It took me 3 years from when I first started dual booting to when I launched Windows for the last time.
Take your time, move as slowly as you want, and always leave a way back. Eventually you might notice that you’re feeling more comfortable with Linux than Windows, and if you’re lucky, you might not even notice when you’ve stopped using Windows.
Peace of mind (knowing that your partner is ok) can significantly reduce stress and increase quality of life.
Even if the device can’t give an alert soon enough to do anything, just looking and seeing that they are ok this morning can bring a sense of peace, and that’s worth something.
Trump is not what’s causing most of the issues in America. He may be a loose cannon and making everything worse, but the real damage is coming from a few very rich people bribing government officials to change laws, and they’ve been doing this for a long time.
Even if you killed every person who made the system this bad, you’d still be left with a system designed to oppress the masses and make rich people richer. Assassinations aren’t a silver bullet (unless made of silver).
That’s a good argument for including very late term abortion. Inheritance tax.
Abortion should be mandatory.
People keep arguing over whether abortion should be legal or not, but my opinion is that it should be forced on everyone whether they want it or not. Late term abortions up to 100 years after birth should also be considered for inclusion in this rule.
One of my favourite activities is finding controversial opinions, then taking an opinion so extreme that it makes everyone else look like a centrist.
I second the Framework laptops. I’ve bought 4 Framework 13s so far, and no issues with any of them.
I recommend dual booting Windows and Linux until you’re comfortable switching entirely. Sometimes you need to go back for just one task.
Always back up your files before installing a new OS. Data loss is always possible during installation, and more likely if you don’t know what you’re doing.
The Grub boot manager (included and installed by default with Linux Mint and some other distros) makes it easy to pick which OS to boot each time when turning the computer on.
Check out Lutris for non-Steam Windows games. It uses Wine, but is a lot more user friendly to set up and use.
You can always try the live USB without/before installing. It’s a great way to start getting comfortable or try out several different distros with minimal effort and risk.
Admittedly, there isn’t much overlap between the people genuinely asking and the people actively advancing climate change.
I think I have graphics driver issues, but it could just as easily be a failing graphics card without testing. Mint has a great driver manager from Ubuntu, but LMDE didn’t seem to have any driver GUI.
The main symptom is about 30 minutes into almost any game the fps drops from 60+ to ~10. Only restarting the game seems to fix it.
I don’t remember the other minor issues, so they’ve either been fixed, or so minor I stopped noticing them.
I think LMDE is good enough to use as a daily driver. The installer is quite nice too.
Installing Plasma should be as simple as “apt install kde-plasma-desktop”, then log out and select plasma from the login screen. I’ve tried other DEs but not Plasma, so I can’t say for certain it will work.
You can always try distros in a VM almost completely risk free. It won’t tell you everything, but it’s an easy way to get first impressions without losing your main OS.
Edit: This forum thread says you can install and use Plasma, but it’s not a great experience. Mint will probably not be the right option for you then.
I’ve been distro hopping for years. After each time trying a few distros, I always find myself coming back to Linux Mint (cinnamon desktop environment). It has everything I need, and just works beautifully out of the box. It might not be flashy or have the latest cutting edge features, but it’s stable.
I’m currently running the Debian edition of Mint (LMDE), and wishing I was back on standard Mint. Nothing major, but a few minor persistent issues that never happened on Mint.
I did try NixOS (immutable OS), but it didn’t seem to have support for all the apps I wanted. I gave up fairly quickly, so you’ll probably have more success.
I wanted to install an extra hard drive in my computer, but the power supply didn’t have enough connectors. I actually had a spare power supply unit, but upon testing, the 24 pin cable was too short to reach the motherboard.
I ended up using both PSUs. Only one had a power switch on it, so that was connected to the hard drives. I had to use a paperclip in the unused 24 pin connector to make it output power. The 2 PSUs had a wire running between the ground pins of a random unused connector, and they were on the same phase circuit.
The hard drive PSU had to be turned on first at the switch. Once that was on, I could press the power button to turn on the computer. I think I used it for about a year before buying enough upgrade parts to effectively replace the entire computer.
I still see this every few months.
I think it’s happening if a key is released at the same time as a window opens or changes to full screen, but it’s too rare to properly troubleshoot. The fix is still the same.
You don’t need to do everything every day. Some days, surviving is enough.
Start today. Download VirtualBox (or equivalent software) and if you make a mistake, you can just nuke the OS and start over without risk.
You can always try Linux risk free in a virtual machine like VirtualBox.
If you like what you see, and you have any valuable data backed-up, you can try dual booting. That way you get to use Linux as your primary operating system, but can switch back and forth as much as needed.
I found I was dual booting Windows and Linux for over 3 years before I was comfortable enough to stop using Windows entirely. Switching to Linux doesn’t have to be an all-or-nothing approach. You can take it as slow as you want.
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It opens quickly
Just remember to turn steam play on for all titles in Steam -> Settings -> Compatibility.
As others have said, Mint is a great starting option. It looks familiar when coming from Windows, and almost everything works without having to touch a terminal.
AAA games with anti-cheat may not work, but just about everything else will. Check Proton DB for each game’s compatibility.
You can add non-Steam games to Steam to take advantage of Proton. Lutris can also work for some Windows games.
If you want to try Linux distributions to see what they’re like before committing, VirtualBox or other virtual machine programs can give you a risk-free preview.
Another option is a live preview. Install Linux Mint on a USB using Rufus or a similar program, then boot your computer from the USB. So long as you don’t access your computer’s hard drive (under devices on the left of the file manager) or run the installer, no changes should be made from your computer. You can simply reboot and remove the USB to go back to your usual OS.
If you are going to dual-boot, install Windows first. Windows has a habit of overriding or deleting Linux if it’s installed second. If you just want to shrink your Windows partition to allow room for Linux, shrink it from Windows. Linux can move “unmovable” Windows files resulting in Windows not booting.
Always have a backup of everything you are not prepared to lose before you play with installing operating systems (and make sure it’s disconnected from that computer). Data loss from software issues is rare, but mistakes are difficult (sometimes impossible) to reverse, particularly as a beginner.