to Mint > CachyOS and for the first time I don’t have any real complaints. There’s a voice inside my head telling me to jump to just standard Arch though. Not really sure why. Have you tried standard Arch? If so, how does it compare to CachyOS? I probably won’t end up switching, I haven’t had any issues yet and I’m a computer problem magnet and certified idiot, so I’ll probably stick to what works, but something draws me to pure Arch.
I've run vanilla arch for quite a while. CachyOS is a ton better. Arch is barebones and you have to do everything yourself. If you have the time and patience to do it, then more power to ya. I'm a dad of two, one of which is on the spectrum. So, I wanted something like Arch that just works and doesn't require too much maintenance, and cachy has been just that.
I've not had a single major issue with it in the 3 months it's been running on my machine. Just your normal Linux annoyances. I love how the gaming package on cachy is literally one click of a button. Also, it's a lot faster
Dude, fucking congratulations 🎉🎉. And yes, your PC should never take time away from your kids. I love taking care of mine, they're so much fun. I love that my PC just works. And if Cachy gives me any trouble, it's gone and will be replaced with something immutable like Bazzite. I legit want my machine to JUST work with minimal issues. I have had Bazzite on a laptop I have for close to 6 months now and it's rock solid and a true just works distro.
Somehow it never broke (1.5 years of usage). the reason i installed nix was because arch worked but felt too messy, full of random systemd services i made and put in random places
Dosent even have to be the way you like it. It only has to be the way that lets you get work done. If you can get work done on your thinking sand tool then it is a good tool.
It certainly seems like public opinion changed the tast ten years or so. As an ubuntu user, could you confirm or deny these claims I've seen? One is that firefox is a snap even if you try to install it with apt. Another is that they show ads to get paid ubuntu in the terminal output?
I really liked Ubuntu back when the color scheme was more brown/orange, it seemed so friendly. The last ten years I've been on Debian though, but LMDE seems interesting.
LMDE is great, it's what I recommend to all new Linux users.
Lots of tiny things that remove friction, like not requiring Sudo for apt and showing stars when typing a password.
I with they would align LMDE with regular Mint in one aspect though, that there would be an out of the box btrfs layout that matches what Timeshift expects (iirc @ and @home?) which is different from how debian and therefore LMDE sets it up automagically. Maybe this has changed in recent years.
If you do a minimal install, it will still force apt to install snapd and snaps for certain packages, including Firefox. It can be worked around, but it’s very hard to keep snaps out of your system. This is why I dumped Ubuntu and never looked back. Fedora is my happy place, now.
Historically they have had a lot of funding problems. There's been at least two or three times where they've partnered with somebody for marketing opportunies. And the egregious things were over a decade ago now. They decide to market with somebody, put an ad in there default desktop, or install a default application, or collect user data from dash, being open source it's been noticed immediately and they end up rolling it back. Hell, it's the reason half the forks exist.
Sure, people still get edgy about everything they do at this point but realistically they've not been all that bad. But I wouldn't trust them with closed source for a second.
At current I think they're only collecting some super basic user information and it is opt out. And to me from a server standpoint I don't really care what they're doing at the desktop level. I don't even really care about snaps because I'm not installing anything on that box that would use snaps. It's like firewall, kubernetes, and some monitoring tools. They're not doing command line spying on my kubectl.
They're a good choice for a headless server. They've got a nice long LTS with support for years. Their agile on security fixes. And they keep their repos pretty current.
My second choice would be Debian. They have an LTS service where people are only encouraged to pay. But imo their repos aren't anywhere near as up to date.
I've always admired Ubuntu for making installing nVidia driver pretty painless.
I don't know nVidia gpu you have, but I'm looking at immutable distros and I found Aurora, (based on Fedora Kinonite). Before I even downloaded the iso, they asked if I had an nVidia chipset and which one. I simply selected the driver for my older 1650 chipset and they automatically added the correct driver into the iso. I installed it and everything was working properly on first boot.
It was without a doubt the most painless nVidia driver install I've ever had on ANY OS.
I am convinced that I will try Arch or similar some day in the future simply because of SteamOS switching over to being based off of it. But for now, I develop software for embedded Linux systems all day at work. When I get home it's either family time inside or it's playing "engineer turned farmer" in my back yard. Literally digging in the dirt and building stuff out of wood. Feels good man.
After a couple of decades of wandering the Great Distro Desert in search of The One, it seems I have landed and Fedora Plasma as what I want in an OS. I've been running Fedora for the past few years now. I'm currently looking into Kinonite for that atomic goodness. It appears good so far.
Edit: You can choose the Cinnamon Spin if you enjoy that DE. I found Fedora Cinnamon to be snappier than the Mint version.
the right distro for you is whatever works for you. you don't order a steak just because your friends get one, when you really want those succulent linguinis.
This comment just gave me a flashback to one of my first big business trips from almost 20 years ago for some training in another state.
I got fettuccine Alfredo (or linguine alfredo or whatever version that place had) at whatever nice restaurant we went to and they brought that shit out in a punch bowl!!
I remember it was good, I ate a lot, and that it didn't feel great after. I cannot remember if I finished it though. There's gotta be no way, but I do know back then at occasional large meals (everything from Thanksgiving down to business trips) I would eat like 3 times what I will now.
I want to switch to Nix... the idea of Nix is compelling. In practice every time I try and test it out I remember that I'm an idiot with a keyboard and I should stop.
I personally think Nix OS brings some amazing features, very few of which are relevant for me as a regular laptop user without my own server farm. Sure, reproducible builds and dynamic package versions are neat. But if it takes me 1000 hrs to learn how to write a functional config file that I now have to keep updated, if I have to work with some weird repository, there is no documentation and community infighting... Nah, I'll stick to debian (BTW) for a while.
Nah, I looked at it and it doesn't interest me. I like arch because, contrary to popular belief, it is quite stable (as in non crashing, not package versions) if you only install exactly what you need. I had way more stability issues on the more standard distros since they had so much extra stuff. Debian for servers every day though.
Nix looks interesting in theory, but is a lot of work and too opinionated for me. Far from an expert though and have nothing against those that like it or any other distro.
As someone considering getting Arch, what is unstable about the package versions? I thought the rolling release was a selling point, but does it actually make things more unstable?
"unstable" as in changing regularly. Not in any way to do with how reliable it is (as another comment mentioned, that's a better way to differentiate).
I've had far fewer problems updating arch (once I had a clean system anyway) than I ever did trying to move through distribution updates on various other more "standard" ones.
It's extremely rare. Big breaking updates are normally shown in the arch news. Usually they just require a command or two to remove a conflicting package before the update. I think there's been a few in the last year, but on the flip side I never got a clean distro update on anything but Debian and they usually took a lot more effort to clean up.
Where it may be "unstable" is if a specific program updates (upstream) with some major change or other, whereas another distro might hold off a while.
Not the same person, but my updates take like 30s (if I don’t go looking at what changed) and happen whenever I want. We’re not talking windows updates here, just sudo pacman -Syu, seeing the list of what’s changing (etc firefox went up a version? Cool), and then saying “sure” if it looks good to me. Don’t even need to restart all the time, although I tend to do updates before turning my pc off anyway so I nearly always do.
Packages tend to use the latest stable version of their software, unless you choose a beta branch instead, so if anything I think I’ve run into less broken software than on Debian-based distros because you don’t get bugs that were fixed a week ago but haven’t made it into the official apt repository version yet. If there is a bug, you can just not upgrade that package if you know about it in advance or just downgrade it until they release a fix (I’ve never had to do this but iirc you can pin a version in pacman).
Not suggesting to jump ship if you’re happy with your current distro, but arch is a great learning experience to set up and once you have a good system running it’s absolutely rock solid. Just don’t expect to install it in fifteen minutes like other distros, if you want a good install you have to do all the reading yourself (arch wiki is priceless) to make informed choices because you’re entirely responsible for piecing together your own OS.
Thank you! That makes sense. I'm on Windows 11 and therefore not happy with my current "distro" 😅
I know Arch isn't recommended for beginners, but I hope that if I take it slow and read a lot, I might survive.
I think you can definitely survive it as a beginner if you’re both patient and happy to learn about your OS, but most people recommend trying another distro first so you don’t have to learn everything up front all at once and that’s good advice imo. Even if you’re happy to learn everything thru the wiki and want to jump into the deep end, I’d probably recommend checking out other distros on distrosea first just so you have an idea of what’s out there and what you like/dislike.
You’ll have to read about and then make a choice for every component of your system, from the filesystem to the kernel to all your user space programs and DE, so you’ll make better choices if you’ve seen some of the options in action imo.
I should also mention I’ve heard the archinstall script trivializes installing arch so if you want an easy way in you could use that - id probably keep this in mind or better, put your arch iso on ventoy along with a second choice of distro in case you get overwhelmed and just want your computer functional again.
Good luck tho, if you choose to do it I hope you have as much fun as I did! Don’t be afraid to ask questions on whichever of the Linux communities are relevant, but definitely expect a lot of “just use mint” answers if you say you’re installing arch as a new Linux user lol.
You can have your cake and eat it too! Just install Arch in a VM to play around with without jeopardizing the stability of your main machine. Once you feel comfortable, you can make the switch. Or not. Having choices is great.
Yeah at some point they are all the same to me it's just the different package manager. Pacman, apt, yum or whatever they are calling it now a days.
Most use systemd.
I started using Arch flavors because when you have brand new hardware the latest kernel can be important. After the machine is a couple years old it doesn't really matter.
Also Endeavouros is where it's at (but don't tell the vanilla Arch people, they won't help me with my problems if they find out)
Agreed. After years of Ubuntu (who remember single digits?) Endeavour OS really knocked it out of the park on my new laptop. Everything smooth as butter, out of the box. Hibernation works on a bleeding edge device. No tearing. HDR works. VRR works. YouTube 4k 60fps no drops. Games run beautifully.
Okay, some BT issues, and the Wifi card is crap, and I don't know how much of this is due to having an AMD graphics vs NVIDIA. But it's sooo damn smooth. Games just work. KDE plasma >>>> gnome, and I say that as a gnome user since canonical killed unity.
Don't get me started on the arch ecosystem and documentation. yay 😁
Just do what you've been wanting to do for a long time
I think when you first get into Linux it's a valid thing. you want to find the distro that you're most comfortable with.
When I first started using linux I tried them all and eventually just settled on Arch because it felt right to me. That being said I don't knock anyone who uses whatever. A good friend of mine online uses Slackware and he loves it, it works for him. There's no "wrong" distro, it's whatever works for you. you have to initially hop around though to find that though.
Also distro hopping is great when it comes to helping people, especially new linux users. I've made many friends within the community because for a solid year I just hopped all over the place and tried to learn it all.
As a gaming-oriented distro, CachyOS is ready to use right out of the box. It’s similar to Endeavor, but goes a few steps further with its opinions. I’d still be using it if it weren’t for AUR’s serious malware problems.
I attempted a few times. Setting up additional repositories and/or enabling testing repos declaratively was not possible. you had to do it via command line before setting the system. checked back some time later, still was the case. Also there are many ways to do the same thing, what are flakes, how to declaratively manage home (again there were multiple ways to do that). Are some of those ways deprecated, are some in testing, which one is assumed to be the default? etc.
If I ever need to manage multiple machines, and I have to setup a new machine every 6 months or so I'll get to work and learn. Other than that, isn't really worth the trouble.
You’re really going to settle on an os with imperfections? With arch, you could finally do what you’ve been meaning to do without the constraints that others’ small minded inefficiencies produce. Just think about it. An OS precisely to your liking. No compromises, just your apotheosis. Become what you were meant to be. (Mate btw)
No, I fixed it by shutting down the PC and restoring from my backup. Plus, how can I search or research when the first thing to go is my Internet access?
It does not. I needed to only offer DHCP for half of the subnet so that I can restrict Internet access for that half so that a Quest Pro can’t get updates and still be on the same subnet as the desktop
I use tiling too (i3), it's more about wayland sucking than the tiling, but combining those 2 results in a lot of frustrating little issues that need specific rules for different software.
I came to Mint after breaking my 6 month old Arch install. Understandably, it is easy to do and I probably shouldn't have tried to install all the desktop environment at once.
I have used Linux off and on since 2003, but never really went full penguin until Microsoft downgraded my Windows 10 pro to 11 home.
I now have my kids running Linux and have started using containers.
Guix's FOSS stance is... cool... I guess... but can be very impractical. The main channel only ships linux-libre which will give you problems on most modern hardware. I immediately had to add nonguix to get my laptop working.
No, the reason I went with Guix is because their tools and APIs seem/feel a bit more polished than Nix. I also feel better about learning Guile Scheme because it's a more general-purpose language than Nixlang and I just personally found it more intuitive.
But yeah Nix is definitely more mature, has more packages, and has more documentation scattered about. Also, Guix uses GNU Shepherd instead of systemd... which... I don't know how I feel about that yet...
How do you do Flakes with Guix? When I tried to use it, the closest I could get was a script using time-machine to output a lockfile, and it was still missing many other important features such as inputting other Flakes and their dependencies. Also NixOS/Home Manager have tons of configuration options that integrate with each other (i.e. Shell integrations, stylix) that Guix doesn't have so with Guix I had to use dotfiles directly which is less powerful. Also on aarch64 Guix is way bugger and like half of the large packages wouldn't compile a lot of the time, their lack of quality control was also one of the things that pushed me to Nix.
The one thing I do miss from Guix though is the containerized shells.
Good question. I haven't gotten there yet... but I hear yeah, something with channels.scm and time-machine? I haven't tried that workflow yet. Also, something about inferiors?
NixOS/Home Manager ... with Guix I had to use dotfiles directly which is less powerful
I actually found that I like using the home-dotfiles-service-type because I already have everything in dot files. Although, I have a very simple setup, so I'm not sure more powerful features would be useful for me... maybe? idk.
aarch64 Guix is way bugger
Ah, ok. I haven't tried this.
half of the large packages wouldn’t compile a lot of the time
Hm, weird. Maybe this has gotten better? I haven't had a problem with anything compiling yet. I did run into a bug with Obsidian not launching correctly and that took a few weeks to resolve, I think.
Guix is definitely lacking manpower for sure, but I'm vibing with the foundations so far. So I'm hoping things get better over time.
This was the closest I managed to get to a Flake with Guix. I'm bad at Guile so there might be other things I missed.
With Nix I made a Flake that automatically configures a text editor that can be imported into other Flakes for my own projects which is easy to do with Nix.
For system configurations, the flake-parts based configuration makes it easy to mix and match modules for different systems that edit parts of program configurations that I need (i.e. different modules add different aliases to Nushell). Idk how Guix handles this since I haven't figured out Guile well.
I did run into a bug with Obsidian not launching correctly and that took a few weeks to resolve, I think.
I've experienced this with Nix before for a different program, although once I made an issue request it got responses immediately and I didn't even do anything else. Meanwhile for Guix, I tried contributing a package that I spent several hours working on, and I asked multiple channels for support and didn't get a response, then when I submitted it no response for a year before it was finally rejected, so my experience with the maintainers wasn't great either and this made me hesitant to invest more time into the ecosystem.
Currently every family computer and server in the house runs Debian 12 as a base. But the urge to convert everything to Nix one day still tickles me, who knows someday...
I have Nix installs on two computers and have moved one of them twice to different hardware. Works, as it says, on the side of the tin.
BUUUUT... It's a bear to get under control. It adds a lot complexity to things that should be simple, it makes some things nearly impossible, and then makes really hugely difficult things cake.
for example, one of a thousands things I want to do that's easy
If I want to run parsec client. (there is no server available sadly)
nix search nixpkgs parsec
legacyPackages.x86_64-linux.parsec-bin (150_97c)
Remote streaming service client
nix-shell -p parsec-bin #ephemeral install, puts it in the store but only links it for this shell
done! Let's start it!
parsec
parsec: command not found
parsec-bin
parsec-bin: command not found
parsec-client
parsec-client: command not found
google: nixos parsec
a million ways to run parsec but none from the package manager
but there are at least notes about how to install it permanently
so you plow through /nix/store looking for parsec, 4 minutes later
parsecd
they could have just included that in the docs, but nope...
Honestly, I really enjoy it, it feels like I'm in slackware back in the 90's completely lost and confused learning everything new, and moving an install from box to box with a home directory sync and two files? chef's kiss
Figuring out why a rebuild isn't working is pain.
Figuring out why an update won't run, is pain.
ohh and you only get a month after a major release to install it before they stop putting in security updates for the previous version. And historically all the revisions before 25.05 were generally not just one and done. 24.11 ended up with me doing a wipe, fresh install, restoring my home folder and slowly easing parts of configuration.nix back in one rebuild at a time. but to be fair, they've been fighting wayland for a while now.
Thanks for your experience, it's easy to forget have stable debian really are and glorify nix as the one config to rule them all. Backports and lts kernels vs a four weeks update window are miles apart. I should go back and enjoy all my systemd services and sync/backup scripts instead.
But the urge still tickles, hopefully I can contain it inside a vm :)
I'm on kubuntu. I can just Google questions with ubuntu attached to the query and it tells me a gui solution if it's available. Bonus, there's far less people telling me I'm doing it wrong, they just assume I'm a newbie.
I was thinking install KDE because of its theme modifications, still went with fedora because everyone works fine on my setup and I like the interface, it's so different.
Fedora doesn't ship video accelerated mesa drivers(which are open source) by default and is a bit of pain in the ass to setup. They do that because they are very much tied to IBM and have to respect software patents(maybe for legal reasons). This is for intel and AMD graphics and if you take fedora as plug and play, browsers will use cpu to decode vidoes and and heats up as if i'm gaming when i play a simple video.
I use fedora too but hates this specific thing. Most other distros ship with official mesa drivers.
Fedora includes incomplete video codecs that can’t use GPU acceleration. This forces the CPU to do the decoding. Fedora claims it’s because of imaginary “patent issues” due to its IBM backing. You can install the correct ones from RPM Fusion, but it’s an extra step and it’s not made clear that this is even a problem. You might notice only after you wonder why you have such high CPU temperatures while doing basic things like browsing the web.
I'm using fedora 42 kde on my new laptop since I couldn't get mint working - fucking visit drivers.
Anywho, doom: the dark ages runs like wet ass and I'm wondering if it has something to do with video codecs or mesa )don't know what mesa is and there's a 5080 in there.
I reinstalled tempeh and all my videos work, but - any chance you could point me towards what to do with the video codecs just so I can confirm? If you can offer some guidance on how to install whatever mesa is I want to try that to see if it helps (even though afaik the game should be using the ncidia drivers anyway).
The laptop has a ryzen cpu btw.
Also cool if you can't help. Figured I'd ask. I'm new to fedora.
Edit: it just suddenly works fine now for no particular reason.
I’ve just installed Fedora. Apart from some installer wonkiness (tbf in Windows) that would totally put off casual adopters it’s been fine and I don’t have to fiddle with anything.
There is a lot of propaganda for Fedora these days. Something I see much less frequently for Arch and its derivatives.
Isn't that meme based on old facts?
I don't even notice Debian, which is exactly how an operating system should work.
And yet...
I love this
Here's the thing. When I talk to friends interested in Linux, it's always Debian or Fedora that I suggest. I think they draw a good line for what the average user wants and needs and they're stable. In fact, I used Fedora for a long time, and all my homelab stuff runs Debian. It wasn't until computers themselves became a hobby that I switched to Arch. And I think that's likely the cutoff. If you're a computer user, stable distros are great. If you're more a hobbiest... Well, the Arch wiki can own your free time.
Debian is where the jaded users end up when they lack the will to flash another usb stick.
"I'm good, fuck it."
https://www.ventoy.net/en/index.html
Sounds lovely for making a swiss-army-knife of distros.
"Man I wish I could do more with my new computer" -- Fedora
"Yeah I just want to breathe some new life into this old laptop and have it last me until the end of time" -- Debian
NixOS has entered the chat
Normal distro -> arch -> gentoo -> nixOS -> QubesOS -> Debian pipeline.
The only problem with Debian is that I want packages from this century.
Thats what you think you want but by the time you're at the end of the pipeline you just want a computer that works.
So far, that's exactly why I've stopped at Nix.
Everything is declared exactly how I want it. If something would break, it just bails on the update. If I want to set up a new machine, I just clone my config and build it.
I'm not sure what could be more "just works" than that.
When I went 24.11 it exploded in some fantastic manner. None of my boot menu rollbacks worked. I spent a long ass time trying to recover the upgrade. I eventually realized it would be a lot faster to wipe, reinstall, re-import my old home and configuration.nix and I was back up.
25.05 didn't even flinch, just worked.
Now I'm patiently waiting for postmarket to sort out LTE modems on phones before I buy an old pixel and install nixos on it :)
In my experience that means packages from this century. Eventually you do need a new software for something. Trying to get software from 10 years ago to agree with software released in the last 6 months leads to breaking things or finding myself doing Linux From Scratch on top of debian or ubuntu.
It turns out if everything is new everything really does just work. That's why I use Artix (child of Arch). It's less pain. You just have to ignore the myth that these systems are "hard." Graphics cards and Steam work out of the gait. There is a reason why StreamOS is built on Arch.
No more compile hell in the rare case you need to compile because the AUR does the same thing, but in a single command line resolving all dependencies. It's like compiling without the experience of compiling.
Just make sure you always
pacman -Syubeforepacman -S {package}. No exceptions. Or in rare cases you may have to chroot from a live disk andpacman -S linuxto fix your initramfs. If you do that one thing nothing ever breaks.The literal ArchWiki says you may not want to use Arch if you are happy with your current OS.
based
This is good, i hope somebody printed this and hand it over to Arch Linux cult
Almost every interaction with a boomer involving their computer/phone
The zoomers and gen-alpha aren't doing much better. Just ask the average teen what a filesystem is and how to find a file without it being organized in some sort of media gallery app.
As a millennial, I often feel like I'm surrounded by tech illiterates on both the upper AND lower sides of my age bracket.
You are absolutely right
It's dumb as hell to most here, but ordinary users their own ideas on what a desktop should look like that often doesn't agree with the intelligentsia. Just let them have it.
The computer in the picture is infected with adware
Unpopular opinion: install community distros, not corporate ones. That way you can support the developers for their hardwork. Redhat doesn't need our money, they already make enough of it. I use CachyOS, btw.
I just switched to CachyOS and I’m really enjoying it so far. My journey so far has been Mint > Bazzite > Kubuntu > back to Mint > CachyOS and for the first time I don’t have any real complaints. There’s a voice inside my head telling me to jump to just standard Arch though. Not really sure why. Have you tried standard Arch? If so, how does it compare to CachyOS? I probably won’t end up switching, I haven’t had any issues yet and I’m a computer problem magnet and certified idiot, so I’ll probably stick to what works, but something draws me to pure Arch.
I've run vanilla arch for quite a while. CachyOS is a ton better. Arch is barebones and you have to do everything yourself. If you have the time and patience to do it, then more power to ya. I'm a dad of two, one of which is on the spectrum. So, I wanted something like Arch that just works and doesn't require too much maintenance, and cachy has been just that.
I've not had a single major issue with it in the 3 months it's been running on my machine. Just your normal Linux annoyances. I love how the gaming package on cachy is literally one click of a button. Also, it's a lot faster
Thanks for your input. I’m going to be a dad soon, so I should probably stick with cachy then.
Dude, fucking congratulations 🎉🎉. And yes, your PC should never take time away from your kids. I love taking care of mine, they're so much fun. I love that my PC just works. And if Cachy gives me any trouble, it's gone and will be replaced with something immutable like Bazzite. I legit want my machine to JUST work with minimal issues. I have had Bazzite on a laptop I have for close to 6 months now and it's rock solid and a true just works distro.
Thanks man, yeah I’m pretty excited. I’ve always wanted kids, it’s crazy to think I’m finally going to have one soon.
For sure, family always comes first, especially kids.
Standard arch is just a downgrade from cachy if you just want a functional computer and not have to think about it.
OpenSUSE Tumbleweed sends it’s love.
Hi, Tumbleweed 👋🏽
Which ones are corporate besides Redhat and what's the relation to this post?
i was happy with Arch on my server.
then, i installed NixOS on it.
update: i've set it up to a usable state, it's a minecraft server
Sane people usually go bungee jumping or cave diving to get their irrational danger kicks.
I also use arch on my servers and it's really stable. Until today that is. I updated one of my systems and it broke Nvidia docker runtime.
Yes I know but I need Cuda :(
Am I the only one that feels like saying "you do you" is more insulting then telling someone to just go fuck themselves and they are a raging idiot.
It just comes across as the most possible condescending possible response possible in the English language.
Been running my mail server on arch for six years and counting. Best decision given the circumstances!
Installing Arch on a server is certainly a choice
Somehow it never broke (1.5 years of usage). the reason i installed nix was because arch worked but felt too messy, full of random systemd services i made and put in random places
This is the way.
The funny thing for me is I swapped to fedora after my last attempt to use arch failed spectacularly.
I've found I'm at a point where I just want my device to work and work well
Just means your over 25
/me a 42 year old that uses Arch
I take that personally.
/me adjusts my knee high socks.
42 and wearing long socks like that? You need help bud'
Once you hit 40 your knees need all the help they can get.
Lol I'm close. Not quite there yet but looks like my linux habits have a head start
If everything is the way you like it, you are winning. Keep on winning.
Dosent even have to be the way you like it. It only has to be the way that lets you get work done. If you can get work done on your thinking sand tool then it is a good tool.
It certainly seems like public opinion changed the tast ten years or so. As an ubuntu user, could you confirm or deny these claims I've seen? One is that firefox is a snap even if you try to install it with apt. Another is that they show ads to get paid ubuntu in the terminal output?
I can confirm them both. I'm considering moving to Debian because of this.
You can uninstall snap and use flatpak for those apps but it was a slap in the face when Firefox suddenly was replaced by a snap through apt
Oh that's a bit underhand, especially when they must be well aware that snap can be unpopular.
If you really like Ubuntu, Linux mint Ubuntu version comes with the snap defaults removed.
I really liked Ubuntu back when the color scheme was more brown/orange, it seemed so friendly. The last ten years I've been on Debian though, but LMDE seems interesting.
LMDE is great, it's what I recommend to all new Linux users. Lots of tiny things that remove friction, like not requiring Sudo for apt and showing stars when typing a password.
I with they would align LMDE with regular Mint in one aspect though, that there would be an out of the box btrfs layout that matches what Timeshift expects (iirc @ and @home?) which is different from how debian and therefore LMDE sets it up automagically. Maybe this has changed in recent years.
True and true.
If you do a minimal install, it will still force apt to install snapd and snaps for certain packages, including Firefox. It can be worked around, but it’s very hard to keep snaps out of your system. This is why I dumped Ubuntu and never looked back. Fedora is my happy place, now.
I tried
I cannot downvote a GNOME lover
I've had 0 problems out of Debian since bookworm.
That said, I daily drive Nix and use Ubuntu LTS for servers because I'm too lazy to keep up with it otherwise.
I thought Canonical got on board with spying ages ago. May I do not recall correctly.
Historically they have had a lot of funding problems. There's been at least two or three times where they've partnered with somebody for marketing opportunies. And the egregious things were over a decade ago now. They decide to market with somebody, put an ad in there default desktop, or install a default application, or collect user data from dash, being open source it's been noticed immediately and they end up rolling it back. Hell, it's the reason half the forks exist.
Sure, people still get edgy about everything they do at this point but realistically they've not been all that bad. But I wouldn't trust them with closed source for a second.
At current I think they're only collecting some super basic user information and it is opt out. And to me from a server standpoint I don't really care what they're doing at the desktop level. I don't even really care about snaps because I'm not installing anything on that box that would use snaps. It's like firewall, kubernetes, and some monitoring tools. They're not doing command line spying on my kubectl.
They're a good choice for a headless server. They've got a nice long LTS with support for years. Their agile on security fixes. And they keep their repos pretty current.
My second choice would be Debian. They have an LTS service where people are only encouraged to pay. But imo their repos aren't anywhere near as up to date.
Nobara works ootb too if you ever want to try a fedora spin. they even have a separate installer for nvidia users.
I've always admired Ubuntu for making installing nVidia driver pretty painless.
I don't know nVidia gpu you have, but I'm looking at immutable distros and I found Aurora, (based on Fedora Kinonite). Before I even downloaded the iso, they asked if I had an nVidia chipset and which one. I simply selected the driver for my older 1650 chipset and they automatically added the correct driver into the iso. I installed it and everything was working properly on first boot.
It was without a doubt the most painless nVidia driver install I've ever had on ANY OS.
Trying to help with the downvote situation. Glad you decided on a distro that works for you and you're not succumbing to the pressure.
Tried it all and ended up with Mint again. Forever the best distro.
Hell yes! Mint 4 life!
I am convinced that I will try Arch or similar some day in the future simply because of SteamOS switching over to being based off of it. But for now, I develop software for embedded Linux systems all day at work. When I get home it's either family time inside or it's playing "engineer turned farmer" in my back yard. Literally digging in the dirt and building stuff out of wood. Feels good man.
Dn it, am.on Mint, currently thinking about going Fedora with plasma
Do it....You know you want to.
After a couple of decades of wandering the Great Distro Desert in search of The One, it seems I have landed and Fedora Plasma as what I want in an OS. I've been running Fedora for the past few years now. I'm currently looking into Kinonite for that atomic goodness. It appears good so far.
Edit: You can choose the Cinnamon Spin if you enjoy that DE. I found Fedora Cinnamon to be snappier than the Mint version.
All I need is a Linux Mint KDE edition, with updates as frequent as Fedora
I was a fedora boy until I met endeavoros and kde.
Now I'm a straight up hoe.
But are you a well loved and taken care of hoe? Cause you deserve to be.
Taking care of your hoes is an essential regular maintenance task for a healthy garden.
the right distro for you is whatever works for you. you don't order a steak just because your friends get one, when you really want those succulent linguinis.
Dibs on band name
This comment just gave me a flashback to one of my first big business trips from almost 20 years ago for some training in another state.
I got fettuccine Alfredo (or linguine alfredo or whatever version that place had) at whatever nice restaurant we went to and they brought that shit out in a punch bowl!!
I remember it was good, I ate a lot, and that it didn't feel great after. I cannot remember if I finished it though. There's gotta be no way, but I do know back then at occasional large meals (everything from Thanksgiving down to business trips) I would eat like 3 times what I will now.
And I thought all Arch users already switched to Nix OS (BTW)
I want to switch to Nix... the idea of Nix is compelling. In practice every time I try and test it out I remember that I'm an idiot with a keyboard and I should stop.
I personally think Nix OS brings some amazing features, very few of which are relevant for me as a regular laptop user without my own server farm. Sure, reproducible builds and dynamic package versions are neat. But if it takes me 1000 hrs to learn how to write a functional config file that I now have to keep updated, if I have to work with some weird repository, there is no documentation and community infighting... Nah, I'll stick to debian (BTW) for a while.
Nah, I looked at it and it doesn't interest me. I like arch because, contrary to popular belief, it is quite stable (as in non crashing, not package versions) if you only install exactly what you need. I had way more stability issues on the more standard distros since they had so much extra stuff. Debian for servers every day though.
Nix looks interesting in theory, but is a lot of work and too opinionated for me. Far from an expert though and have nothing against those that like it or any other distro.
The words stable and reliable should have formal definitions.
As someone considering getting Arch, what is unstable about the package versions? I thought the rolling release was a selling point, but does it actually make things more unstable?
"unstable" as in changing regularly. Not in any way to do with how reliable it is (as another comment mentioned, that's a better way to differentiate).
I've had far fewer problems updating arch (once I had a clean system anyway) than I ever did trying to move through distribution updates on various other more "standard" ones.
So the updates don't tend to break things? Is it just annoying to constantly update?
It's extremely rare. Big breaking updates are normally shown in the arch news. Usually they just require a command or two to remove a conflicting package before the update. I think there's been a few in the last year, but on the flip side I never got a clean distro update on anything but Debian and they usually took a lot more effort to clean up.
Where it may be "unstable" is if a specific program updates (upstream) with some major change or other, whereas another distro might hold off a while.
Makes sense, thank you!
Not the same person, but my updates take like 30s (if I don’t go looking at what changed) and happen whenever I want. We’re not talking windows updates here, just
sudo pacman -Syu, seeing the list of what’s changing (etc firefox went up a version? Cool), and then saying “sure” if it looks good to me. Don’t even need to restart all the time, although I tend to do updates before turning my pc off anyway so I nearly always do.Packages tend to use the latest stable version of their software, unless you choose a beta branch instead, so if anything I think I’ve run into less broken software than on Debian-based distros because you don’t get bugs that were fixed a week ago but haven’t made it into the official apt repository version yet. If there is a bug, you can just not upgrade that package if you know about it in advance or just downgrade it until they release a fix (I’ve never had to do this but iirc you can pin a version in pacman).
Not suggesting to jump ship if you’re happy with your current distro, but arch is a great learning experience to set up and once you have a good system running it’s absolutely rock solid. Just don’t expect to install it in fifteen minutes like other distros, if you want a good install you have to do all the reading yourself (arch wiki is priceless) to make informed choices because you’re entirely responsible for piecing together your own OS.
Thank you! That makes sense. I'm on Windows 11 and therefore not happy with my current "distro" 😅 I know Arch isn't recommended for beginners, but I hope that if I take it slow and read a lot, I might survive.
I think you can definitely survive it as a beginner if you’re both patient and happy to learn about your OS, but most people recommend trying another distro first so you don’t have to learn everything up front all at once and that’s good advice imo. Even if you’re happy to learn everything thru the wiki and want to jump into the deep end, I’d probably recommend checking out other distros on distrosea first just so you have an idea of what’s out there and what you like/dislike.
You’ll have to read about and then make a choice for every component of your system, from the filesystem to the kernel to all your user space programs and DE, so you’ll make better choices if you’ve seen some of the options in action imo.
I should also mention I’ve heard the archinstall script trivializes installing arch so if you want an easy way in you could use that - id probably keep this in mind or better, put your arch iso on ventoy along with a second choice of distro in case you get overwhelmed and just want your computer functional again.
Good luck tho, if you choose to do it I hope you have as much fun as I did! Don’t be afraid to ask questions on whichever of the Linux communities are relevant, but definitely expect a lot of “just use mint” answers if you say you’re installing arch as a new Linux user lol.
I want to (and previously tried it out for a bit) but the difficulty curve (more like a difficult brick wall) is hard to deal with
Naw, archer users either become cachy users OR nix. It's a pipe line with a y junction.
You can have your cake and eat it too! Just install Arch in a VM to play around with without jeopardizing the stability of your main machine. Once you feel comfortable, you can make the switch. Or not. Having choices is great.
I feel a lot of people really forget that virtual machines exist.
I don’t get distro hopping
There are better uses for your time
But hey, do as you want
Yeah at some point they are all the same to me it's just the different package manager. Pacman, apt, yum or whatever they are calling it now a days.
Most use systemd.
I started using Arch flavors because when you have brand new hardware the latest kernel can be important. After the machine is a couple years old it doesn't really matter.
Also Endeavouros is where it's at (but don't tell the vanilla Arch people, they won't help me with my problems if they find out)
Agreed. After years of Ubuntu (who remember single digits?) Endeavour OS really knocked it out of the park on my new laptop. Everything smooth as butter, out of the box. Hibernation works on a bleeding edge device. No tearing. HDR works. VRR works. YouTube 4k 60fps no drops. Games run beautifully.
Okay, some BT issues, and the Wifi card is crap, and I don't know how much of this is due to having an AMD graphics vs NVIDIA. But it's sooo damn smooth. Games just work. KDE plasma >>>> gnome, and I say that as a gnome user since canonical killed unity.
Don't get me started on the arch ecosystem and documentation. yay 😁
Just do what you've been wanting to do for a long time
If anyone is interested in something different, I could recommend Guix. No systemd. The package manager works different than your typical
apt.I think when you first get into Linux it's a valid thing. you want to find the distro that you're most comfortable with.
When I first started using linux I tried them all and eventually just settled on Arch because it felt right to me. That being said I don't knock anyone who uses whatever. A good friend of mine online uses Slackware and he loves it, it works for him. There's no "wrong" distro, it's whatever works for you. you have to initially hop around though to find that though.
Also distro hopping is great when it comes to helping people, especially new linux users. I've made many friends within the community because for a solid year I just hopped all over the place and tried to learn it all.
I switched from Ubuntu to Debian when I got pissed about something.
But it’s not a hop, more like a leisurely walk 😀
See the world, they said....
What is grass and why should I touch it?
Lol, The grass is kind of okay but that brake glowing thing in the sky can f right off
It causes cancer so how good is it really
Arch is for new users, experienced ones use Gentoo
Calm down there Satan.
Neither one of those will put hair on your chest, Saddle up NixOS, that'll make you want to stab people in the eye... still fun tho
If Nix wasn't binary (at least it was last time I checked.
Dunno, it never seemed too interesting to me.
I moved to fedora after a decade on Arch.
Feels like home.
I've been running cachyOS for the last few months....
i've heard a bunch of people talking about cachyos
i use endeavour os, and when i get my pc back (i moved and haven't been able to build it yet) i'm planning on installing base arch
so, what are the upsides to cachyos?
As a gaming-oriented distro, CachyOS is ready to use right out of the box. It’s similar to Endeavor, but goes a few steps further with its opinions. I’d still be using it if it weren’t for AUR’s serious malware problems.
hmmm interesting. i might use it, but now i need to know more about the AUR's malware problems. i haven't heard of them and am now kinda scared
I'm happy with Arch (BTW) and have the same thoughts about NixOS.
Yeah the concept of NixOS is impossible to not be attracted to for avid Arch users.
The reality? It can be a deterrent.
I attempted a few times. Setting up additional repositories and/or enabling testing repos declaratively was not possible. you had to do it via command line before setting the system. checked back some time later, still was the case. Also there are many ways to do the same thing, what are flakes, how to declaratively manage home (again there were multiple ways to do that). Are some of those ways deprecated, are some in testing, which one is assumed to be the default? etc.
If I ever need to manage multiple machines, and I have to setup a new machine every 6 months or so I'll get to work and learn. Other than that, isn't really worth the trouble.
But still tempting :)
You’re really going to settle on an os with imperfections? With arch, you could finally do what you’ve been meaning to do without the constraints that others’ small minded inefficiencies produce. Just think about it. An OS precisely to your liking. No compromises, just your apotheosis. Become what you were meant to be. (Mate btw)
Nothing like getting to screw up your computer your way! Ultimate customization* 😄
*am Arch-based user
I tried arch at one point :3 im back on pop!_os tho
I avoid it only because of its loudest user base.
I used to be like you, then I used Arch btw. Then I actually used fedora then I started reminiscing about Arch btw.
Your message makes me think i shouldnstart a new fork of Arch, and name it "Arch btw", and make it crappy.
It would break all the memes about arch
Use NixOS
Every time I've tried using Arch, something breaks.
So you fixed it with a simple search and a bit of research, r-right?
No, I fixed it by shutting down the PC and restoring from my backup. Plus, how can I search or research when the first thing to go is my Internet access?
You people don't have phones?
Why should I have to use my phone, when I have a whole computer sitting there like a lump of chips and random stuff?
I couldn’t even configure a static IP on setup. You have to keep looking up commands with obscure syntax and no examples
If your use-case allows, it's probably easier to set a reservation on your router.
It does not. I needed to only offer DHCP for half of the subnet so that I can restrict Internet access for that half so that a Quest Pro can’t get updates and still be on the same subnet as the desktop
Slackware for me.
Tarballs. Yum!
And here I am on popos 22.4, while my friend tries to make me install arch with hyprland lol
unpopular opinion: tiling wms and wayland are nothing but a flashy headache... I use Arch (with i3, btw)
Your opinion will stay unpopular, because tiling is a lifesaver. Fuck mouse controls.
I use tiling too (i3), it's more about wayland sucking than the tiling, but combining those 2 results in a lot of frustrating little issues that need specific rules for different software.
Oh, yeah, I agree. Tried it too and had a lot of bugs and glitches
sighs
Welp. Once more, with feeling.
$ ./clears-throat.shUse whatever the fuck you want, you weirdo cultists.
::: spoiler spoiler I use Kubuntu (
--minimal-installto avoidsnapfuckery). Truly, an "S-Tier" computing experience. :::On Mint. Love Mint. Deb is life.
I'm trying to convince myself to try Bazzite from Mint. I have used Mint for 3 years now and need to install on a new larger drive.
I've really enjoyed my Bazzite experience. I've been running Linux for decades though, so take it with a grain of salt.
I came to Mint after breaking my 6 month old Arch install. Understandably, it is easy to do and I probably shouldn't have tried to install all the desktop environment at once.
I have used Linux off and on since 2003, but never really went full penguin until Microsoft downgraded my Windows 10 pro to 11 home.
I now have my kids running Linux and have started using containers.
Bazzite is great, but take a look at Aurora and Bluefin, too. All built from the same community with slightly different goals.
I started with Bazzite and ended up staying with Aurora.
Install Guix
Guix's FOSS stance is cool, but Nix is much more mature
Guix's FOSS stance is... cool... I guess... but can be very impractical. The main channel only ships linux-libre which will give you problems on most modern hardware. I immediately had to add
nonguixto get my laptop working.No, the reason I went with Guix is because their tools and APIs seem/feel a bit more polished than Nix. I also feel better about learning Guile Scheme because it's a more general-purpose language than Nixlang and I just personally found it more intuitive.
But yeah Nix is definitely more mature, has more packages, and has more documentation scattered about. Also, Guix uses GNU Shepherd instead of systemd... which... I don't know how I feel about that yet...
How do you do Flakes with Guix? When I tried to use it, the closest I could get was a script using time-machine to output a lockfile, and it was still missing many other important features such as inputting other Flakes and their dependencies. Also NixOS/Home Manager have tons of configuration options that integrate with each other (i.e. Shell integrations, stylix) that Guix doesn't have so with Guix I had to use dotfiles directly which is less powerful. Also on aarch64 Guix is way bugger and like half of the large packages wouldn't compile a lot of the time, their lack of quality control was also one of the things that pushed me to Nix.
The one thing I do miss from Guix though is the containerized shells.
Good question. I haven't gotten there yet... but I hear yeah, something with
channels.scmandtime-machine? I haven't tried that workflow yet. Also, something about inferiors?I actually found that I like using the
home-dotfiles-service-typebecause I already have everything in dot files. Although, I have a very simple setup, so I'm not sure more powerful features would be useful for me... maybe? idk.Ah, ok. I haven't tried this.
Hm, weird. Maybe this has gotten better? I haven't had a problem with anything compiling yet. I did run into a bug with Obsidian not launching correctly and that took a few weeks to resolve, I think.
Guix is definitely lacking manpower for sure, but I'm vibing with the foundations so far. So I'm hoping things get better over time.
This was the closest I managed to get to a Flake with Guix. I'm bad at Guile so there might be other things I missed.
With Nix I made a Flake that automatically configures a text editor that can be imported into other Flakes for my own projects which is easy to do with Nix.
For system configurations, the flake-parts based configuration makes it easy to mix and match modules for different systems that edit parts of program configurations that I need (i.e. different modules add different aliases to Nushell). Idk how Guix handles this since I haven't figured out Guile well.
I've experienced this with Nix before for a different program, although once I made an issue request it got responses immediately and I didn't even do anything else. Meanwhile for Guix, I tried contributing a package that I spent several hours working on, and I asked multiple channels for support and didn't get a response, then when I submitted it no response for a year before it was finally rejected, so my experience with the maintainers wasn't great either and this made me hesitant to invest more time into the ecosystem.
I have the same problem with NixOS and Debian.
Currently every family computer and server in the house runs Debian 12 as a base. But the urge to convert everything to Nix one day still tickles me, who knows someday...
I have Nix installs on two computers and have moved one of them twice to different hardware. Works, as it says, on the side of the tin.
BUUUUT... It's a bear to get under control. It adds a lot complexity to things that should be simple, it makes some things nearly impossible, and then makes really hugely difficult things cake.
for example, one of a thousands things I want to do that's easy
If I want to run parsec client. (there is no server available sadly)
nix search nixpkgs parsec
nix-shell -p parsec-bin #ephemeral install, puts it in the store but only links it for this shell
done! Let's start it!
parsec
parsec: command not found
parsec-bin
parsec-bin: command not found
parsec-client
parsec-client: command not found
google: nixos parsec
a million ways to run parsec but none from the package manager
google: nixos packages->https://search.nixos.org/packages
https://search.nixos.org/packages
parsec-bin
nothing about how to run it
but there are at least notes about how to install it permanently
so you plow through /nix/store looking for parsec, 4 minutes later
parsecd
they could have just included that in the docs, but nope...
Honestly, I really enjoy it, it feels like I'm in slackware back in the 90's completely lost and confused learning everything new, and moving an install from box to box with a home directory sync and two files? chef's kiss
Figuring out why a rebuild isn't working is pain. Figuring out why an update won't run, is pain.
ohh and you only get a month after a major release to install it before they stop putting in security updates for the previous version. And historically all the revisions before 25.05 were generally not just one and done. 24.11 ended up with me doing a wipe, fresh install, restoring my home folder and slowly easing parts of configuration.nix back in one rebuild at a time. but to be fair, they've been fighting wayland for a while now.
My desktops are Nix, my servers are Debian.
Thanks for your experience, it's easy to forget have stable debian really are and glorify nix as the one config to rule them all. Backports and lts kernels vs a four weeks update window are miles apart. I should go back and enjoy all my systemd services and sync/backup scripts instead.
But the urge still tickles, hopefully I can contain it inside a vm :)
I tried three times. Failed 3 times.
And I started with Slackware in the 90s. I can handle jank.
But Nix really needs to take a clue from Arch on the documentation front…
After trying 10+ distributions over the years the urge to try something new is not that strong, I settled on Debian based distributions.
But if I should try something new I would look into FreeBSD to get some Unix experience, or else NixOS also sounds interesting.
"You don't HAVE any friends! NOBODY likes youuuu!" (/s)
A fitting image choice, in more than one way, lol.
This is me, my PC currently runs Arch but I keep reading more about NixOS.
Y'all still not using puppy?
Do you snort it or is it a pill
I'm on kubuntu. I can just Google questions with ubuntu attached to the query and it tells me a gui solution if it's available. Bonus, there's far less people telling me I'm doing it wrong, they just assume I'm a newbie.
If you are happy with your distro then that's cool.
But if you got an urge to try a different distro, just install on a spare drive or partition your current drive and dual boot.
You could even try a live image or something like Distrosea without installing anything.
It's easy, free, and you might form new opinions.
If it works, don't try to fix it
I feel this way about hyprland....
Well you can just install that alongside your DE and try it out
First Linux experience beyond retro station. I love bazzite. Super fucking easy!
I was thinking install KDE because of its theme modifications, still went with fedora because everyone works fine on my setup and I like the interface, it's so different.
There's a Fedora KDE flavour. I've been rocking it since 2020.
Yea I know, but I wanted the full fedora experience.
What's missing from the KDE versión?
I don't really know, it's been long time since I used it to be true l.
*Except their stand on software patents and video acceleration
Fedora doesn't ship video accelerated mesa drivers(which are open source) by default and is a bit of pain in the ass to setup. They do that because they are very much tied to IBM and have to respect software patents(maybe for legal reasons). This is for intel and AMD graphics and if you take fedora as plug and play, browsers will use cpu to decode vidoes and and heats up as if i'm gaming when i play a simple video.
I use fedora too but hates this specific thing. Most other distros ship with official mesa drivers.
Fedora includes incomplete video codecs that can’t use GPU acceleration. This forces the CPU to do the decoding. Fedora claims it’s because of imaginary “patent issues” due to its IBM backing. You can install the correct ones from RPM Fusion, but it’s an extra step and it’s not made clear that this is even a problem. You might notice only after you wonder why you have such high CPU temperatures while doing basic things like browsing the web.
I'm using fedora 42 kde on my new laptop since I couldn't get mint working - fucking visit drivers.
Anywho, doom: the dark ages runs like wet ass and I'm wondering if it has something to do with video codecs or mesa )don't know what mesa is and there's a 5080 in there.
I reinstalled tempeh and all my videos work, but - any chance you could point me towards what to do with the video codecs just so I can confirm? If you can offer some guidance on how to install whatever mesa is I want to try that to see if it helps (even though afaik the game should be using the ncidia drivers anyway).
The laptop has a ryzen cpu btw.
Also cool if you can't help. Figured I'd ask. I'm new to fedora.
Edit: it just suddenly works fine now for no particular reason.
I’ve just installed Fedora. Apart from some installer wonkiness (tbf in Windows) that would totally put off casual adopters it’s been fine and I don’t have to fiddle with anything.
install mint
When I started using Linux again, I used Linux Mint :3
Still happy with Fedora.
You should install arch-linux
Artix is one step further. The non-systemd realm beckons you.
There is a lot of propaganda for Fedora these days. Something I see much less frequently for Arch and its derivatives. Isn't that meme based on old facts?
It's not propaganda. Fedora's just that good. Been using it since 2019 myself. Never felt the need to distrohop after.
Opposite experience from me. I feel at home with Debian and Arch but there was always something wrong with Fedora.