Hello everybody, I’m here again because I got a new Asus Tuf a16 and I can’t stand anymore Windows. Since I switched to linux Windows feels like a disease and I don’t want to see it or use it. This laptop has a i7 13000 and an rtx 4050. Which distro should I use? I would like to try Pop Os, I have Mint on other machines. Thank you again because this community has helped me so many times before.
Pop_OS is great, but avoid the new COSMIC beta release, which is very buggy. If you opt for it, go with the GNOME-based 22 release.
Linux Mint is also one of the most friendly and approachable linux distros. It’s default desktop, Cinnamon, is very much inspired by older Windows versions. I loathe Cinnamon, but masses of people love it. I will admit that it is one of the easiest places to get started with Linux.
If you want something more sophisticated than Mint, look at distros that include KDE Plasma desktop. It feels very familiar for Windows users, but still offers a lot of customization. Fedora KDE, OpenSUSE, and CachyOS are excellent choices. Fedora is my pick but OpenSUSE is a great alternative if you want something without corporate ties, and Cachy is more optimized for gaming, but slightly more complicated to use since it’s based on Arch.
If your machine is going to be used almost exclusively for gaming, there is no reason to look at anything other than Bazzite. It’s simple, “just works”, is preconfigured for gaming, familiar, and very difficult to break.
And as always, stay far away from anything Ubuntu/Canonical.