So im a noob as some say, theirs certain games and software i use on windows that wont work on linux. ive tried linux but i found myself switching back to windows. I really do want to stay with linux but im not sure how or if i should duel boot or something? also what flavor of line do you enjoy or would suggest?
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Personally, I dual boot with an external NVMe drive. It works great! I have Linux and only Linux on the internal drive and Windows gets relegated to an external one.
The trick to getting it to work is: you have to temporarily install the NVMe drive internally in order to install Windows onto it. Then you pop it into an external enclosure and it just works. Just make sure your BIOS is set up to boot USB devices before internal drives.
The ideal thing to me is if you have your last pc. You throw linux on that (I recommend zorin) and you have it available alonw with your newer windows machine. In most cases I believe the linux machine will perform better. Move as much as you can to it until you have whatever little things you still need windows for. Ideally you realize you need windows for so little that you flip the script and change your newer machine to linux and windows as your backup or you put linux on your next machine and the older windows machine sticks around.
I use FOSS even when I used to use Windows. So the programs I use and format I use were ready for me to switch. If for some reason you rely on a proprietary or Windows-only software you may have to make the effort to migrate, readjust and learn a new set of software to to do your work.
It’s very simple.
You simply switch your apps too, not just the OS. Everyone thinks that they can switch the OS 1:1, but it’s not like that. You will never be happy if you expect the same apps on all the OSes. Instead of photoshop, you use Gimp. Instead of Illustrator, you use Inkscape. Instead of resolve/premiere, you use kdenlive. And so on. You will have to invest some time to relearn not just the OS, but the apps too.
Simply put – you’ve got to realize a couple things: 1- Linux is not Windows. 2- Use Linux like a brand new type of software you never heard about – do not make any pre-assumptions. 3- Use Google to search for the most simple things, including “How do I install something on (Linux distro name you’ve chosen)”? 4- Have some patience – you won’t learn (everything) on day one. There will be mistakes, there will be problems you will not solve em today. But you will solve em tomorrow. And here’s a little “cheat sheet” of mine on how to use (and get used with) linux: 1- Get used how to use the package manager. (Where you will search and install stuff.) 2- Learn what are your audio and graphic packages (The “drivers”) are. (See 3- above.) 3- Learn how to run the stuff you installed. 4- Learn how you configure the distro to your liking. Learn all these four steps, and you can consider yourself a linux “pro” user.
If the software you need to use isn’t very demanding, you can run windows in a virtual machine (VM) inside of Linux – the exception is games that have kernel-level anti-cheat, those will probably never work on Linux in any way, and you’ll have to dual boot to run them. Most other games will run easily if you just install them with Steam, but I’ve come across a few that I use a VM for.
What software and games do you need to run? I might be able to help.
Also, the distro you should go for is called Linux Mint.
Mint has the perfect balance of stability, support and up-to-date-ness for beginners - and honestly for a lot of experienced users as well.
I’ve been running only Linux for 25 years. Any software you think you need that you only can get on Windows you don’t. Drop windows, say goodbye to your apps, and explore the alternatives. Try to have fun. A growth mindset helps
Remove windows completely or you’ll swap back at any inconvenience, once used to linux then dualboot windows and swap when needed. I use windows for iracing and wrc, if im not playing that I swap to linux and use it for everything else.
a few tips for you:
- try open source software in windows too, like libreoffice, inkscape, etc, depending on your needs. It will help the transition to be easier
- if you have a spare machine, try linux on that instead of dual booting, because windows tend to mess with the bootloader in dual boot
- don’t be harsh on yourself. It’s normal to have difficulty to adapt to things. You can do that in steps as small as you feel comfortable with
- try distros like linux mint, because they tend to be easier for new users
- experiment wine or winboat for software you need from windows, if there aren’t alternatives
I agree with all of this except maybe the wine suggestion. Wine on its own, imo, is too complicated for new linux users.
I would instead recommend looking at lutris (yes I know it is mostly games but it does have some software too) or bottles. Since these abstract away the manual management of wine prefixes.
Makes sense. Do you know a more user-friendly alternative? Maybe something like bottles?
I think bottles is the simplest that still lets you configure things. You can also do the trick with steam where you add the exe as a non-steam game.
What games can’t you play on linux? Some apps can’t be run natively in linux, but use an emulation for them. That will work…
So I started by dual booting; it’s not a bad way of doing things although Windows likes to mess with bootloaders.
Optimal way is have physically separate hard drives/NVME cards, Windows on one, Linux on the other. The Linux bootloader should detect windows and point to it’s bootloader as a menu option without issue.
Make Linux the default OS and only switch to Windows when you really have to. I haven’t used my Windows install in like 1 year? I kept it for gaming but everything I want works in Linux. I even have a Windows VM in Linux for using Office if I need to for work (used it a few times in a year and beat having to restart into windows)
I’d wipe the windows drive but I just can’t be bothered right now.
I recommend a KDE distro to start as it’s very flexible - it can mimic windows and also be wildly different if you want. I use OpenSUSE Tumbleweed but I’d recommend OpenSUSE Leap as a stabler point release distro when starting out. I know longer recommend Mint as I find Cinnamon tired and there is so much old and bad advice on tweaking or fixing issues on Mint that it is actually potentially detrimental to being secure and safe.
Just accept shit won’t work and drop it cold turkey. Nuke the fuck out of the windows drive and force your self to move on.
If you don’t need to to make a living then fuck it and move on.
You learned to use a computer once you can do it again. When you didn’t know how to do something in the past you looked it up. When you needed an application you churned though options till one worked.
Shit breaks or is half assed on windows. Your just use to what you know that works. Your use to having your apps your use to.
Learn to get over the fact you gotta relearn things, find new options, and will be frustrated.
After like a month you will be fine Basically git gud. You were gud growing up and got bad. Time to return to your childhood and have fun learning and exploring again.
Also plain ass normal fedora is going to be your best middle ground if you want the widest possiable support of software. Arch if you don’t mind a bit more leg work with the aur.
if you don’t need those windows only programs to earn a living, just install linux, don’t fuck around with dual booting. accept that you’re gonna have to learn new things. you’ll adapt.
if you do need windows for something, i guess dual boot, but make a pact with yourself to only use it for that one program, and switch back when you’re done, and keep looking for replacements so you can cut that last chain lashing you to m$. i highly recommend alternativeto for that.
This is the move. When I installed CachyOS (a year ago today actually), I set up a dual boot - figured it’d be good to have the “backup plan” instead of jumping right into it. I found myself going back a few times for various odds and ends. Over time I found I’d been flipping back to it less and less, I think the last time I actually used it was for a stupid gacha game that I finally put down for good.
Finally got to the point where I just nuked the windows partition to free up some space. and looking back I really only kept it around in the early days because I didn’t feel confident yet. (Though I do wish I had the forethought to arrange the partitions in a logical way because I couldn’t actually extend my cachyos partition to the left, so I just opted to add it to the btrfs pool instead, it works I guess).
I like having a Windows 11 VM for stuff I need Windows for (Visual Studio, pretty much, for one project), though I realise having enough system resources to do this is a bit of a privilege (especcially now…)
you gotta get used to it, get over the frustration of having a system work completely differently than you are used to.
people spent 30 years learning windows, which is why windows frustrations are invisible.
Thanks for this question, I’ll get a bit out of this too
