Good choice. Linux mint is nice for people coming from windows

Yes Linux Mint. You CAN migrate later to other distros without losing your data so feel free to test others out later when you feel ready and know more about them.

Following is a good resource for a distro decision https://www.privacyguides.org/en/desktop/ If you ever want to know more about something like firewall, bkuetooth, etc. use wiki.archlinux.org/ but only use arch if you want a very steep learning curve.

It doesn’t matter too much which distro you choose. It’s all linux.

1. Install graphical apps via flatpak (stay away from snaps)
2. Install graphical apps via distrobox (may want to do this later when you are confident enough with linux)

Zero experience = ignore standard Distributions

Fedora Kinoite from ublue.it

So much stability and reliability, while modern packages. Just using Debian or Mint (Ubuntu LTS with an outdated Desktop and opinionated theming) is not a solution for a good experience, as you need updates.

Btw I broke every other Distro before, so I ended up on Fedora Kinoite

Mint 💯

PopOS or Mint. Easy peasy.

Another day another switching post. We need a new community for these posts.

Im going to try out Nobara when they move to plasma 6 and also EndeavourOS. One of those will suit my needs for gaming.

Before you leave W10, install it in a VM or dual boot so you can test it/get used to the interface

What games do you play?

You need to first understand what kind of interaction you expect with your OS. For this, you can start by considering what you use your OS for and currently what you do for your OS. e.g. Before I jumped to Linux, I was just starting to learn PowerShell on Win, because I saw a lot of places in my system where I wanted to use it. I felt consistently dissatisfied with the lack of things I could just tell the system to do, making me go to scripting. This way, I knew I won’t have a problem with putting time into something that takes a lot of configuring. But since I was still new and wanted an easy start, I went with Manjaro KDE. It was based on Arch, but had a system of differed updates, giving me a feel of it being easier. Plus, it had a lot of customisations out of the box, some of which, I learnt from, when making my own configurations for EndeavourOS. EndeavourOS considers itself to be more terminal oriented, and it is possible to easily get a full-fledged tty system, just by selecting it in the installer. I chose KDE because I like changing the Appearance a lot, but you might want to look at other DEs depending upon your expectations.

Ubuntu has been shifting a lot to snaps, so if you want your computer to be snappy (the literal meaning), you might want to avoid it (ironically). But at the same time, if you want less configuration requirements and want to keep most of your exp outside the terminal, on top of finding it easier to install software from vendors’ websites, you can consider it. If you are fine with putting in the minimal amount of brain usage it takes to understand the installation instructions of the website - and by that I mean, read the heading telling you which distro the copy-paste text is meant for (I know ppl too lazy to do that and trying paste an apt command into Red Hat) - I suggest Fedora/Linux Mint and a slew of others.

DE = Desktop Environment apt = Package Manager (kinda like an app store on terminal) used for Ubuntu

P.S.: If you choose an Arch-based distro, make sure you keep a backup OS that is in the Debian/Fedora tree. I keep a Debian KDE, mainly for older linux games, which ask for packages that have been long removed from Arch, but it is useful in case you break something. That way you won’t have to wait for the time it takes to make a Live USB and can just restart.

I recently went over to fedora. Love it so far. Really stable and also newer packages than e.g. linux mint.

I think it depends on what you are looking for. While Linux Mint is a safe option, it does have some drawbacks… well it’s more drawbacks from Ubuntu but as Linux Mint is based off of it, it’s also impacted. Primarily the fact that Ubuntu packages are terribly out of date. Thankfully mint makes adding PPA’s painless, but for apps that don’t have a PPA it’s a pain to install them from scratch like Mangohud. It’s not impossible, but there is an expect level of Linux knowledge which is required before going in.

Another option is Manjaro. You will hear the litany of endless criticism about it from the community, some of it is valid. But for the most part, while it’s not as nice as Linux Mint, I think the OS will get you to the point where you can start using your machine faster. Mostly thanks to Arch’s rolling release, as well as the AUR for filling the gap between official packages and flatpaks.

I was using Manjaro for the longest time, but switched to Mint due to a freak bootloader accident. I prefer Manjaro in terms of how well it handled Games and Windows software due to it’s association with Arch. But I like how well Mint manages my laptop’s battery and performance or lack thereof due to it’s pitiful cooler.

version 6.6.10 is not bad, working great for me

Start looking at the desktop environments and use a virtual machine/live usb to try them out. For something similar to Windows I’d recommend KDE plasma or Cinnamon, both can be tried out using KDE Neon or Linux Mint.

You can always start sooner and dual boot on Linux Mint to get familiar test your usecases. I have been dual booting and haven’t logged into Windows in over 6 months. Gaming is pretty good for many games on Linux.