Hey all,
I used to use Linux for a few years. Distro-hopped a bit, used Manjaro, Kubuntu, Mint, and Debian. I want to go back, but what I want is stability. I want to be able to do my regular day-to-day tasks without any sacrifices to my regular performance and stability on Windows 10.
Using Linux, I had the following issues:
-
Manjaro - for a first-timer, I think the problems here were pretty self-explanatory
-
Kubuntu - worked like a charm, up until I needed to update to the latest version, which it refused to do no matter what I did, causing me to swap to Mint. Reinstalled at a later date only for the entire distro to crash every so often with simple tasks like minimising and maximising windows, opening browser tabs, etc.
-
Mint - worked, but disliked the layout, swapped to Debian
-
Debian - Most in line with values, but could not for the life of me figure out how to install the Nvidia drivers. I reinstalled the distro multiple times after following the official tutorial to install the drivers to a tee… which would brick the distro entirely each time. Also had same issue with simple tasks like minimising and maximising windows, navigating browser tabs, etc. crashing my system.
I want to enjoy Linux, but I also want basic functionality. For all the crap I rightfully give Windows, it’s never crashed on me, whereas with the two distros I mainly used, it would crash probably once or twice a day. I’m not a AAA gamer, and I don’t feel it’s a hard ask to play a game like osu! without constant stuttering when it runs effortlessly on Windows.
I went back to Windows because I simply couldn’t deal with the issues anymore, I had to get a whole new computer and I feel that the constant issues with stability I had and needing to constantly manually turn the power on and off because of the crashes, and reinstalling distros for mundane reasons wore out my SSD much sooner than it should have.
If anybody can help me find something that I can be confident in to simply work without major issues, I would greatly appreciate it. I feel trapped, I want to ditch Windows, but also don’t want to deal with those nonstop issues all over again.
Any of the ~15 most used distros is stable when you learn how to not fuck it up.
As an anecdote:
my Ubuntu and Debian installs used to break twice a year on dist upgrade back then (started with Linux when Ubuntu 12 came out, got it in a magazine). It would cost me a weekend of trying to fix it before giving up and reinstalling the whole dammn thing and re-doing my setup from scratch …
Then I switched and my arch install has been the same for the past ~10 years with only minor fixes maybe once a year. It outlived the hardware it was on twice.
But every time people keep saying Debian and Ubuntu are stable and Arch is unstable 🤷♂️
Yeah, well if they’re new then they don’t know how to not fuck it up, now do they? Besides, in this day and age, you shouldn’t have to tip-toe around an OS to stay on its good side, it should just work.
Usually the problem is that new users go out of their way to fuck things up.
I don’t see anything wrong with that. Most of us did that and that’s how we learned. But really, all mainstream distros are good out of the box unless you have an unusual hardware configuration. Specially now with flatpaks, appimages and Snaps.
Of course if you want to tweak and twist KDE or install extensions on Gnome or PPAs from who know where on Ubuntu or overuse the AUR in arch you need to know what you are doing.
However, it’s no different in Windows but for different reasons. The most common way to fuck windows up is to start installing software from non reputable sources. I think many of us have had to clean windows installations from friends and family when it becomes unusable.
If one wants rolling, I would suggest NixOS, Guix System or Tumbleweed. Or something container based like Silverblue or openSUSE micro.
But rolling doesn’t really make sense. Just go with Debian/Leap and then use Flatpak, podman, Nix and/or Guix on top of that. For Desktop.
Same here, dist-upgrades where always hit or miss. I am on EndeavourOS now and would always chose a distro with rolling releases.
Similar experience. Non rolling release are always so volatile with version upgrades. Never had a major regression from rolling release if I update regularly.