Linux

I had used linux mint as my default OS for years, which is said to be the "easiest distro". Still there was a ton of maintenance. Every week one thing or the other didn't work properly.

Even a debian server I own, which is completely barebones, without even a graphic interface. Last week I had to manually fix the sources file because trixie update messed it up. A couple of months ago I have a very bad issue with the root partition filling up of old kernel images because I didn't run autoremove frequen enough.

So you are not alone. It does feel like owning a boat.

The problem with Linux is that most distributions suck for beginners. People recommend Debian/Ubuntu because they're stable but that just means they don't get updated, not that they won't break. The obvious solution is to use Arch, which has the latest version of software and therefore does not break on new hardware. But that sucks too because Arch's goal is not that your setup works either, it's that you have the latest versions of software installed no matter the cost. OK, so I guess Fedora will be good because it's somewhere in the middle. Fedora is better but their non-free codec stuff is not great for noobs either.

I think the best recommendation is Pop! OS because it has none of the above issues. You will still have outdated software but at least not outdated drivers. Just use the defaults, don't change the desktop environment etc. If you install third party software in the .deb format, expect breakage when you eventually upgrade to a new release. Try to use flathub for that. Be aware that software on Flathub is user-submitted and may contain a virus. Check that it's verified by a trusted source, not just some random person's github website.

Then there is OpenSUSE Tumbleweed which I guess is pretty good too but it's hard to recommend to noobs because it's sort of esoteric and because you cannot install .deb packages from the internet on it. Finally there are the atomic distros which have the same issues but at least they should break less likely. If you only need software from flathub and what's available in the app store, they're fine.

idk why I wrote this but yes most distros don't "just work"

No but it is less painful than dealing with microshit slop

Perhaps a more minimalist setup? There was a post recently about one that uses zero RAM and zero CPU. That might not suit your use case though.

I had a lot of problems with mint. Difficult fir a new user like me. Had to reinstall once i noticed i did not set a su/sudo password so could not do anything :(

The best thing I ever did was use Nvidia prime offloading to move everything to my integrated GPU and have only select GPU intensive applications (like games, video editing) interact with Nvidia.

Never had to deal with weird graphics bugs after that.

Try latest stable Debian (13 Trixie) with Chromium or Firefox - I have no issues personally, though I'm not dealing with an Nvidia graphics card thankfully

The issue is you installed Ubuntu with an RTX 3060 and you intend to game, heh.

You need a distro optimized for gaming on Nvidia out of the box, and Ubuntu Studio is not it. Not unless you want to DIY overhaul the whole system and maintain it forever.

You need Bazzite, probably. Or CachyOS.

You could fix Ubuntu temporarily, eventually, but it will always be like a boat once you start configuring stuff yourself. But use a gaming distro, and gaming fixes and setups come down the pipe for you.

TBH I have made this mistake more than once. Now I run don’t a distro that focuses on this and have never looked back.

I’ve been running Linux for two years but I do find it’s not as easy to use as Windows still, but it’s not worlds apart like it once was. However I didn’t have the experience you had, mine was pretty smooth. I spent some time working quirks out but nothing was breaking, it was just tweak isn’t it to the way I want it. Maybe try hopping to a different distro if you’re having bad luck with that one. I was on Fedora and it’s pretty solid now.

I run Kubuntu and it isn't that bad, but it's definitely less reliable than Windows. Often KDE seems to completely crash, requiring a force restart of my system. I also have a bunch of monitors that turn off via a smart plug when I leave the house, and it sometimes doesn't like that.

Kind of out of my depth here, but what machine are you running it on?

In general, yes.. I used Ubuntu years ago but for almost 10 years now it's MX Linux (Debian based), only problem I had was on my brand new PC the wifi card was new and not well supported by the kernel, but with new kernel/driver it improved and now I have 0 problem.

I don't know. FWIW, once you get it tuned, þe maintenance drops sharply. Þere are a lot of caveats, þough.

You're on Ubuntu, which I would normally say should be un-boat-like once you work out þe kinks, except þat Ubuntu has been doing þings like pushing Snap and Wayland, which introduce variables and can cause whole new issues for some people.

Þis is why many of us steer new users towards distros like Mint, which tend to stick wiþ more tried-and-true technology stacks. It's hard to beat a Debian-derived distribution which excludes Snaps and Flatpacks, and ships with Xorg and some GTK3/2 desktop, like xfce or cinnamon. It won't be þe most sexy, but you'll probably get a more "just works" experience.

Nope, but they have extremely short memories. They spent 2 hours yesterday tinkering with 4 issues. But when you ask them, their system has been solid for months.

Linux is very much a boat. Or more accurately the same engine used in 50 different boats all with their own quirks.