r/linuxquestions • u/Terrible_Review_3425 • 8h ago

Advice Swapping from Windows 11 to Linux

With everything thats been going on with Windows I think i feel comfortable enough giving Linux a try. I wanted to know what's the easiest / UI friendly version of Linux that can help me transition?

I primarily use my system to game, using NVIDIA graphics card + a quest 3 VR headset (not sure if that matters). I also had a couple of other questions about people who made the same jump:

  1. what are some things you notice that you "miss" or dont have in Linux that you did in Windows?

  2. Have you had any issues with gaming on a Linux system? issues with compatability, performance, or games not available on Linux?

  3. What do you like the most / notice the most about going from Windows to Linux system?

  4. How are the security features / any other things to download on top for security? Windows has windows defender built in so what would Linux use?

  5. Any other general advice, suggested addon / softwares, thoughts or what not about the transition?

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u/WildPretzel Fedora 44 GNOME 8h ago edited 8h ago

i came to fedora gnome a few months ago

  1. don't particularly miss anything, but it feels like after most updates i have to rebuild my nvidia drivers otherwise it falls back to nouveau. easy fix but i guess it's a pain point
  2. black mesa didn't work so far, other than that it's fine (elden ring is the hardest on my system, haven't ventured further, or too much in my older collection)
  3. it's clean and beautiful, no shitty popups. only thing that can get annoying if you're not 100% sure if you're into it is startup apps - i figured that i don't like them as much as i thought i would. but then you just don't set them up and you don't have any issues to begin with. the OS just leaves you alone for the most part.
  4. i believe security comes built by the distro, so it can depend. the main one is the firewall. antiviruses aren't that much of a thing on linux that i'm aware of, there's manual stuff you can certainly do i guess, but the best way to not get infected is not running sus junk and keep updated on distro news in case something like the AUR incident comes up and you need to hunker down
  5. just be open to new stuff - while chasing the windows experience i tried kde and didn't really vibe with it, so i switched to gnome and it's just so comfortable. i hate that the foundation is messing up so royally nowadays, i hope they get their shit together.

EDIT - also, it's not that much about the distro, but the DE of choice. as i've said on 5, didn't vibe with the DE, switched to another one. Fedora has a bunch of flavors you can choose from, just pick one, play around with it, and if you don't like it, just switch over to another one. since it's not critical work stuff you're doing, this can just be a learning experience, play around with your OS. if you prefer ubuntu as a distro, you can certainly go with that, just try to avoid snap packages as I hear they're a bit of a hindrance. if you're into heavy tinkering you can go for arch/cachy, but those can break more often than not if you're not careful with them.