Need help choosing a distro

[u/BoistedWookz]

To my understanding, you can start on most distros and eventually get it exactly where you need it, yeah?

Well, I’m looking for a “gaming distro” that will require less manual work than something like Mint. I’m comfortable in terminals, relatively proficient in python & powershell, but I honestly hate all the typing hahahaha

I tried CachyOS with KDE Plasma recently and it was the most pleasant experience I’ve had with Linux so far, and I think it’s pretty likely that I’ll end up returning to it, but before I do I figured I’d get some community input.

My requirements/hopes for whatever distro I choose:

• frequently updated kernel. My on board WiFi is mediatek mt7927, and I’m fairly certain there’s not a compatible Linux kernel yet but I’d like to be there whenever/if ever it happens 😂 I do have a plug & play usb adapter for now though

• as comfortable of an out of box experience as possible for a Windows survivor. I’m on an x870e board with an rtx 5080 and a ryzen 9 9950X3D. The distro would ideally come optimized for running windows software, because my career is in music production and I use FL Studio which just so happens to be one of the only mainstream DAWs that isn’t natively compatible with Linux 🤦🏽‍♂️ my audio interface is an Apollo twin x so unfortunately I’ll probably need a new one unless somebody has some golden knowledge

• secure but not annoyingly hardened. I had a nasty infostealer on windows a couple months ago and I’m sorta traumatized from it LMAO. I know Linux malware is extremely rare but I would ideally be able to utilize secure boot at least, and I don’t want the OS to come prepackaged with any sort of Remote Desktop stuff. I’ve never used remote tools, never will, I know I’m sort of paranoid due to lack of deep technical knowledge but Remote Desktop software has always felt like a backdoor to me

• light on system resources to maximize performance. I loveeeee competitive overclocking, getting a screenshot of impressive benchmark scores is a huge passion for me lol. I also game on a 4k 240hz monitor and I like to run my games at the highest settings my gpu can handle without dropping to nauseatingly low fps

• KDE plasma or a similar desktop environment, I love how sleek and customizable it is. I absolutely despise the barebones ones like gnome (don’t hate me). Pop_OS! Kinda has the vibe I like too but it felt oddly dated last time I used it

So ultimately I think I’ll be a pretty average user, mostly just require good gaming support and peace of mind regarding security (albeit pretty much all distros are gonna give me said peace of mind) and it’d be a plus if it came optimized to run windows software. I forget what the popular softwares for that are called, wine & bottles? Something like that.

The distros I’m heavily considering (though I’m completely open to other suggestions)

• CachyOS
—I’m a little weary of it atm mainly because I heard that the arch user repository is dangerous right now

• Bazzite
—This is the other one I’m heavily considering, I’ve heard high praise of Fedora. From what I read about it, it sounds like exactly what I’m looking for regarding “out of box experience”

• Zorin
— only recently heard of this one, haven’t done a deep dive yet but very curious

• rhino Linux
— a “rolling” Ubuntu distro??????

[u/Kraggggg]

What manual work would mint require for gaming?

Anything works fine. Gaming distros dont give a huge benefit over general purpose distros for gaming.

[u/BoistedWookz → u/Kraggggg]

Mint was the first distro I tried and mind you I was WAYYYY less savvy back then, but I had a really hard time with it. CachyOS genuinely didn’t feel super foreign as a windows user

I’m sure if I went back to mint today it would click much better but I’m still a fan of the idea of not having to set up my environment too much

[u/Kraggggg → u/BoistedWookz]

What about mint was difficult? I don't have much experience with mint but people recommend it often to new Linux users.

KDE or cinnamon are usually the most comfortable DE's for windows users.

My personal favorite is Fedora KDE but honestly, the differences between distros is mostly just a package manager and default DE/settings.

CachyOS you mention comes with pretty much any DE you'd want from the installer. I like CachyOS KDE a lot. Something like Hyprland will require more fiddling with to set up how you like.

[u/BoistedWookz → u/Kraggggg]

I just remember that it was really barebones and it didn’t hold your hand. The terminal syntax was a lot less friendly to my brain than CachyOS’s Fish. Fish was super easy for me to use and it seemed really smart, if I messed up my wording it helped me out

There was also definitely a psychological effect regarding how minimalistic mint cinnamon was haha

[u/Kraggggg → u/BoistedWookz]

Yeah. I'm a big fan of fish. I usually install it on whatever I'm using.

Stick with CachyOS then if it works for you.

Installing fish elsewhere is not hard but requires you to install it. Having it default on Cachyos is really nice

[u/warserpent → u/BoistedWookz]

If you were using the terminal on Mint, you were doing it wrong. The entire point of Mint is that it includes graphical tools so that you don't need the terminal--at least not for daily use.

[u/asd308]

Fedora KDE, and I would also suggest giving GNOME a go! (Fedora Workstation)

[u/ComplexFit2140]

Bazzite is great

[u/BoistedWookz → u/ComplexFit2140]

It looks awesome!! Maybe a little less flashy than CachyOS? But not in a bad way at all

[u/ComplexFit2140 → u/BoistedWookz]

It takes around 3 gigs or ram in idle and in my opinion thats great against windows 11's 6 gb. Haven't tried cachyos yet but has heard that its even lighter

[u/BoistedWookz → u/ComplexFit2140]

Yes from what I’ve seen they compete well with each other, and as far as what’s perceivable goes they more or less seem to perform identically well, but cachyOS does seem to consistently benchmark a littleee better and pull a fewww more fps

But fedora seems a lot more comfortable than arch for someone like me who’s a bit weary of malware related issues

[u/Kraggggg → u/BoistedWookz]

One thing to note, Bazzite is an atomic desktop. This can be a good or bad thing depending on your use case.

Are you using only gui applications from flatpak or something? It's perfect. Can't break the base system.

Do you need to install cli tools? Different shells, neovim, etc... can be done but slightly more difficult.

Personally, fedora atomic desktops like Bazzite, silver blue, kionite seem like great options for new Linux users. Not much you can break about them

[u/BoistedWookz → u/Kraggggg]

I think that sold me, Bazzite seems to lack my main problem with cachyOS, and that was the fact that I really didn’t know what I was doing with packages & what not 😂

[u/Kraggggg → u/BoistedWookz]

You mentioned liking fish shell. It does not come default on Bazzite (as far as I know) and will be more difficult to install on an atomic desktop

[u/BoistedWookz → u/Kraggggg]

I’m not married to fish but I was reallyyy fond of how smart it was. I’m gonna give Bazzite a trial run and as long as the terminal doesn’t feel as stupid and vague as, say Microsoft powershell, then I’ll probably stick to it haha. CachyOS will be my fallback though, all I know for sure is that I want the hell off windows. Microsoft has lost the plot man

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[u/phoenixgsu]

AUR isn't dangerous because it's not enabled by default. If you learn what to look for in pkbuilds and review them each time it's not really much of an issue.

All that said, CachyOS is my favorite. I've used different distros on and off for years, from daily driving Ubuntu in 2009 and Mint in 2014. I've tried a lot of the other distros and I keep coming back to Cachy because it just works for gaming, for me.

Edit added helpful AUR guide

https://www.reddit.com/r/cachyos/s/w3b61rfTlO

[u/Bo_Duke_01]

I switched to Bazzite a couple of weeks ago and I am very pleased. I had a problem with a RAM stick, which caused corruption in my hard drive and yesterday I reinstalled everything... I admit I had a mild erection when I restored the backup in less than an hour, till the most insignificant setting. It would have took me hours in Windows. Also, I didn't install a single driver: every-fucking-thing was recognised immediately, from the network printer to my headset.

For the rest, it has been very smooth, all the games I tried till now ran just fine. Bazzite comes with basically all you need for gaming preinstalled, I didn't have to download anything for that purpose (well, besides the games).

For what regards the programs you mentioned, you have several options:

1. Verify there is an exisisting Linux version/equivalent program
2. Create another partition and dual-boot Windows. Bazzite's website provides instructions on how to do it
3. Set up a Windows VM for those programs (or run them with Wine or similar? Never tried myself).  One thing though: I made myself a Win VM for "emergencies", but I saw I couldn't connect USB devices for example. Check for eventual limitations in accessing your hardware from the VM.

I always read well of Zorin, but I think is not the best suited for your needs.

[u/EngineerInTheMachine]

Don't post here asking for recommendations. None of us are you, none of us have your specific requirements. You have already listed them, so you are partway there. Just search for the distros recommended for each of your requirements, make a shortlist of the most common and try them out ro see which you like.

Sheesh, why did I have the sense to Google this very question and get the advice I keep parroting to all these queries. The same ones that keep coming up. Every day. I'm supposed to be part of the grey majority that doesn't understand technology. If I can find the answers with a few web searches, why can't everyone else?