Hi all, Relatively long time Linux user (2017 to be precise), and about two 3rds of that time has been on Arch and its derivatives.

Been running Endeavour OS for at least 2.5 years now. It’s a solid distro until it’s not. I’d go for months without a single issue then an update comes out of nowhere and just ruins everything to either no return, or just causes me to chase after a fix for hours, and sometimes days. I’m kinda getting tired of this trend of sudden and uncalled for issues.

It’s like a hammer drops on you without you seeing it. I wish they were smaller issues, no, they’re always major. Most of the time I’d just reinstall, and I hate that. It’s so much work for me.

I set things the way I like them and then they’re ruined, and the hunt begins. I have been wanting to switch for a long time, and I honestly have even been looking into some of those immutable distros (that’s how much I don’t want to be fixing my system.

I’m tired, I just want to use my system to get work done). I was also told that Nobara is really good (is it? Never tried it). My only hold back — and it’s probably silly to some of you— is the AUR. I love it.

It’s the most convenient thing ever, and possibly the main reason why I have stuck with Arch and its kids. Everything is there.

So, what do y’all recommend? I was once told by some kind soul to use an immutable distro and setup “distrobox” on it if I wanted the AUR.

I’ve never tried this “distrobox” thing (I can research it, no problem). I also game here and there and would like to squeeze as much performance as I can out of my PC (all AMD, BTW, and I only play single player games).

So, I don’t know what to do. I need y’all’s suggestions, please. I’ll aggregate all of the suggestions and go through them and (hopefully) come up with something good for my sanity. Please suggest anything you think fits my situation. I don’t care, I will 100% appreciate every single suggestion and look into it.

I’m planning to take it slow on the switch, and do a lot of research before switching. Unless my system shits the bed more than now then I don’t know. I currently can’t upgrade my system, as I wouldn’t be able to log in after the update. It just fails to log in.

I had to restore a 10 days old snapshot to be able to get back into my damn desktop. I have already copied my whole home directory into another drive I have on my PC, so if shit hits the fan, I’ll at least have my data. Help a tired brother out, please <3. Thank you so much in advance.

  • bubbalouie@lemmy.ml
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    20 minutes ago

    I am responding to you as well as n00bs, or the curious, at large. Debian is your answer, or, fedora and suffer gnome. Following is how I do it.

    Debian trixie

    Above link is the net installer, download it, burn it to a USB nub, boot to it - be connected when you run it. Think about whether you want to allow root (I do, certainly) and how you want your partitions formatted. I use ext4 for my / (root) partition with noatime and discard and XFS for /home with noatime. Ridiculously fast with an nvme drive. Hot damn. I have 32GB of ram so I do not create a SWAP partition. I can suspend just fine.

    When you get to package installation and you’re presented with desktop environments, whatnot - uncheck everything (arrow, spacebar) except system utilities near the bottom…continue the installation, grub options will probably be: no, yes, and if you are not dual-booting, no. Continue to reboot

    after reboot…

    You will be in a tty, nothing but black screen and a login prompt, it’s cool. Login as root, install sudo and aptitude (apt install sudo aptitude), following, run visudo. Add your uname below root near the bottom. If you’re the only one using this machine add like this: <your username> ALL=(ALL:ALL) NOPASSWD:ALL ctrl+x to close, y, then enter. logout.

    Log in as your user. I have a script I run now that installs the apps I use on my desktop - I do not use Gnome or KDE or a desktop environment, but, openbox, instead, for a zillion reasons. Productivity, responsiveness and customization to name a few.

    Here is the script:

    #!/bin/bash
    # Check root
    [ "$(id -u)" -ne 0 ] && { echo "Must run as root" 1>&2; exit 1; }
    
    # Install packages
    echo -e "\e[1mInstalling packages...\e[0m"
    [ "$(find /var/cache/apt/pkgcache.bin -mtime 0 2>/dev/null)" ] || apt update  
    apt -y install xorg openbox lxpanel thunar thunar-archive-plugin intel-microcode claws-mail polkitd xinit intel-media-va-driver-non-free
    apt -y install curl feh bat lsd unclutter numlockx wget whois mesa-utils mesa-va-drivers mpg123 alsa-utils ffmpeg bc jq libnotify-bin mc lshw lsof ncal ncdu inxi psmisc s-tui sed cpufetch dfc sysstat tar unzip zip x11-xserver-utils htop apt-utils at preload pwgen usbutils vnstat xpdf oxygencursors gpicview jpegoptim libimage-exiftool-perl
    apt -y install tango-icon-theme keepassxc lxappearance obsession scrot gvfs-backends arandr menu menu-xdg mesa-utils pnmixer bogofilter bleachbit gifsicle
    apt -y install geany geany-plugins claws-mail-bogofilter lynx alacritty claws-mail-fancy-plugin claws-mail-pgpmime claws-mail-tools claws-mail-pgpinline claws-mail-vcalendar-plugin
    apt -y install rsync xscreensaver gpicview xscreensaver-gl xscreensaver-gl-extra fd-find libxml2-utils starship pulseaudio
    apt -y install meld mintstick ips tldr mpv net-tools neverputt gnome-characters mpv gparted bsd-mailx pkexec xclip gsimplecal
    apt -y install hwinfo iftop imagemagick acpi lm-sensors python3-pexpect preload pwgen s-tui sensible-utils catfish iotop pithos
    apt -y install xdg-user-dirs-gtk xdg-utils xdotool unzip usbutils util-linux vym yelp zenity zip silversearcher-ag galternatives 
    apt -y install planner libreoffice libreoffice-gtk3 xfce4-screenshooter smartmontools screenfetch gimp obsidian-icon-theme orage gmrun synaptic yad zim bashtop grc duf
    

    Save it as a file, make it executable (chmod +x) and run as sudo: sudo ./NAME.sh

    When it’s done you’re fabulous. Log in to the emptiness of openbox by issuing: startx at the command line. Right-click and find the menu.

    Now, openbox uses 3 files: autostart, menu.xml, and rc.xml and it gets better from there in your terminal with a functional .bashrc, .bash_functions, and .bash_aliases. You will likely edit ~/.profile as well to include any bin directories

    # set PATH so it includes user's private bin if it exists
    if [ -d "$HOME/bin" ] ; then
        PATH="$HOME/bin:$PATH"
    fi
    
    # set PATH so it includes user's private bin if it exists
    if [ -d "$HOME/.local/bin" ] ; then
        PATH="$HOME/.local/bin:$PATH"
    fi
    
    if [ -d "$HOME/.local/share/scripts" ] ; then
        PATH="$HOME/.local/share/scripts:$PATH"
    fi
    

    Of course I have tweaked-out files replete with functionality and customizations. This is a set it and forget it desktop that will remain bullet-proof on Debian. Nothing is free, esp functionality you want/demand - it’s your box on Linux, you will create it.

    I usually install the liquorix kernel, as well, like this, from a terminal, as a regular user:

    curl -s 'https://liquorix.net/install-liquorix.sh' | sudo bash

    If you do that, reboot after installing. It’s a modified kernel for desktop use, makes things a little faster, easier. I have a game that plays smoother after I install it and boot to it.

    People ask for easy set-and-forget Linux distributions all the time completely ignoring the fact that the OS they are typically coming from, WIndows, is definitely not. It’s a haughty demand, actually, especially when there are a zillion ways to get set-and-forget in Linux.

    Now, the above script will install a wicked desktop, but, you must edit ~/.config/openbox/autostart and put what you want started when you login in there; for example, I use the lxpanel, unclutter, numlockx, and some other stuff, following are some of those entries:

    sh ~/.fehbg &
    unclutter &
    numlockx &
    lxpanel &
    #orage &
    pnmixer &
    #redshift &
    (sleep 4s && ~/bin/fastcompmgr -o 0.4 -r 12 -c -C) &
    (sleep 4s && ~/bin/frank) &
    (sleep 15s && xscreensaver -no-splash) &
    

    In my ~/.config/openbox/rc.xml file I have some handy keybinds:

    <keybind key="A-F2">
       <action name="Execute">
         <command>gmrun</command>
       </action>
     </keybind>
     <keybind key="W-p">
       <action name="Execute">
         <command>planner</command>
       </action>
     </keybind>
     <keybind key="W-e">
       <action name="Execute">
         <command>x-text-editor</command>
       </action>
     </keybind>
     <keybind key="W-f">
       <action name="Execute">
         <command>thunar</command>
       </action>
     </keybind>
    

    IN ~/.config/openbox/menu.xml I have completely customized it and it’s fabulous - you don’t need an app to do this, just open the file…

    Behold, my menu; I get to it by hitting win+z (rc.xml file entry)

    Here is my menu entry for scrot, that I rarely use because the functions are bound to keys in rc.xml:

    <menu id="scrot" label="Scrot" icon="/usr/share/icons/Dracula/apps/scalable/screenie.svg">
          <item label="click and done" icon="/usr/share/icons/Dracula/apps/scalable/screensaver.svg">
    		<action name="Execute">
    		<execute>
    		scrot -q 100 '%Y-%m-%d_$wx$h_%X.jpg' -e 'mv $f ~/scrots/'
    		</execute>
    		</action>
    		</item>
    		<item label="delay 5" icon="/usr/share/icons/Dracula/apps/scalable/shotwell.svg">
    		<action name="Execute">
    		<execute>
    		scrot -q 100  '%Y-%m-%d_$wx$h_%X.jpg' -d 5 -e 'mv $f ~/scrots/'
    		</execute>
    		</action>
    		</item>
    		<item label="Select Area" icon="/usr/share/icons/Dracula/apps/scalable/shutter.svg">
    		<action name="Execute">
    		<execute>
    		scrot -q 100  '%Y-%m-%d_$wx$h_%X.jpg' -s -e 'mv $f ~/scrots/'
    		</execute>
    		</action>
    		</item>
    		<item label="screen with 20% thumb" icon="/usr/share/icons/Dracula/apps/scalable/silicon-32.svg">
    		<action name="Execute">
    		<execute>
    		scrot -q 100  '%Y-%m-%d_$wx$h_%X.jpg' -t 30 -e 'mv $f ~/scrots/'
    		</execute>
    		</action>
    		</item>
    </menu>
    

    That will get you started - there are so may helpful and useless tutorials out there, you will find a good one.

    Additionally, I am a terminal user because it’s fast and beautiful, esp alacritty and kitty. You may customize each, check this out:

    Or, this:

    I get that not everybody likes to use the terminal as much as I do but I would be remiss if I neglected to bring it up, for its amazing functionality. The bash functions and aliases I use are handy and fast bring me wicked function, I even type: wc to get a gorgeous weather report.

    I left a lot out for you to find. Linux is amazing, as most of us know, but it requires you to work with what is available, or, create it yourself. What is available, however, is amazing and will more than fit your needs. As far as folks complaining about specific apps, please. If blender doesn’t do it for that function you need then don’t use blender, find another way, or stick to windows and make the best of it. Or, change your expectations.

    As far as system snapshots, backing up, stuff like that - there are a zillion ways. I keep it simple and rsync my ~ to a USB nub. Fast and reliable and I’m not adding a bunch of supporting nonsense or overhead to my system. I use firefox and install it with another script:

    #! /bin/sh
    sudo install -d -m 0755 /etc/apt/keyrings && wget -q https://packages.mozilla.org/apt/repo-signing-key.gpg -O- | sudo tee /etc/apt/keyrings/packages.mozilla.org.asc > /dev/null && echo "deb [signed-by=/etc/apt/keyrings/packages.mozilla.org.asc] https://packages.mozilla.org/apt mozilla main" | sudo tee -a /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mozilla.list > /dev/null && echo '
    Package: *
    Pin: origin packages.mozilla.org
    Pin-Priority: 1000
    ' | sudo tee /etc/apt/preferences.d/mozilla && sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install firefox
    

    This system can do anything and most of it with keybinds. Most of the apps I use daily can be customized to great affect, as well the desktop. If you want tiling it’s easy enough to install cortile or the like and have at it. Put an entry for it in your autostart file.

    There is a bit more I do like add this to ~/.profile to autostart from startx: [ "$(tty)" = "/dev/tty1" ] && exec startx

    • HereIAm@lemmy.world
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      8 hours ago

      How easy is it to get gaming on Debian (as OP mentioned occasional gaming)? I use Popos myself, so all nvidia drivers and gamemode and such works out the box.

  • JTskulk@lemmy.world
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    18 hours ago

    I’ve had the same issues with Endeavour, sometimes you get buggy software and need to roll back. I do a full system backup once a week and update once or twice a day (I like updating frequently as it makes it obvious which package broke your system). When I get a bad package I just restore from backup but exclude /home. Then from there I install packages one at a time until I find that bad one and then just ignore it for a while. It really hasn’t been too bad. I don’t think you’ll find anything like the AUR if you start distrohopping. Debian is the king of set it and forget it, but it might be a shock to go back older packages of everything.

    • DonutsRMeh@lemmy.worldOP
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      17 hours ago

      Sounds so annoying to do honestly :/
      I’ve just installed Nobara and will give it a whirl for a while and see how it goes.

      • JTskulk@lemmy.world
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        14 hours ago

        It’s the price of bleeding edge :) Hope you find what you’re looking for in Nobara, my dude.

  • mazzilius_marsti@lemmy.world
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    1 day ago

    I have Fedora on my work laptop and vanilla Arch on my tinkering laptop.

    I think instead of thinking about “set it and forget it”, you might want to think about “if shit happens, how fast can I fix it?”. That is because stuff break or there are bugs . If you use a very old and LTS distro, you might be comfortable but there might be bugs that do not get fixed until much later. Eg: Debian’s kernel used to be able to suspend-then-hibernate, then they jump to one that cannot. So if you want that feature back, you need to wait… until Debian catches up with mainline’s fixes.

    So if you only use your computer for web, email, movie. Then any distro will work.

    Now, imo there are 2 types of problems in Linux:

    1. Boot/GRUB/partition problems: this can happen if you’re dual boot, or a config goes wrong. To fix, usually you need to boot a live cd.

    Pop OS would be #1 choice just because it has a “Recovery Partition” with live environment. You can reinstall the entire OS while you’re on the plane, without wifi or any USB.

    Arch would be #2 here, just because the arch iso is so good. It is minimal and has all the tools you need to fix stuff: partitions, wifi…etc. Plus, it boots in tty so it is faster for fixing.

    1. Problems with library mismatch: for this you want one with good snapshots built in. So OpenSUSE or if you know how to configure btrfs, maybe Fedora. I would still go Pop OS here, so you can configure btrfs AND get the recovery from point 1) above. Linux Mint would be #2 choice because they have timeshift built in.

    So the TLDR for you is: pick Pop OS for the recovery partition. Also, use btrfs. Lastly, configure your disk nicely, i.e. dont do any crazy LVM encryption, just use standard layout so when comes the time to fix, it is easier.

    • DonutsRMeh@lemmy.worldOP
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      1 day ago

      It’s now a very strong candidate. I’m just testing cschy os for now, but I’m still leaving heavily towards mint. Do you use it?

      • Asfalttikyntaja@sopuli.xyz
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        1 day ago

        I have used it many years now. Couldn’t be happier. I still have Windows lying on somewhere in the hard drive, but I haven’t booted it for a year or so.

        • DonutsRMeh@lemmy.worldOP
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          1 day ago

          Awesome. Thank you. I’m getting the run around between distros now to see which one works the best. So far Cachy os isn’t as game ready as they claim. I had to install so much shit. Couldn’t even boot into any of the Garuda ISOs that I’ve burned on the flash drive. Was very confused with immutable distros. Tried mint, and it was cool, but didn’t try it for gaming. Man, this is a pain.

          • Asfalttikyntaja@sopuli.xyz
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            13 hours ago

            To be honest, I don’t really do much of playing with my computer. I only have dosbox for old games and then couple of other games from software center, which are made for Linux. So I’m not sure how Mint works with new games.

  • utopiah@lemmy.ml
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    2 days ago

    Another Debian suggestion here, including for gaming and even VR. It basically just works.

  • Avid Amoeba@lemmy.ca
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    2 days ago

    Debian stable. It’s been here for 30 years, it’s the largest community OS, it’ll likely be here in 30 years (or until we destroy ourselves). Any derivative is subject to higher probability of additional issues, stoppage of development in the long run, etc.

    If you’re extra lazy, Ubuntu LTS with Ubuntu Pro (free) enabled. You could use that for 10 years (or until Canonical cancels it) before you need to upgrade. Ubuntu is the least risky alternative for boring operation since it’s used in the enterprise and Canonical is profitable. The risk there is Canonical doing an IPO and Ubuntu going the way of tightening access like Red Hat did.

    • signofzeta@lemmygrad.ml
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      2 days ago

      I’ll second Debian. I run it on backports and it’s reasonably stable, but if you want it rock-solid, don’t do that.

      You might want to keep your browser more up to date than the rest of your OS. That’s up to you as the user. Mozilla has a deb you can add to Apt manually, should you choose.

    • Stefen Auris@pawb.social
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      2 days ago

      I’m in complete agreement with this post. Debian is pretty meticulous with their releases and Ubuntu LTS has a predictable release cadence if that’s more important than “when it’s ready”

      • jacksilver@lemmy.world
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        19 hours ago

        Also, whether you see it as a plus or minus, windows wsl defaults to Ubuntu. So, msoft also seems to be somewhat invested in them long term.

    • AugustWest@lemm.ee
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      2 days ago

      Ubuntu? Never. I have had longer less problem free with Arch than Ubuntu. Last time I tried it for a project it was broken on install.

      I am all for Debian, love it. But Ubuntu has been crappy since day one.

      • Avid Amoeba@lemmy.ca
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        2 days ago

        Interesting. We use it for work since 2016 (high hundreds of workstations) and I’ve used it since 2005 on variety of machines and use cases without significant issues. We’ve also used it to operate a couple of datacenters (OpenStack private clouds) with good results. That said I’ve been using LTS exclusively since 2014 and don’t use PPAs since 2018-20 and it’s been solid. My main machine hasn’t been reinstalled since the initial install in 2014.

        • AugustWest@lemm.ee
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          2 days ago

          Seriously? You have successfully managed to upgrade Ubuntu since 2014? Just to be clear, on desktops?

          So you went through 3 desktop environment changes, systemd changes, snap environment changes, and it all worked? I am shocked.

          Like I said the last time I even tried Ubuntu a default out of then box feature was broken by default.

          And with desktops, it’s always some thing: the snap needs editing and is missing dependencies, a ppa is required, etc. On the server it’s fine but the desktop environment usually requires effort every other update.

          Like I said, even at ububtu 4 I broke it in a week and went back to Debian.

          • Montagge@lemmy.zip
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            2 days ago

            I’ve updated my gaming rig twice with no issue using Ubuntu

            20.04 to 22.04 to 24.04

            • AugustWest@lemm.ee
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              Your experience is very different from mine. I usually have to dig in and fix crap that shouldnt be wrong in ubuntu long before I even get to the upgrade phase! Lots of circular problems: oh this snap doesn’t have the full dependencies. Thats ok, I know how to edit them. Except that didn’t work, so lets add the PPA. But that was out of date, lets build from scratch… and so on.

              Edit: Let me add something: Glad it worked for you. And Ubuntu is Linux, and we have that in common, and I want to make sure this type of discussion is always framed under “SAME TEAM!”

          • Avid Amoeba@lemmy.ca
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            2 days ago

            On desktop, yeah. Unity > GNOME, upstart > systems, snap. I don’t fuck with snap, I just use it as intended, I don’t try to remove it. I think I started actively using it in 2016. As a software developer I understand that only the happy path is reasonably tested so I try not to go too far out of it. 😂

            I typically wait for the LTS point release before upgrading. I check the release notes. I check if anything is broken after the upgrade, fix as needed. I’m sure I’ve done some stuff when the migration to GNOME happened. But that’s to be expected when a major component change occurs. If you had some non-default config or workflow, it might require rework. E.g. some custom PulseAudio config broke on my laptop with the migration to Pipewire in 24.04. But on that legendary desktop install, the only unexpected breakage was during an upgrade when the power went out. Luckily upgrades are just apt operations so I was able to recover and finish the upgrade manually.

            I think a friend is running a 2012 or 2010 install. 🥲

            And I’ve also swapped multiple hardware platforms on this install. 😂 Went AMD > Intel > AMD > more AMD. Swapped SSDs, went single to mirror, increased in size.

            I mean… once you kick the Windows-brain reinstall habit and you learn enough, the automatic instinct upon something unexpected becomes to investigate and fix it. Reinstall is just so much more laborious on a customized machine.

            • AugustWest@lemm.ee
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              2 days ago

              Wow, that is impressive. I have been using Linux full time since around 2003. Have had it on a lot of machines in a variety of flavors. Ubuntu was always the one that did something stupid that I had to figure out to fix, and by stupid I mean Canonical’s choices more than anything else. Your example gives me hope at least.

              I am using an Arch rolling now that was installed about 5 years ago, and it has been far easier to maintain than anything else. Maybe that is because change is incremental, instead of all at once. My laptop has Fedora for a couple of years and that too has been painless. I have not done a single thing except click update on that machine.

              The other desktops/laptops are a variety of Debian, Suse, and Slack just to keep things interesting, but are not used nearly as frequently, so dont get updated as often.

  • ikidd@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    Been using Linux almost 30 years, went from Redhat to everything else, and now I’m back on Redhat to stay. Fedora KDE for a nice, boring, up to date, and bulletproof OS.

    • heythatsprettygood@feddit.uk
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      21 hours ago

      Definitely agree. The KDE spin used to have some quirks and bugs, but have been running it on my laptop as a daily driver for nearly six months with no real issues and it is rock solid reliable. Fedora also has a ton of community and commercial support so pretty much any Linux app will work fine on there.

  • IsoKiero@sopuli.xyz
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    3 days ago

    Debian. I’ve had installations which went trough several major version upgrades, I’ve worked with ‘set and forget’ setups where someone originally installed Debian and I get my hands on it 3-5 years later to upgrade it and it just works. Sure, it might not be as fancy as some alternatives and some things may need manual tweaking here and there, but the thing just works and even on rare occasion something breaks you’ll still have options to fix it assuming you’re comfortable with plain old terminal.

      • superkret@feddit.org
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        2 days ago

        They are the opposite of “set it and forget it”.
        Probably the most maintenance-heavy distros out there.
        They’re like Arch, if the Arch maintainers didn’t care about keeping the system working.

      • IsoKiero@sopuli.xyz
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        2 days ago

        They are excactly what the name implies. Testing is generally pretty good, but it’s still testing. And unstable is also what the name implies. People, myself included back in the day, run both as daily drivers, but if you want rock stable distribution installing unstable revision might not be the best choise.

    • adhocfungus@midwest.social
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      2 days ago

      I can’t speak for the desktop side, but for my server it’s been running without interruption for years. About once per week I do something stupid and use all available memory, but it hasn’t crashed once. It just runs a bit slow until I free up some RAM, then Docker comes back to life once I free up some disk space. I definitely recommend it for anyone who wants a server OS that just works.

  • priapus@sh.itjust.works
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    2 days ago

    One of ublue’s offerings are probably best. Immutability is great for resiliency and updates are easily rolled back if something were to go wrong. Bazzite is great for gaming, otherwise checkout Aurora and Bluefin.

    • DonutsRMeh@lemmy.worldOP
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      1 day ago

      I installed aurora and distrobox got me a bit confused, so it is now on the back burner until I read more about it.

      • priapus@sh.itjust.works
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        1 day ago

        You probably won’t need distrobox much unless you’re a dev. Most packages will be available as a flatpak or in homebrew. You could also consider using Nix, which will most likely have every package you’d want.

          • priapus@sh.itjust.works
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            20 hours ago

            It should work fine, but you might have to manually install the udev rules after creating them in distrobox. Is there something you need that can’t be accomplished with systemd.mount or editing /etc/fstab?

            Bazzite docs also recommend this tool - media-automount-generator - which seems to accomplish a similar thing.y

  • Communist@lemmy.frozeninferno.xyz
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    2 days ago

    You want bazzite, for this usecase, disregard anyone who suggests something that isn’t immutable, all of the immutable suggestions are valid, but if it’s not immutable, it is huge downgrade for this usecase.

    • DonutsRMeh@lemmy.worldOP
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      1 day ago

      I’m leaning towards an immutable, but to be fully honest, they’re a very, very new thing to me and understand nothing about them. Like when you give an idiot a grenade. That’s me with an immutable distros. Lol
      I need to learn more about them and how things work, because they do sound like what I’m looking for.

      • Communist@lemmy.frozeninferno.xyz
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        23 hours ago

        with bazzite it’s just regular fedora essentially except substitute the normal rpm commands for rpm-ostree and you’re essentially golden

        • DonutsRMeh@lemmy.worldOP
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          21 hours ago

          So, when you install things with rpm-ostree, will whatever I install stick, or will it be overridden whenever the system updates?

          • Communist@lemmy.frozeninferno.xyz
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            20 hours ago

            It’ll stick, but you’re really meant to use flathub/flatpak to install things wherever possible, rpm-ostree is kindof a backup method.

            • DonutsRMeh@lemmy.worldOP
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              19 hours ago

              I get that, but sometimes I need dependcies or packages that I can’t get as flatpaks. Like today, I wanted to install a driver (or whatever it is) that’s called “ntfs-automount” and it needs to be built from source with

              sudo make install
              

              And that I couldn’t do on an immutable distro. And it is not available anywhere except the AUR and GitHub.

                • DonutsRMeh@lemmy.worldOP
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                  17 hours ago

                  Awesome and good to know. I’m actually experimenting with distros to see where this takes me. I’m currently running Nobara with snapshots set up in grub. It also has other kernels entries in grub after big updates so you can roll back if things break.

  • Silent John@lemmy.ml
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    2 days ago

    Basically every distro is based on either arch or debian (some exceptions). I’ve been perfectly happy with debian, even as a gamer.

    • DonutsRMeh@lemmy.worldOP
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      2 days ago

      Debian stable? You don’t have issues since it has older packages? All of your hardware works just fine?

      • Spider89@lemm.ee
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        2 days ago

        If you want stability, Debian Stable is the way to go (Servers, mission critical tasks). Even Debian Sid works great on my Legion Go.

        I recommend Testing or Sid for desktops.

      • Silent John@lemmy.ml
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        2 days ago

        Stable yea. My PC is a bit older (7 years) and I’ve never had any issues with hardware, even with my nvidia card.