Linux distro recommendation

[gauss]

I have really liked Linux Mint Cinnamon edition x64.

- It runs quite well on my older Dell Latitude D630 laptop with 4 GB of RAM and SSD.

- It is very pleasing, aesthetically speaking, unlike some of the 'Ubuntu-proper' distributions.

- It contains drivers and media codecs so everything works quite well out of the box.

It is, I understand, based on Ubuntu.

Note I am running the LTS version 17.2 from I think 3 years ago (which is about to become unsupported) so this may have all changed in the interim - YMMV.

-gauss

 

[gauss]

I just setup Linux Mint-Cinnamon last week to try out as my first experience with Linux. I'm a lifelong DOS/Windows user, but I'm not sold on Windows 10. I was pleasantly surprised at how easy it was to setup this version of Linux and I like the GUI's similarity to Windows 7. So far, I'm not seeing any reason not to migrate to Linux over Windows 10. The office suite (Libre Office) will take a bit of time adjusting to, but it seems very capable for my purposes.

Any advice or cautions for a Linux newby thinking of ditching Windows? I may need to setup a Windows virtual machine to run a couple of legacy apps occasionally, but that's not a big deal to me.

If you try to open someone else's finally crafted presentation (based on MS Office) in Libre office, it may be "readable" but not look quite right. Something to be aware of if you ever need to inter-operate with those running Microsoft Office tools.

FWIW, my MS Office 2007 has managed to keep me running in that crowd for the past 12 years with no major compatibility problems.

 

[jim584672]

I tried out Manjaro and like it a lot. I installed the Mate desktop in Manjaro and it is very stable. It is based on Arch, but the packages are slowed down just a bit to catch any bugs. The Arch distro I gave up on, just too many problems after updates break things. Ubuntu 18.04 LTS is the main daily driver.

Win 10 I run in a virtual machine just in case I need a Win 10 program, but I never really need to use it much at all.

 

[copyright1997reloaded]

I just setup Linux Mint-Cinnamon last week to try out as my first experience with Linux. I'm a lifelong DOS/Windows user, but I'm not sold on Windows 10. I was pleasantly surprised at how easy it was to setup this version of Linux and I like the GUI's similarity to Windows 7. So far, I'm not seeing any reason not to migrate to Linux over Windows 10. The office suite (Libre Office) will take a bit of time adjusting to, but it seems very capable for my purposes.

Any advice or cautions for a Linux newby thinking of ditching Windows? I may need to setup a Windows virtual machine to run a couple of legacy apps occasionally, but that's not a big deal to me.

Having a Window's guest (Virtual Machine) is a good idea, and you can do it for free:
1) Download virtualbox (free): https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads
2) Microsoft has virtual appliance versions of windows + browser for testing. They are free to use for 90 days and also have the ability (in most cases) to restart the activation trigger one time. Even better, you can set the guest up as you want (but prior to doing the activation) and save the state. That way, when the time limited license expires, you reset to your saved machine state.
Here is a link to the appliance download site. Note this is a Microsoft site (i.e. legitimate): https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-edge/tools/vms/
3) In terms of files, I would recommend setting up a shared folder between the guest and the Linux host. That way, even though you will end up having to restart/restore the saved state, any data files you have created will still be available.

Hope this helps/ let me know if you have any questions.

 

[Ready-4-ER-at-14]

I have moved several machines to Linux mostly after windows quit supporting an operating system or it crashed and wiped out the drive even with current antiviruses.

One thing I've done is create a MANUAL dual boot computer that runs both an older version of windows specifically for older programs and games and the newest ubuntu (18.04.2 lts) . It was a windows 7 machine but I run xp on it and I found an xp driver disk on ebay that had a gazillion drivers on it including my motherboard for the xp portion. (no internet connection for xp portion so even if virus it is contained)

I have the ejectable hard drive setup for all the drives (currently 3, 1 @3.5" and 2@2.5". One hard drive for ubuntu and another for xp.

I would do this on my win 10 computer except it does not have front accessible drive bays. (maybe i'll build one with the right case for next upgrade to get down to one tower.)

Neatest thing about all this is I have a very small very fast 3 month calendar program in machine language that runs in all these programs after I played with wine for a bit in ubuntu. I've had this since maybe my monitors were all green screen and my storage was big floppies...

Only problem is sometimes when I take one OS drive out and put another in, I have to reset boot order. Simply having same hard drive for both would alleviate this.

 

[ejman]

I have moved several machines to Linux mostly after windows quit supporting an operating system or it crashed and wiped out the drive even with current antiviruses.

One thing I've done is create a MANUAL dual boot computer that runs both an older version of windows specifically for older programs and games and the newest ubuntu (18.04.2 lts) . It was a windows 7 machine but I run xp on it and I found an xp driver disk on ebay that had a gazillion drivers on it including my motherboard for the xp portion. (no internet connection for xp portion so even if virus it is contained)

I have the ejectable hard drive setup for all the drives (currently 3, 1 @3.5" and 2@2.5". One hard drive for ubuntu and another for xp.

I would do this on my win 10 computer except it does not have front accessible drive bays. (maybe i'll build one with the right case for next upgrade to get down to one tower.)

Neatest thing about all this is I have a very small very fast 3 month calendar program in machine language that runs in all these programs after I played with wine for a bit in ubuntu. I've had this since maybe my monitors were all green screen and my storage was big floppies...

Only problem is sometimes when I take one OS drive out and put another in, I have to reset boot order. Simply having same hard drive for both would alleviate this.

I tried the dual boot on a single drive approach for a period of time with Win 10/ Linux Mint but I found that the constant/frequent Win 10 updates requiring multiple reboots would muck things up so much that it wasn't worth the pain. That's why I ended up with a dedicated Win 10 PC for the tax preparation programs and Linux machine for everything else. The good thing with that approach is that the Win 10 machine can be really inexpensive as it needs just the bare minimum to run Win 10 since the tax programs are not very "taxing"

 

[easysurfer]

I tried the dual boot on a single drive approach for a period of time with Win 10/ Linux Mint but I found that the constant/frequent Win 10 updates requiring multiple reboots would muck things up so much that it wasn't worth the pain. That's why I ended up with a dedicated Win 10 PC for the tax preparation programs and Linux machine for everything else. The good thing with that approach is that the Win 10 machine can be really inexpensive as it needs just the bare minimum to run Win 10 since the tax programs are not very "taxing"

I stuck with Win 10 as my main machine. Main reason is familiarity with Win, plus tax and GPS update programs which are Win only. But you can't pay me to use the Win 10 tiles so I got third party software to suppress them.

My Linux machine(s) is on a laptop. Primary uses are to remotely connect to my desktop when I'm traveling along with running some screen recording and dvd programs which work better for me in Linux.

I had thought about having my main desktop as Linux and laptop on Win. But last thing I want to do when traveling is to fire up my laptop and sit and wait for updates.

 

[bjorn2bwild]

My mechanical solution to multiple drives is to move the hard drive outside the box with an extension cable.

Simply unplug one drive and replace with another. I also have one laptop set up this way.

 

[tsoispf]

I've have had pretty good success running Windows 10 as a KVM under Linux Mint. Like easysurfer, I run my tax software on Windows 10. But the KVM was a nice alternative to dual booting. I do an sshfs share and have cut and paste going between Mint and the KVM, which is sweet.

 

[IBWino]

Having a Window's guest (Virtual Machine) is a good idea, and you can do it for free:
1) Download virtualbox (free): https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads
2) Microsoft has virtual appliance versions of windows + browser for testing. They are free to use for 90 days and also have the ability (in most cases) to restart the activation trigger one time. Even better, you can set the guest up as you want (but prior to doing the activation) and save the state. That way, when the time limited license expires, you reset to your saved machine state.
Here is a link to the appliance download site. Note this is a Microsoft site (i.e. legitimate): https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-edge/tools/vms/
3) In terms of files, I would recommend setting up a shared folder between the guest and the Linux host. That way, even though you will end up having to restart/restore the saved state, any data files you have created will still be available.

Hope this helps/ let me know if you have any questions.

Thanks. I'm very familiar with VirtualBox; I'm actually running Linux Mint as a VM in VirtualBox for my evaluations.

Regards,
Wino

 

[kgtest]

I'm sticking with Ubuntu, as it's working great.
Today I just upgraded from version 16.04 LTS (Long Term Support), meaning very stable and supported. to version 18.04 LTS.

It's a little different, and I'm finding the X to close windows has moved to the right corner (like Windows).
I want to get DW onto linux and this change of the X placement will help make that change easier for her.

I need to upgrade my 16.04 LTS Good to know it's working for you. I run it on my garage PC which serves 2 purposes...diagnosing the cars right next to the car in the garage via youtube and online searches, ordering parts right when I am out in the garage and 2. Getting away from DW when she needs her space. In that regard, and because of Reason2, Linux is a lifesaver!

 

[timo2]

DW uses the LXLE distro on her old Toshiba Satellite C655 and it works great. She primarily works on the internet, not locally, so the only slowness is the built in wifi. I might upgrade that for her, but she thinks it is fine as is.

 

[easysurfer]

My computer setups (as of today):

1) Desktop: Windoze - due to familiarity and some Windoze only programs
2) Laptop (dual boot) - a) MX Linux - my main distro, b) Peppermint OS (for apps not available on MX Linux)

I tried installing virt-manager and qemu/kvm but struggled and struggled and gave up. Also, thought about virtualbox, but I feel claustrophobic using virtualbox.

Hopefully, with this setup, I won't be tempted to distro hop for awhile .

 

[robnplunder]

I used Mint, Ubuntu, Redhat, .... They all have pros and cons so if you have time, try different distros. Otherwise, I think Mint may be good enough for most casual users.

 

[Ed_The_Gypsy]

I use Linux Mint almost exclusively these days (totally retired). It is MUCH faster (and much less annoying) than Win7 on my backup laptop. You can burn Mint onto a thumb drive and check it out on your machine without actually installing it on your machine. I bought an HP laptop at Costco on a deal, wiped Win10 without blinking and installed Mint. No regrets. LibreOffice works a little different from MS Office but I have managed workarounds for the simple things I need. Having trouble getting it to print using my new Canon printer. Have to transfer documents to old Windows machine to print. (One good reason to try before you commit.)



Sometimes you can get a pre-burned DVD in a Linux magazine (look for them at Barnes & Noble)



I have an interest in TrueOS (a desktop FreeBSD) but not ready to fiddle with it yet. Not recommended for newbies.

 

[Sunset]

I'll admit, once I tried Ubuntu at home (after using debian at work) I was hooked on Ubuntu.
It is really easy to use, frankly just like using Windows without the troubles.
At the Ubuntu.com site anybody can download an iso file, and then use their computer's dvd burner to burn the iso to the dvd.
Then anyone can try it out, but simply booting from the dvd. It also gives you the ability to install it from the same dvd if desired.
They do ask for a donation, but let you get it and use it for free.