So I've been hearing the buzz about Linux and gaming and how it's finally fixed everything and is a perfect replacement for windows. My windows install has definitely accumulated some bloat, so blasting it and trying some Linux for a bit sounds like a solid plan.
Last time I tried this was early Ubuntu days, so I know there's some... hurtles especially with Nvidia. But at least they're releasing official drivers now!
So after some research I settled on trying out Fedora. Loaded up a USB, selected live mode... and blank screen. Guess it doesn't like Nvidia 3080s much. Rebooted, used troubleshooting mode with basic graphics. It loads 1024x768 on my ultra wide which looks about right for Linux.
So I do some digging and find Nobara Linux which is Fedora but all set up for Nvidia and gaming! Perfect! Made a USB, tried to boot live and.... Kernel error, could not get further.
So back to base fedora and...
Off to install Nvidia drivers!
After some googling I found RPMfusion is the route to go, and I set down to decipher the cryptic text that is their god awful and confusing how to. After almost 2 hours I managed to get the fucking thing installed and figured out how to UFI disable safe mode on my ASUS ROG, which also was not straightforward. Fuck whatever key process he was trying to describe.
Next up is getting my media server, which is a basic NAS on a SAMBA server up and running. On windows you open up your file explorer, right click under your drives, select "map network drive", enter username and password and you're gravy. Or you can find it via network discovery.
So first thing is first, open up file explorer and try to browse via GUI. It sees the workgroup and the server but when I try to open it or click mount it gives the cryptic message "software refuses connection". After an hour or so of cryptic tutorials involving command line and confusing bullshit I admit defeat, and connected to it as an FTP server. Which worked relatively smoothly.
First thing is first downloaded VLC and played The Expanse Season 5 EP 3 where I'd left off. Success, but some noticable choppiness. Then I tried to jump to a random point in the episode. File crashes. I want to note that FTP streaming over the Internet to my phone using the same damn VLC player doesn't react like that, nor does Windows. Tried tweaking some settings in VLC to do with performance and the screen is blank when I try to play again, audio works great. Try to reset the settings, still blank. Try rebooting, still blank. Full reinstall of VLC and we're back in business.
So 3 hours have passed. I barely got my graphics card working and can't mount a network drive. Plus now I can't play my media and skip to any point of it meaning I can't pick up where I left off or jump around the episode to see if I've seen it before.
I haven't even tried gaming.
I'm going to try again tomorrow, but y'all are dirty liars. Linux is still bullshit and has been since I first installed it over 20 years ago. What the hell has the community even accomplished if it still sucks this much dick to use?
Lots of tooltips and pop ups from what I remember last time.
There’s also the fact that windows is the default, and that can’t be ignored. People have been taught windows since they were in school. There’s less of a need for a ton of tutorials because the vast majority of at least the US have been using windows since elementary school.
Linux does not have that advantage and it is explicitly user unfriendly in most cases. Having to use the terminal to do things should not be required at all. Most users should never need to know it exists, let alone use it.
Are you saying that it's unfriendly because it's different and not the default?
Gnome, Pop_OS!, Elementary, etc is pretty user friendly, sure it's not perfect, but it does have a new user experience that tells you how to do things, how to find help, etc. The UX includes a lot of helpful tool tips too.
As for the terminal, it's completely possible to use most popular distros without touching the terminal at all.
It’s not possible to use popular distros without the terminal. Anyone saying that is lying. Within an hour of a fresh install there’s normally 5-10 things I’ve had to use the terminal for because a GUI didn’t work or didn’t exist.
I’m saying it’s unfriendly because it has 0 protections for the user to prevent them from bricking their own system. I know that’s a positive to Linux purists, but it’s a huge problem for everyone else.
Windows can get away with a certain level of expecting people to know how their OS works. Linux can’t. With the different defaults it makes it a very unfriendly move from windows
True, to an extent. It does warn you when you're doing something obviously dumb for the most part though. Most of that is mitigated by keeping everything in a user context and sandboxing. For example it will allow you to mess up your own account, just like windows will, but it will make you enter a password to do anything outside of your user that could create problems system wide. Windows does similar things too.
Different does not equal user unfriendly, IMHO.
Would you say that macOS is not user friendly because it has different defaults than Windows? Would you say that Samsung's version of Android is not user friendly because it does things different than Google's version? Would you say that all smart phones are not user friendly because they do things differently than iPhone (IOS)? What about Chrome and Firefox? Which one would you said is user unfriendly because it does things differently? Would you say that Gmail is unfriendly because it has different defaults than Outlook?
As with all things it just depends on what you're doing and how you're doing it. If someone is handed a system that has something like Fedora setup on it. They could just install steam, install some games, install chrome, or whatever else they want without touching the terminal.
Now the process of setting up, installing packages to make hardware work eg Nvidia, tweaking things, etc. Yeah that part in some instances does need the terminal. If you have hardware and a distro where everything just works, then you could actually not have to use the terminal at all. System76, Dell, etc has shown this with their laptops, Valve showed this with the steamdeck, etc.