Technology
This is the official technology community of Lemmy.ml for all news related to creation and use of technology, and to facilitate civil, meaningful discussion around it.
Ask in DM before posting product reviews or ads. All such posts otherwise are subject to removal.
Rules:
1: All Lemmy rules apply
2: Do not post low effort posts
3: NEVER post naziped*gore stuff
4: Always post article URLs or their archived version URLs as sources, NOT screenshots. Help the blind users.
5: personal rants of Big Tech CEOs like Elon Musk are unwelcome (does not include posts about their companies affecting wide range of people)
6: no advertisement posts unless verified as legitimate and non-exploitative/non-consumerist
7: crypto related posts, unless essential, are disallowed
view the rest of the comments
Pop!_OS, PikaOS, CachyOS, and Bazzite are the top gaming distros right now.
I recommend Pop! if you have Nvidia cards. If you have AMD, any of them will work.
PikaOS or Bazzite with the KDE Plasma desktop are going to be closest to Windows 10 in terms of how you use them.
Pop! has a super different UI, almost Mac-like. But it's based on Ubuntu, the most-used distro. Which means that if anything goes wrong you can search "[problem] Ubuntu" and get hundreds of solution pages.
CachyOS is based on Arch, which is the big, scawy Linux that all the nerds say they use. It's easier to break than the other ones, and won't officially offer some of the apps that something Debian/Ubuntu based might have. I would recommend it when you're looking to get a bit more technical.
That said, I haven't broken my install yet and CachyOS is like the fastest OS available right now. Serious FPS gains for a LOT of games compared to Windows, and even other Linux distros. I also have not had to sit and troubleshoot it over anything. I was shocked at how smooth it was for an Arch system.
So, there's not really a bad choice in those 4. I'd recommend Pop! if you never want to have to tinker, Pika or Bazzite if you want to feel like you're still using Windows, and Cachy when you feel comfortable taking some training wheels off (and that could be right now!).
For browsers, try LibreWolf. It's a locked-down version of Firefox. Or just use Firefox. It ain't perfect, but then again it ain't Chrome.
oh hey nice I haven been on Mint for awhile and my Nvidia card gives me no end of trouble
PopOS vote from me. Very easy to get set up, especially if you have an Nvidia card. Flatpak is integrated to their store, it just works out of the box.
I've been on PopOs for over 7 years and its been steady as a rock! I could never go back to windows.