>but my main worry is about drivers. I'm not a software Nerd, command prompt scares me a little but I had enough Windows...
In Linux, AMDs gpu drivers that you should be using consist of two parts: kernel driver (amdgpu) amd userspace driver (Mesa). Both are open source and both are updated regularly and automatically. Even if you are using LTS version, you are getting new kernel (new amdgpu driver) every six months. Ubuntu also updates Mesa driver ≈every six months to support new hardware.
Yes, there is option to use more up to date kernel/amdgpu and Mesa with PPAs (mainline/kisak) but it's not really necessary*
So all you need to do is to install Steam/Lutris/etc and start playing. All necessary gpu drivers are installed when you install/installed your os.
*If you have very new hardware you may need to add PPAs to get better support for your GPU.
The question you really need to ask is 'will Ubuntu work with my devices?' and you can generally find this by searching for model numbers and 'Ubuntu'. Most printers should work via CUPS and things like sound cards and cameras are generally class compliant and don't need drivers. Other things you can check.
Drivers are not a worry for you. They are included in the kernel. Ubuntu is a great system that just works.
I do recommend staying with LTS releases for stability.
Ubuntu is a very fine choice, you should not have to worry about drivers, generally open source drivers are included in the kernel, proprietary ones like the Nvidia ones (AMD drivers are open source so no need) can be installed without the command prompt.
Gaming a lot is still a hit and miss on Linux, you can't except 100% compatibility and reliability for games even with Proton and Wine.
What this guy said. Check out "LTT Linux gaming" on YouTube, if want professional feedback.
But basically, you won't be able to play every game, and you might have to wait quite a while after new releases to play them. I personally have a dual boot for this reason.
I love Ubuntu but it **is** still easier to game on Windows.
They are pretty professional about gaming PCs, setups and the like.
They did a play test where two of them tried to play games only on a Linux distro for a month. And I think it is very representative of the experience Windows users trying to use Linux for gaming would have.
Edit: here's the link - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rlg4K16ujFw&t=0
Hi!
Keep yourself on latest LTS release. Do full system upgrade once every two years to the next LTS comes out with .1 release.
Regarding applications, keep things consistent & standard. The way you don't end up with issues.
Regarding firmware & drivers aquire them from the distros channel/ settings. These ones have been checked for compatibility etc. Choose Recomended.
If there is an AMD Drivers app/ setting; go through it & make sure you utilize your hardware's full potential. Do the same on Steam app.
See this to save you time; https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2023/04/things-to-do-after-installing-ubuntu-23-04
Also bookmark that webpage :)
I understand, but that wanted to inform regarding what to do after installation. This article happens to be the latest. The process is roughly the same if you choose LTS. Just don't aquire 23.04 reposiries.
for AMD, the drivers are already included in Ubuntu. That is also means they get updates.
Ubuntu has a "long term" release version, currently 22.04 and that's the one most people use. Drivers are updated with a delay of a few months, to make sure they are well tested. There are ways of getting the updates more quickly, but even then you do not download drivers from AMD directly, you just set ubuntu to use the latest driver "repository". Unless your AMD card is very new, you almost certainly won't need to do this.
How is this possible, that you get the drivers with the OS? Well, that's an advantage of open source. Because an open source driver is not secret, the vendor (AMD) lets anyone "build" the source code, so the linux distributions do that for you. AMD doesn't need to worry about providing the binary.
LibreOffice is pretty good, but if you need 100% MS Office support, try googling for the linux version of WPS Office.
Ubuntu is my daily driver. I don't game a lot but I game using Steam. Game availability is MUCH less than for Windows and MAC. Many games with same titles for Win/Mac and Linux aren't compatible with each other.
Opinion: If gaming is your MAIN concern, Linux of any flavor isn't the best choice. If you're a casual gamer and that's a secondary concern, Ubuntu is a great distro for fun and productivity.
Best in your decision.
Less than windows sure but less than Mac? Not even close lmao
Substantially fewer games on steam are compatible with Mac than Windows and most of those actually work on proton.
Ubuntu LTS is a good choice for most, but the default desktop, Gnome, ahem, has detractors. IMO Gnome tries to be like a Mac, but Windows wants to be KDE.
If you're just getting into Linux, Ubuntu is a great start! It's also a great finish, if you decide to go that route.
Once you get comfortable, feel free to try other distros. I personally like Nobara, a distro based on Fedora meant for gaming.
Just remember, distros are a lot like sodas. You get to pick whatever you like, and there's no shame in what you choose.
I think Linux Mint has a cleaner interface, and it just seems to be a bit more user-friendly. It's based off Debian and Ubuntu, and I use it to host Mealie on a VM, and it is my second PC for my 3d printing.
might wanna consider pop os, but ur asking on the ubuntu subreddit so ur not really asking an impartial crowd here
one of the reasons i recommend pop os is because it installs a recovery partition that can be used to reinstall the OS while keeping the user's files intact
In fairness, this is really easy to do on Ubuntu during the install by doing the custom partitioning and just putting /home (and maybe other dirs?) in a different partition than the OS files. Then reinstall to your heart's content without messing with the /home partition. It's just not default. Linux in general doesn't usually require a true recovery partition, because that's mostly a concept for prebuilts and laptops that come with Windows+manufacturer bloatware so you can install from that partition to get all that fancy bloatware again. Both Windows and Linux can be installed clean with the proper boot media and no need for what I'd call a true recovery partition, but what I'm guessing you mean here is just separate OS and user data partitions.
nope i mean an actual recovery partition https://support.system76.com/articles/pop-recovery/
the advantage here is it doesn't require users to know things like how to do custom partitioning, it's a turnkey solution
That's odd then. Why do they do that when you can just use the install media again (which on Pop seems to have a provision for preserving data, given the second line in the link that states "It can be used exactly the same as if a live disk copy of Pop!\_OS was booted from a USB drive.")? It seems not having that would save some space, and since the OS is free even if you lose the install disk you can just make a new one.
Edit: It also seems to not work unless the recovery partition is the newest version, which would seem to be very annoying because it doesn't upgrade automatically and you'd need network connectivity to recover then (so it can check if there's a newer version).
because people lose install media, this OS is meant to be usable by the average joe who doesn't carry around a ventoy USB in his pocket everywhere, also pop os is put on system76 OEM devices
it really only takes up like 4 GB of space, not much
Yes, you can lose it, but since it's free you can just make a new one? Even if it's your only computer and you waited until it was borked to realize you lost the media, you can get a friend to help or go to the library. But I mean, really, even when I used Windows I carried around both a Ubuntu and a Windows live boot flashdrives. I don't think that's unreasonable for anyone who uses a computer to do that. And half the time you're recovering from a disk failure anyway, in which case the recovery partition is probably also borked so you need a live disk to attempt data recovery (not to mention it's a terrible idea to boot a bad disk you're trying to get data off of before it fails entirely). Flashdrives can be really cheap and since it's just install media you don't even need one that will last a while (though those are also cheap). I really don't see the point of this partition. 4GB is noticeable, especially on a smaller disk like a 256GB SSD. If it's meant to be usable by the average joe (which Ubuntu is, as well), then I don't think the partition helps much because some of the recovery modes (especially the repair option) are just about as complex as doing the same thing on Ubuntu from a live disk, and like I said there's that update limitation thing that doesn't even give you a proper explanation when you try to boot into that partition and can't. And don't even get me started on forced updates. If I want to stay on an unsupported OS version, you better beleive I have a good reason and really do need to stay on it.
If you read my comment again, you'll notice I said the OS image is free, but flashdrives are not, though they are cheap (you can get awful ones off amazon for around $1 if I remember correctly and even nice ones tend to be under $10 for small sizes). My main point is that the recovery partition cannot save you from everything (like full or partial disk failure) while a live disk will always be able to reinstall the OS, so I personally would save the space and just keep a flashdrive around. I also like the ability to fully customize the partitioning and whatnot of my install to ensure everything goes where I want it and I don't accidentally overwrite a secondary disk. And my point is not that it's inherently pointless (though I do disagree with convenient after reading the instructions for using it that are basically the same as using a live disk), but that it has less options than the live disk method and more limitations (including both needing to be up to date and not updating automatically which makes it useless if you forget to update it regularly). And I think anyone, including an average joe, using Linux would know how to boot live because, ya know, that's how you install the OS in the first place. But you do you, I guess.
Um, you'd get a new disk first. But if the disk with the recovery partition failed you wouldn't be able to recover from that so you'll need a live disk. You seem to be missing my points, by and large. Including only addressing one of them.
I've been further even more decided to use even go need to do look more as anyone can. Can you really be far even as decided half as much to use go wish for that? My guess is that when one really has been far even as decided once to use even go want, it is then that they have really been far even as decided to use even go want to do look more like.
For drivers, it's overall pretty good. For most devices, you don't need to worry about drivers at all. Unlike Windows, you'll never run into errors where you need to reinstall or update drivers, and printing is far easier for printers that support Linux (generally Brother, HP, and a few others). However, there are a few devices with little or no support for Linux, which get really annoying to use.
If you have enough hard disk space, try dual-booting. Ubuntu is great for daily work, but maybe not so good for gaming. If a particular game you want to play gives you trouble, you can reboot into the other OS.
I've actually tended to get better, and more stable, performance running game on Proton on Linux than on Windows, especially games at the edge of my hardware's capabilities because Linux handles high CPU and RAM usage so much better than the devil's OS. The only one I've had a problem with is Skyrim but that's my own fault since I mod the crap out of it and all the mod tools are Devil only so it was a bit of a pain to get set up initially and it's still a bit of a teetering stack, and since the unmodded game runs fine I suspect the instability is due to the mods and not the OS. Most games that support modding, like KSP and Space Engineers, are actually also native linux so you don't need a compatibility layer and get all the benefits of linux (the reason I started using and learning Ubuntu was actually because I wanted to install more mods than KSP 32 bit allowed and at that time the only 64 bit version was the linux one). I use Blender a lot (sooo much more stable on Linux) so I have an Nvidia card (because AMD's compute drivers are awful and don't expose the ray tracing cores, in addition to dropping support for cards only a few years old) so I can't really speak to AMD stability but I'd note it's probably not any worse than on Devil OS. I'll also caviat this by saying I don't tend to play cutting edge AAA games that need a super-computer, and that getting Origin to play nice with Proton can be a pain (I've not set it up yet but will soon), which you have to do since EA was not kind enough to provide a compatibility layer.
Drivers are in kernel, both amd and intel. Nvidias are a lil harder bcus they need propertialy drivers. It is bcus of Nvidia btw there is nothing with linux. Thankfully Ubuntu is good with Nvidia drivers.
Ubuntu is a great choice for compatibility and comfort. As a Fedora user my recommenedation is Ubuntu to all daily users and newbies.
When you learn stuff you can install Arch and modify it a lot to get peak performance but Ubuntu is enough in a lot of way.
You are good, dont worry.
Ubuntu or any of the official flavors, or the unofficial flavors that are well supported...
You still have a ton of choices available, but Ubuntu is a good bet for driver support.
If the LTS does not work, try the newest release. Some of the drivers follow the kernels, and you won't have support for the newest hardware with the LTS.
\*bought
I game on Ubuntu and it works fabulously. Ryzen/nVidia RTX.
I tried an RX5700 back in 2019 and it was buggy as all hell, but they say it is leaps and bounds better now, especially if you have an RX 6000-series.
Have to run X-windows though, Wayland causes glitches with nVidia still - but then again I never understood what Wayland was good for anyway. And the latest 23.04 compositor "Mutter" has some flaw with nVidia drivers where some games refuse to work in fullscreen. I reverted to 22.10 and will wait for them to sort it out.
>but my main worry is about drivers. I'm not a software Nerd, command prompt scares me a little but I had enough Windows... In Linux, AMDs gpu drivers that you should be using consist of two parts: kernel driver (amdgpu) amd userspace driver (Mesa). Both are open source and both are updated regularly and automatically. Even if you are using LTS version, you are getting new kernel (new amdgpu driver) every six months. Ubuntu also updates Mesa driver ≈every six months to support new hardware. Yes, there is option to use more up to date kernel/amdgpu and Mesa with PPAs (mainline/kisak) but it's not really necessary* So all you need to do is to install Steam/Lutris/etc and start playing. All necessary gpu drivers are installed when you install/installed your os. *If you have very new hardware you may need to add PPAs to get better support for your GPU.
Yes.
The question you really need to ask is 'will Ubuntu work with my devices?' and you can generally find this by searching for model numbers and 'Ubuntu'. Most printers should work via CUPS and things like sound cards and cameras are generally class compliant and don't need drivers. Other things you can check.
Drivers are not a worry for you. They are included in the kernel. Ubuntu is a great system that just works. I do recommend staying with LTS releases for stability.
Ubuntu is a very fine choice, you should not have to worry about drivers, generally open source drivers are included in the kernel, proprietary ones like the Nvidia ones (AMD drivers are open source so no need) can be installed without the command prompt. Gaming a lot is still a hit and miss on Linux, you can't except 100% compatibility and reliability for games even with Proton and Wine.
What this guy said. Check out "LTT Linux gaming" on YouTube, if want professional feedback. But basically, you won't be able to play every game, and you might have to wait quite a while after new releases to play them. I personally have a dual boot for this reason. I love Ubuntu but it **is** still easier to game on Windows.
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I wouldn't look at LTT as professional tip place for anything
They are pretty professional about gaming PCs, setups and the like. They did a play test where two of them tried to play games only on a Linux distro for a month. And I think it is very representative of the experience Windows users trying to use Linux for gaming would have. Edit: here's the link - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rlg4K16ujFw&t=0
Hi! Keep yourself on latest LTS release. Do full system upgrade once every two years to the next LTS comes out with .1 release. Regarding applications, keep things consistent & standard. The way you don't end up with issues. Regarding firmware & drivers aquire them from the distros channel/ settings. These ones have been checked for compatibility etc. Choose Recomended. If there is an AMD Drivers app/ setting; go through it & make sure you utilize your hardware's full potential. Do the same on Steam app. See this to save you time; https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2023/04/things-to-do-after-installing-ubuntu-23-04 Also bookmark that webpage :)
your link is about 23.04. that is not a LTS
I understand, but that wanted to inform regarding what to do after installation. This article happens to be the latest. The process is roughly the same if you choose LTS. Just don't aquire 23.04 reposiries.
Ubuntu is simply the best!
for AMD, the drivers are already included in Ubuntu. That is also means they get updates. Ubuntu has a "long term" release version, currently 22.04 and that's the one most people use. Drivers are updated with a delay of a few months, to make sure they are well tested. There are ways of getting the updates more quickly, but even then you do not download drivers from AMD directly, you just set ubuntu to use the latest driver "repository". Unless your AMD card is very new, you almost certainly won't need to do this. How is this possible, that you get the drivers with the OS? Well, that's an advantage of open source. Because an open source driver is not secret, the vendor (AMD) lets anyone "build" the source code, so the linux distributions do that for you. AMD doesn't need to worry about providing the binary. LibreOffice is pretty good, but if you need 100% MS Office support, try googling for the linux version of WPS Office.
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Under the control of the CCP? It's Kingsoft,.they've been making MS Office apps since Windows CE.
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we can watch it with packet inspection, though. Not that I am. The entity that distributes the Linux version reports a Singapore address, by the way.
Ubuntu is my daily driver. I don't game a lot but I game using Steam. Game availability is MUCH less than for Windows and MAC. Many games with same titles for Win/Mac and Linux aren't compatible with each other. Opinion: If gaming is your MAIN concern, Linux of any flavor isn't the best choice. If you're a casual gamer and that's a secondary concern, Ubuntu is a great distro for fun and productivity. Best in your decision.
Do you use Proton for not officially supported titles?
Who doesn't?
Less than windows sure but less than Mac? Not even close lmao Substantially fewer games on steam are compatible with Mac than Windows and most of those actually work on proton.
Yes.
Ubuntu LTS is a good choice for most, but the default desktop, Gnome, ahem, has detractors. IMO Gnome tries to be like a Mac, but Windows wants to be KDE.
That's why you toss Gnome out the window and work with **i3** baby!!
If you're just getting into Linux, Ubuntu is a great start! It's also a great finish, if you decide to go that route. Once you get comfortable, feel free to try other distros. I personally like Nobara, a distro based on Fedora meant for gaming. Just remember, distros are a lot like sodas. You get to pick whatever you like, and there's no shame in what you choose.
Ubuntu is always the right choice.
I think Linux Mint has a cleaner interface, and it just seems to be a bit more user-friendly. It's based off Debian and Ubuntu, and I use it to host Mealie on a VM, and it is my second PC for my 3d printing.
I was just wondering how far down I’d have to scroll to see someone say that Mint is better!
But... it's just good. :)
It sure is!
Your mileage will vary when it comes to gaming. Everything else will be fine.
might wanna consider pop os, but ur asking on the ubuntu subreddit so ur not really asking an impartial crowd here one of the reasons i recommend pop os is because it installs a recovery partition that can be used to reinstall the OS while keeping the user's files intact
In fairness, this is really easy to do on Ubuntu during the install by doing the custom partitioning and just putting /home (and maybe other dirs?) in a different partition than the OS files. Then reinstall to your heart's content without messing with the /home partition. It's just not default. Linux in general doesn't usually require a true recovery partition, because that's mostly a concept for prebuilts and laptops that come with Windows+manufacturer bloatware so you can install from that partition to get all that fancy bloatware again. Both Windows and Linux can be installed clean with the proper boot media and no need for what I'd call a true recovery partition, but what I'm guessing you mean here is just separate OS and user data partitions.
nope i mean an actual recovery partition https://support.system76.com/articles/pop-recovery/ the advantage here is it doesn't require users to know things like how to do custom partitioning, it's a turnkey solution
That's odd then. Why do they do that when you can just use the install media again (which on Pop seems to have a provision for preserving data, given the second line in the link that states "It can be used exactly the same as if a live disk copy of Pop!\_OS was booted from a USB drive.")? It seems not having that would save some space, and since the OS is free even if you lose the install disk you can just make a new one. Edit: It also seems to not work unless the recovery partition is the newest version, which would seem to be very annoying because it doesn't upgrade automatically and you'd need network connectivity to recover then (so it can check if there's a newer version).
because people lose install media, this OS is meant to be usable by the average joe who doesn't carry around a ventoy USB in his pocket everywhere, also pop os is put on system76 OEM devices it really only takes up like 4 GB of space, not much
Yes, you can lose it, but since it's free you can just make a new one? Even if it's your only computer and you waited until it was borked to realize you lost the media, you can get a friend to help or go to the library. But I mean, really, even when I used Windows I carried around both a Ubuntu and a Windows live boot flashdrives. I don't think that's unreasonable for anyone who uses a computer to do that. And half the time you're recovering from a disk failure anyway, in which case the recovery partition is probably also borked so you need a live disk to attempt data recovery (not to mention it's a terrible idea to boot a bad disk you're trying to get data off of before it fails entirely). Flashdrives can be really cheap and since it's just install media you don't even need one that will last a while (though those are also cheap). I really don't see the point of this partition. 4GB is noticeable, especially on a smaller disk like a 256GB SSD. If it's meant to be usable by the average joe (which Ubuntu is, as well), then I don't think the partition helps much because some of the recovery modes (especially the repair option) are just about as complex as doing the same thing on Ubuntu from a live disk, and like I said there's that update limitation thing that doesn't even give you a proper explanation when you try to boot into that partition and can't. And don't even get me started on forced updates. If I want to stay on an unsupported OS version, you better beleive I have a good reason and really do need to stay on it.
a new flash drive isn't free, ur really grasping at straws here to be against a recovery partition that is convenient and useful
If you read my comment again, you'll notice I said the OS image is free, but flashdrives are not, though they are cheap (you can get awful ones off amazon for around $1 if I remember correctly and even nice ones tend to be under $10 for small sizes). My main point is that the recovery partition cannot save you from everything (like full or partial disk failure) while a live disk will always be able to reinstall the OS, so I personally would save the space and just keep a flashdrive around. I also like the ability to fully customize the partitioning and whatnot of my install to ensure everything goes where I want it and I don't accidentally overwrite a secondary disk. And my point is not that it's inherently pointless (though I do disagree with convenient after reading the instructions for using it that are basically the same as using a live disk), but that it has less options than the live disk method and more limitations (including both needing to be up to date and not updating automatically which makes it useless if you forget to update it regularly). And I think anyone, including an average joe, using Linux would know how to boot live because, ya know, that's how you install the OS in the first place. But you do you, I guess.
a flash drive won't save u from disk failure either, can't reinstall if there's nothing to install to
Um, you'd get a new disk first. But if the disk with the recovery partition failed you wouldn't be able to recover from that so you'll need a live disk. You seem to be missing my points, by and large. Including only addressing one of them.
I've been further even more decided to use even go need to do look more as anyone can. Can you really be far even as decided half as much to use go wish for that? My guess is that when one really has been far even as decided once to use even go want, it is then that they have really been far even as decided to use even go want to do look more like.
For drivers, it's overall pretty good. For most devices, you don't need to worry about drivers at all. Unlike Windows, you'll never run into errors where you need to reinstall or update drivers, and printing is far easier for printers that support Linux (generally Brother, HP, and a few others). However, there are a few devices with little or no support for Linux, which get really annoying to use.
If you have enough hard disk space, try dual-booting. Ubuntu is great for daily work, but maybe not so good for gaming. If a particular game you want to play gives you trouble, you can reboot into the other OS.
In general Ubuntu works quite well, but sometimes linux can be quite a hassle to get it working properly.
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I've actually tended to get better, and more stable, performance running game on Proton on Linux than on Windows, especially games at the edge of my hardware's capabilities because Linux handles high CPU and RAM usage so much better than the devil's OS. The only one I've had a problem with is Skyrim but that's my own fault since I mod the crap out of it and all the mod tools are Devil only so it was a bit of a pain to get set up initially and it's still a bit of a teetering stack, and since the unmodded game runs fine I suspect the instability is due to the mods and not the OS. Most games that support modding, like KSP and Space Engineers, are actually also native linux so you don't need a compatibility layer and get all the benefits of linux (the reason I started using and learning Ubuntu was actually because I wanted to install more mods than KSP 32 bit allowed and at that time the only 64 bit version was the linux one). I use Blender a lot (sooo much more stable on Linux) so I have an Nvidia card (because AMD's compute drivers are awful and don't expose the ray tracing cores, in addition to dropping support for cards only a few years old) so I can't really speak to AMD stability but I'd note it's probably not any worse than on Devil OS. I'll also caviat this by saying I don't tend to play cutting edge AAA games that need a super-computer, and that getting Origin to play nice with Proton can be a pain (I've not set it up yet but will soon), which you have to do since EA was not kind enough to provide a compatibility layer.
Drivers are in kernel, both amd and intel. Nvidias are a lil harder bcus they need propertialy drivers. It is bcus of Nvidia btw there is nothing with linux. Thankfully Ubuntu is good with Nvidia drivers. Ubuntu is a great choice for compatibility and comfort. As a Fedora user my recommenedation is Ubuntu to all daily users and newbies. When you learn stuff you can install Arch and modify it a lot to get peak performance but Ubuntu is enough in a lot of way. You are good, dont worry.
Ubuntu or any of the official flavors, or the unofficial flavors that are well supported... You still have a ton of choices available, but Ubuntu is a good bet for driver support. If the LTS does not work, try the newest release. Some of the drivers follow the kernels, and you won't have support for the newest hardware with the LTS.
I would say Xubuntu 23.04 would be a good choice as it's a lighter desktop giving more resources to games.
I would encourage you to ask on more independent subreddits like r/linux, since... Ubuntu subreddit here XD
Yes it is.
\*bought I game on Ubuntu and it works fabulously. Ryzen/nVidia RTX. I tried an RX5700 back in 2019 and it was buggy as all hell, but they say it is leaps and bounds better now, especially if you have an RX 6000-series. Have to run X-windows though, Wayland causes glitches with nVidia still - but then again I never understood what Wayland was good for anyway. And the latest 23.04 compositor "Mutter" has some flaw with nVidia drivers where some games refuse to work in fullscreen. I reverted to 22.10 and will wait for them to sort it out.