Serious question from someone who is in this situation: What the best os for someone who want to switch from window 10 to Linux because of the eol? Is it really mint ?
First step: Decide on the so-called desktop environment. A shortlist is provided below. For a new user, this should be decisive when choosing between beginner-friendly distros.
Before going over to the next (and final) step, we need to set the stage for our contenders:
Versions of Linux Mint. Linux Mint has (rightfully so) become the face of Linux for beginners. Stand out feature would be how crazy popular it is; it’s a joy to look up your problem through a search engine and find solutions for it.
Images of uBlue. Where Linux Mint tries to smooth the rough edges of the “traditional Linux model” as nicely as possible, uBlue’s images can be referred to as revolutionary by comparison. The model strikes some (re)semblance to what you might know from your phone or chromebook. These images aren’t even close to reaching their full potential, but have already garnered/amassed a wide audience for how they (at least attempt to) solve some of Desktop Linux’ long-standing issues. Note that finding solutions for your problems might not be as straightforward. However, documentation is decent and they’ve been very helpful on Discord.
Final step: Pick the distro corresponding to your preferred desktop environment. The list found below (ordered alphabetically) isn’t trying to be exhaustive on desktop environments.
Cinnamon; Linux Mint Cinnamon Edition. This is their flagship and probably what people mean when referring to Linux Mint.
GNOME; Bazzite’s GNOME. If you don’t intend to game, then consider Bluefin instead.
KDE Plasma; Bazzite’s KDE Plasma. If you don’t intend to game, then consider Aurora instead.
My first foray into Linux was through what you’d refer to as immutable Linux; shortly after the release of Fedora Kinoite. I’m literally the embodiment of the antithesis to your statement.
It is very new
This is factually true. So I can’t simply deny that. But being more precise is helpful:
Fedora Atomic, the family of distros that enable uBlue, has been in the works since 2014. This eventually culminated into the release of Fedora Atomic Workstation in 2018, which was the name of Fedora Silverblue before the name change.
The first commit of uBlue as a project happened over three years ago.
They will get a little more respect from me when they stop trying to target programmers and gamers. Because of course everyone uses Steam and VScode. It just feels very much like it is being run by young edgy programmers. It is the same group that is trying to force crappy “dark mode” everywhere.
What’s the bigger program is the lack of internet knowledge about how to fix problems. With Ubuntu and Debian there are tons of stack overflow pages on all of the various issues. Sure things have changed over time but it still the most documented distro. I can look up “how do I fix X Linux Mint” and I will get an answer. With the Bazzite immutable base almost all of the help online will be useless.
So in short I wouldn’t recommend something like Bazzite. Immutable Linux requires that you understand Linux under the hood. Also I am strongly against distros that need to market themselves as gaming.
I switched from Win10 to Mint, and am quite happy. You can get a lot of stuff done through GUI, so you can put off learning how to use the terminal a little. If you are worried about using it, I can recommend using ChatGPT. Helped me troubleshoot a lot of issues and learning a few tricks.
Such a decisive question. I wouldn’t say there’s necessarily a “best”. Mint is an EXCELLENT choice. So too would be Fedora (Fedora KDE edition I’d recommend for most) or OpenSuSe Tumbleweed.
Just pick what looks decent to you and give it a shot.
Kubuntu uses snaps as default and I’ve had some trouble with that. My dad is using Kubuntu and there are problems with how programs communicate. Mint is probably a better choice.
I’ll admit I’m biased because I think Cinnamon is ugly. Most people seem to like it and I get it. I just wish Mint hadn’t abandoned the KDE edition. Mint is definitely a great choice though.
And you could stay in mint for years and barely have to use bash, and when you do there is a well stocked forum, so it is sometimes even easier than windows to troubleshoot.
mint is good, pop!os is also good, i use and recommend endeavouros as arch-but-easy. tbh just about any popular distro these days is prolly gonna do fine for the average user.
Serious question from someone who is in this situation: What the best os for someone who want to switch from window 10 to Linux because of the eol? Is it really mint ?
Whatever you pick, first test it by running it from a USB drive first.
First step: Decide on the so-called desktop environment. A shortlist is provided below. For a new user, this should be decisive when choosing between beginner-friendly distros.
Before going over to the next (and final) step, we need to set the stage for our contenders:
Final step: Pick the distro corresponding to your preferred desktop environment. The list found below (ordered alphabetically) isn’t trying to be exhaustive on desktop environments.
I wouldn’t go uBlue personally. It is very new and I don’t like the focus. Don’t go straight to immutable Linux.
My first foray into Linux was through what you’d refer to as immutable Linux; shortly after the release of Fedora Kinoite. I’m literally the embodiment of the antithesis to your statement.
This is factually true. So I can’t simply deny that. But being more precise is helpful:
Could you be more elaborate 😜?
They will get a little more respect from me when they stop trying to target programmers and gamers. Because of course everyone uses Steam and VScode. It just feels very much like it is being run by young edgy programmers. It is the same group that is trying to force crappy “dark mode” everywhere.
What’s the bigger program is the lack of internet knowledge about how to fix problems. With Ubuntu and Debian there are tons of stack overflow pages on all of the various issues. Sure things have changed over time but it still the most documented distro. I can look up “how do I fix X Linux Mint” and I will get an answer. With the Bazzite immutable base almost all of the help online will be useless.
So in short I wouldn’t recommend something like Bazzite. Immutable Linux requires that you understand Linux under the hood. Also I am strongly against distros that need to market themselves as gaming.
I switched from Win10 to Mint, and am quite happy. You can get a lot of stuff done through GUI, so you can put off learning how to use the terminal a little. If you are worried about using it, I can recommend using ChatGPT. Helped me troubleshoot a lot of issues and learning a few tricks.
Such a decisive question. I wouldn’t say there’s necessarily a “best”. Mint is an EXCELLENT choice. So too would be Fedora (Fedora KDE edition I’d recommend for most) or OpenSuSe Tumbleweed.
Just pick what looks decent to you and give it a shot.
Mint is fine, Kubuntu is also great.
Kubuntu uses snaps as default and I’ve had some trouble with that. My dad is using Kubuntu and there are problems with how programs communicate. Mint is probably a better choice.
I’ll admit I’m biased because I think Cinnamon is ugly. Most people seem to like it and I get it. I just wish Mint hadn’t abandoned the KDE edition. Mint is definitely a great choice though.
Mint is the best to start tbh.
And you could stay in mint for years and barely have to use bash, and when you do there is a well stocked forum, so it is sometimes even easier than windows to troubleshoot.
mint is good, pop!os is also good, i use and recommend endeavouros as arch-but-easy. tbh just about any popular distro these days is prolly gonna do fine for the average user.
Anything Arch based has a higher chance of breakage. The trade off is that you get very new packages frequently