What Linux distro is best as a daily driver for a beginner?

Byteang3l

FOSSOS they could as far as I know, I just didn't regard that as being the most beginner friendly task.

DeletedUser433

pit2p Wouldn't read-only mean that I can't write new files?

WestQuester Yes, I have heard of those issues with Fedora, which is why I was hesitant initially. I'm not a fan of tinkering with stuff

TheGodfather All Linux distros have low resource usage compared to Windows

Do you mean to say that a distro like Qubes is less intensive than Windows 11? I don't know much but the sites I checked all mentioned that it was resource-intensive

TheGodfather No Linux OS does that (VPN leak protection) by-default. Your VPN app needs to do this properly.

Doesn't Whonix run all traffic through Tor? I mentioned leak protection because iirc GOS has this feature and hoped that some distros would have it

spl4tt I'm not a computer guy, I have used the command line before but generally avoid it because I'm afraid that a typo would ruin something

I watch movies occasionally so codec support is quite important, I heard Fedora doesnt come with ffmpeg

TheGodfather

DeletedUser433 Do you mean to say that a distro like Qubes is less intensive than Windows 11?

QubesOS is not a Linux distro.

DeletedUser433 Doesn't Whonix run all traffic through Tor?

Yes

spl4tt

DeletedUser433 Then go with fedora That one just works 👍

DeletedUser433

DeletedUser396 Are u able to run distros like QubesOS?

Eirikr70 Does ur driver update automatically?

Are Rufus, Ventoy and Yumi safe for setting up multiboot thumb drives?

DeletedUser396

DeletedUser433
Yes Qubes works fine.

Eirikr70

DeletedUser433 Does ur driver update automatically?

Usually, there nothing updating automatically with Linux. You have a command (dnf update for Fedora) that takes care of the updates. There is also a graphical interface for that I suppose.

DeletedUser433

DeletedUser396 why did the other guy say that QubesOS isn't a Linux distro?

DeletedUser396

DeletedUser433
perhaps, and this is a guess, they may feel that independent distributions, like Fedora, Debian, Arch or openSuse etc. are linux distros and any other OS that is based upon a Linux distro is not a true distro in its own right. Just like Qubes, there no such linux called Qubes rather an operating system called Qubes, based on Fedora linux and Debian linux, depending on what VM's you load and run.

TheGodfather

DeletedUser433 why did the other guy say that QubesOS isn't a Linux distro?

Why do you ask him about what I said? Read QubesOS FAQ: https://doc.qubes-os.org/en/latest/introduction/faq.html#is-qubes-just-another-linux-distribution

Is Qubes just another Linux distribution?

If you really want to call it a distribution, then it’s more of a “Xen distribution” than a Linux one. But Qubes is much more than just Xen packaging. It has its own VM management infrastructure, with support for template VMs, centralized VM updating, etc. It also has a very unique GUI virtualization infrastructure.

DeletedUser433

DeletedUser396 ohh so in layman's terms it's like a fork of a distro rather than a distro itself

DeletedUser433

Eirikr70 I see, so dnf check update, then dnf update should take care of all drivers without any hunting?

Eirikr70

I'd define it a Linux OS since it runs out of a Linux kernel. But it doesn't really bring the functions of an OS. Rather it brings environments for running OS's.

ryrona

Eirikr70 I'd define it a Linux OS since it runs out of a Linux kernel.

Well, it doesn't. Not really. It runs on a Xen hypervisor. So the root of trust is not in the Linux kernel, and the security does not rely on the Linux kernel. The Linux kernel is only run inside virtual machines. Eg inside dom0 to provide driver support for the GPU, audio and disk controller, inside sys-net to provide hardware support for network drivers, inside sys-usb to provide support for external devices, and so on. Virtual machines can also run the Windows kernel.

I wouldn't call QubesOS a Linux distribution. It uses a lot of the Linux software stack, but the core is not Linux, it is Xen.

TheGodfather

DeletedUser433 Does not take care of firmware, for that you need fwudp

DeletedUser433

TheGodfather You sound quite familiar with Linux, would you say that Mint or Fedora is more stable?

DeletedUser433

ryrona I plan to change my drives to ext4 for compatibility with Linux. What should I do with the boot drive though? If I made it into a multiboot drive, should it be exFAT for compatibility with both systems?

DeletedUser433

ryrona So since QubesOS is widely regarded to be one of the most secure DEs can GrapheneOS do the same thing without relying on the Linux Kernel? Iirc they had plans to leave Linux

DeletedUser433

DeletedUser410 Is there a way to add an additional firewall/kill-switch in the desktop in case the main one fails? I use public WiFi so I can't configure the router

Toiletterider I suppose you're telling me to boot from my USB drive whenever I want to surf the internet? It's a bit troublesome, how about using a VM?

ZoraIsHere

Eirikr70 exactly the same happened to me.

Panda7878

Hello everyone, new user and recent GOS converter, here. I concur, Linux Mint is a great distro for beginners. Although, I came from a Mac OS background, a lot of the features in Linux Mint resemble those from Windows, but just a lot more secure. Also, I like the fact that the OS is free (although you can donate, if you feel you have gotten some worth from it). I switched to Linux because I got tired of paying $1100+ for a Mac computer and Windows always had so many virii (or viruses) written for it. I have tried several distros over the years (Ubuntu, Debian, Fedora, OpenSuse, etc.), I always came back to Linux Mint, as it seemed to be the most user friendly and easiest to work with. Also, to remind me of Mac OS, I downloaded a program called "plank", which lets you put frequently used programs across the bottom of the screen, just like Mac OS's "Dock" does.

DeletedUser433

Panda7878 For some reason, I've had bugs on my main OS after live booting Linux Mint from a USB Drive. My time settings on Windows has changed every time I did it and I got logged out of certain applications. My Windows software also detected my external HDD (which wasn't connected during live booting) as having defects. The fact that all these bugs happened at the same time is putting me off

Probably9857

DeletedUser433 My time settings on Windows has changed every time I did it

This is a known issue with solutions. See https://www.howtogeek.com/323390/how-to-fix-windows-and-linux-showing-different-times-when-dual-booting/

It's possible (though not guaranteed) that the incorrect time is causing some or all of your other issues.

Don't despair yet.

Probably9857

DeletedUser433 while it does solve this particular bug

DeletedUser433 I got logged out of certain applications

Authentication tokens often have a time-based component. An incorrect system time could plausibly result in the tokens being seen as invalid.

DeletedUser433 My Windows software also detected my external HDD (which wasn't connected during live booting) as having defects

An incorrect system time could plausibly cause this too. As an overly simplistic example, what would the system do if a file's metadata said it was created in the future? There may also be lower-level disk management operations that use the time for various purposes.

DeletedUser433 there is still the risk of other bugs occurring

Well, that is always true, not only with Linux. It's unfortunate that you had a poor and probably scary first experience, but I think it has given you a false idea of the kinds of issues you're likely to encounter.

I dual-booted Windows and Linux for years, and other than the time thing, I never saw any issues that seemed related to using Linux.

« Previous Page Next Page »