I'm looking for a free OS, should it be Debian or Arch Linux(community)?
1mon 14h ago by lemmy.world/u/CarlLandry357 in linuxmemes
They say debian is free and has its promise, but Arch has like 2-4 maintainers?
If you know vaguely what you're doing or are willing to learn, you can go with whatever and it'll be fine.
Personally not a big fan of debian because they tend to be slower and more conservative on updates. Arch is a bit more technical, but very customizable.
I'm personally a big fan of Fedora. Software updated quickly enough to have all the bells and whistles, slow enough to not get cut by bleeding edge software.
Gentoo is where you learn the most about Linux and software in general.
Long time gentoo advocate(/fanboy) here, and so, it stings a little to say this, but, there are ways to use gentoo that do not have you learn as much about your system as, say, e.g. CRUX, KISS/Carbs, LFS(?), starting with just a busybox and kernel, Exherbo, or even many ways of using slackware [and several other suggestions yet, but gotta cut the list short somewhere].
Gentoo's very conveniently wrapped up with portage. So conveniently, you can be forgiven for lingering in the convenience and not venturing deeper into what the convenience wraps around. It's not a thick opaque plastic wrap like some distros that try hard to lower the entry bar, but it is still convenient. ... Conveniently availing advanced fidelity of choice over what you're installing, conveniently managing complexity in simplicity, but ultimately a convenience trap still none the less. ... Many Gentoo users look like uneducated yokels in flying saucers, compared to those who actually do compile their software themselves (they run make), rather than those who have emerge do it for them. [Or an even more extreme example, we're like anyone using an LLM voice assistant.] As in: We're not superior skilled savvy sysadmin, we just have better tools.
And why do the effort of learning to become better, when the machine does it for you.
But then, with gentoo, you do still have the choice. Gentoo is all about choice.
One can try say same for any distro, and that's true, for all being (mostly) Free Software ("Opensource") and so can study (freedom1) it to whatever depth your curiosity takes you, but, Arch does try take some of your choice away from you, not the freedom to study it, but in that it insists it have the freedom to bite you. [ Though, there be ways to mitigate that ]. Debian (or Devuan), Gentoo, Suse, and others, let you opt-in to the fast lane. Arch seem to be screaming "COME WITH US, FAST AS WE CAN!!!" and leaving little room to hear anything about taking arch to a slow lane.
It was mostly sarcastic suggestion, but as you said, you can hit the ground running with Gentoo nowadays very quickly, and go back and revisit every part of it and play around with it, and learn about everything later.
I think it's Ubuntu that's slow, while Debian as its base is smaller and faster?
No, Debian is typically quite a bit older than even the Ubuntu LTS. E.g. they currently still don't ship a Nvidia driver that supports the 50 series GPUs.
Slower on updates, not slow to run. Slower on updates is referring to how it takes longer for new features / software to be shipped out for you to download. Debian usually prioritizes machines that chug along for a long time without anything breaking, rather than adding new stuff
You're right that it's not slow to run. It is small and fast
But fast on security updates when running on stable
Performance differences between distros tend to be negligible. Unless you have a specific use case and a distro specifically tuned for that, you will hardly notice any difference.
you will hardly notice any difference
until you leave linux, to assembly operating systems, like kolibrios.
Ubuntu is based off the testing version of Debian, so they have newer software versions
Your logic seems sound, yup.
Though broader than the issue you're responding to, the bigger quality of note in Ubuntu, is not that it's slow (nor larger), but instead, the most issue of ubuntu, is that they're very very silly. More marketing silly than sensible development.
Better Ubuntu be slow than fast anyway. See what they do when they try go fast? Like replacing the userland with rust...
That's beyond just "ready or not, here it comes" release model madness.
It's silly.
Debian is rock solid, there are even more user-friendly distros though. In a few edge-cases it will expect you to know your way around things, however there are a lot of guides for it. Going with this will cause the growth of a mighty white beard!
Arch Linux will make you cry. If you want to learn how to fix and configure things it's great (and their wiki arguably is the greatest of all), but their lack of QA and expectation to do that yourself often causes issues. You'll probably cut your fingers on its bleeding edge. If you want to learn with less bleeding I'd recommend CachyOS these days. I'm certainly not saying this because my computer didn't boot after updates multiple times. /s
HOWEVER if you have an Nvidia GPU, first off: I'm so sorry. Secondly, you absolutely (!) should use a distro that takes care of their driver for you. Their drivers are hot steaming garbage that you do not want to meddle with (many distros try their best to do it for you, but often enough it won't work for some people). See below, Nvidia distros marked with recycling symbol.
A few other options to consider with noticeable features:
- Bazzite (♻️): If you mainly play games. User-friendly, most compatible with handhelds next to CachyOS. Takes care of a lot of small things related to gaming.
- Fedora: If you want modern features on a very stable system. Very good ecosystem. Basically the other stable workhorse next to Debian. Will spawn a nice hat on your head, m'lady.
- OpenSuse: Also very stable, best distro for those concerned about US influence (it's strongly EU-based). Tumbleweed arguably most stable rolling-release distro (newest system software) with a great graphical settings' tool YaST (future unknown, unfortunately). Leap is rock-solid but slow, meant more for Office PCs and Enterprise users. After installing this you'll suddenly start talking german.
- Linux Mint: If you want things to just work with the flattest learning curve possible for former Windows victims. Helpful tips for Ubuntu usually apply and that weird software offering you a manual download for Ubuntu will just work.
- ElementaryOS: Very good for users used to MacOS, probably flattest learning curve for them. Great accessibility! Not as feature rich as others (their whole desktop is made in-house, so it's very cohesive but a lot of work for them), but what they have is very well tested.
- ZorinOS (Core): Also very good. Most likely the one with the biggest software selection from the start (comes with both Snap and Flatpak pre-configured). Probably the one you'd eventually find on some school computer.
And three others interesting if you might buy new hardware soon (damn, you rich):
- TuxedoOS (♻️): Default OS on devices from Tuxedo Computers (EU). Works on any machine and is a really nice distro in general.
- SlimbookOS (♻️): Default OS for Slimbook (EU) devices. Also nice.
- Pop_OS! (♻️): Default OS for System76 (US) devices. They're currently developing a whole new desktop environment (Cosmic), so their normal release hangs a little bit behind. It's okay though. Be aware it's from a US company (not just maintainers, but commercial entity). Fucked up Linus Tech Tips once.
[Arch's] wiki arguably is the greatest of all
100% agree. Even as a Fedora user, in the rare occasion I have some obscure issue the Arch wiki is a godsend. Even though I've never actually used Arch, I'm still extremely grateful for the work they do on documenting every little thing for desktop Linux. A lot of that info is applicable for all Linux desktop distros.
Yup. Arch's wiki's one of the two best things Arch has going for it.
Thankfully, don't have to use Arch to make use of arch wiki.
This is such a fantastic answer. I wish stuff like this was the top search result for these questions.
I will note that perhaps Linux Mint should get a ♻️, since it comes with a very simple "Driver Manager" utility that detects your GPU and allows you to select the appropriate proprietary driver for it. The onboarding welcome program directs you to open it.
Edit: demo video: https://youtu.be/12FKdE0ZRc4
I only marked those who bundle the driver with the image since that way they can treat is as core system package and add the necessary deep system configurations + helper scripts straight form the start. There are in fact quite a few distros who use such a helper tool (I think Zorin has one too?), but even with their best effort the driver still causes issues so god damn often or just fails to install for weird reasons. Additionally there might be issues after updates. Distros that integrate them from the start might add a few extra scripts to mitigate update problems, perhaps ensure Secure Boot still works, make specific changes to Wayland due to Nvidia being really bad with it by default, set up everything for hybrid graphics, ecetera.
My brother just threw out an RTX 3060 because of all the issues (in that case on OpenSuse) and I had so. many. issues. In the last 10 years with all kinds of green GPUs that I can only in good conscious recommend distros with pre-installed drivers to Nvidia users, and to avoid that company like the Plague.
I will push back on this a bit because Debian is great, but point release distros like Debian that focus on stability can be incredibly behind on important updates that include features users will want. I personally recommend Fedora to start because imo it's the best of both worlds for new penguins and greybeards alike.
I didn't game, but use Bazzite. It has worked on every system I've installed it on, even an old AMD A6. I just feel safe in there, but it's not perfect. And the distro is large.
Mint deals with nvidia just fine
I can tell you from experience that it's not a given. Not because of Mint, but because of the driver. You're just lucky that your hardware-driver-kernel combination happened to work flawlessly.
Fairs
Why have you forsaken God? You should be praying in TempleOS.
Isn't it true that a server running TempleOS has the best protection against remote exploits?
Yes, the networking stack is perfectly protected for it only connects directly to the heavens via faith based prayer-wave.
Most based opinion i've seem here
larp larp larp sahur ✌️
If you have to ask, you definitely don't want Arch
The fact that you're asking this suggests you might be new to linux so go Mint but if it has to be one of those two then Debian
Linux Mint Debian Edition. Best of both worlds.
The lack of PPA support might bite you though. For newcomers I'd strongly recommend staying with the standard Mint (Cinnamon) version, any reason not to is highly technical and more of an issue for the maintainers.
:3 I would have thought best of both worlds be more like: install Devuan, read everything on https://bedrocklinux.org/,run the script once knowing the implications of running it and are enthused for this nontrivial change of your system, and then just brl fetch arch. Or other way around if you prefer arch's installer. Or Debian/Devuan, Arch/Artix(/Obarun/Joborun/etc) if preferring init freedom.
Edit: ... cos then you can do cool things like apt upgrade && pacman -Syu
I'm honestly not sure if I'm witnessing the most autistic responses to the most obvious shitpost ever, or if the AI bots got into Lemmy already.
Why wouldn't we? Lemmy has at least 12 real people.
I'm a real people, and I'm livid that I shouldn't respond with a paragraph about Mint because this is obvious shitposting.
That's right, you are a real people! You can tell you're real because your eyes are real eyes.emoji . This was first discovered by the early 21st century philosopher — jayden smith.
So are you, Bruce. You're also real, and don't need to dress up in a rubber suit for attention. You're good enough.
NixOS ;)
Fucking sadistic bastard...........I second this.
Let me expose my lack of knowledge and experience in this.
Afaik. NixOS is completely build from configs, thus easy to VCS, and you can try stuff and then just roll back like nothing happened... what's the difference to snapshots and why is it sadistic/masochistic but worth it?
Give me your NixOS pitch.
Snapshots work in filesystem level. NixOS rollbacks work in system configuration level. NixOS has steep learning curve due to the nix language and fragmented documentation but once you get grip of it, it works great. Either way, you netted the days of suffering to set everything up :)
The problem with a beginner using NixOS is that it teaches them, well, NixOS. Using just about any other distro will teach them transferrable skills; i.e. suffering , until they embrace ansible;)
Unless that other distro is Guix, in which case Stall man smiles upon you and I wish you the best with your ultra libre Pentium machine.
You can learn to fly.
Here, take off, for the first time, from the top of this cliff.
I moved to nixos, then moved my server to nixos. It was painful, but now I don't have to remember where I put that systemd timer or where stuff is in general.
If you are interested in maintaining your OS as an ongoing and constant project, go with Arch. You will learn a lot about Linux, and about system administration in general. You will also have entire days where you are unable to do anything productive with your computer because the last update broke userspace again and you can either spend a lot of time troubleshooting your specific problem, or spend a lot of time reinstalling and reconfiguring your system.
If your computer is more than just a hobby platform and you need to use it regularly for any kind of productivity, go with Debian. Set it and forget it.
Either way, off-system file backups are recommended.
Unless you intentionally doing something wrong or have close to zero experience with linux there might some of the problems you've mentioned, also you can expect similar on debian if you are having them on arch.
Anyway, I would recommend something other to OP because both of these distributions require some non-zero experience with linux. (Also OP itself feels like trolling)
Is your hardware ten years old or more?
Do you want a system made up of software that is on average 3 years old?
Do you want absolutely ridiculous stability for the uptime memes?
Are you a fan of the idea that every design decision should be done by a committee of theoretically democratically chosen developers but is actually just whoever wants the job because there is never any real transparency or motion about when the meetings are, much less when elections are?
Does the idea of your operating system being compatible not because its good but because it's just the largest base thanks to corporate investment make you moist?
Then pick Debian.
If you answered no to literally any of those options then go ahead and pick an Arch flavor, or Arch itself.
You mean Cachy OS? Yeah, I've heard of that, might choose it, I dunno yet.
Linux '26er here. I tried a few and CachyOS is now my jam. I'm way too new to offer true insight, but as a new convert, Cachy has good video/gaming support and all the core features I need to keep exploring. 100% recommend a day or two to try it out.
I run Cachyos (KDE), for 10 months now, on a 13 year old HP workstation. Daily updates. Best distro I've used (previously used Mint, SuSE, Debian, Ubuntu), wouldn't go back to any of the others.
But is it catchy?
I'm also fairly new, and one big benefit of CachyOS is the sensible defaults. You get to start with the modern way of doing things instead of having to discover them slowly.
micro instead of nano for example
I've never used it but recommend it to newcomers because they all seem to like it.
Debian is chosen for Satellites because it is "stable", that is it doesn't do major changes like changing the Kernel.
Arch isn't for beginners, but it's a rolling release distro that's nice and simple but powerful.
You do have the option though. I run LMDE7, and installed a 7.0-prempt kernel yesterday because I felt that I was seeing too much stuttering in 3d games. I installed it from my package manager which already had debian Backports turned on.
Some have started with arch.
Not all beginners are alike.
... Some even started with LFS.
I use both, debian on servers and old machines, arch on my desktop. Arch being rough is way overblown in my experience, the install script makes it straightforward to setup and it's been pretty much painless since I switched to it two years ago, I had experience with debian before that. Both arch and debian have fantastic documentation available.
Debian and derivatives, in my experience, are really well supported so that's a plus. Age of packages has never really bothered me and cases where I want bleeding edge there's options for that.
Both are solid options and I don't think you'll be upset either way, if you can I'd try both.
Debian Unstable, if you like to live dangerously and have to reboot every couple of years.
/s
I like that even without the "/s"
I feel like there are other options here. Fedora? OpenSUSE?
I am obligated to recommend Alamalinux at any and all opportunity
Fedora is so, so nice. I have it on all my personal computers.
At my work they only tolerate Ubuntu. My God, it can be so frustrating. Snap gets in the way constantly. Somehow Ubuntu LTS seems to have a knack for precisely choosing the worst package versions for a workstation.
Fedora on the other hand just gets out of my way and lets me get shit done.
And a few more yet
This
Two extremes here. Debian is slow to update while arch is bleeding edge.
I avoid containerized desktop apps (snap, flatpak) so I couldn't run Debian as a daily driver. You'd want to use the latest FireFox and their repo's release is old. You you can get it from flatpak, but I don't want to do that. Running on recent (<1y) hardware will also be problematic. I guess you could keep on adding 3rd party repos to your install, though some post from debian forums always stuck with me: "Debian is only what is released + whats in the official repo. Install anything else and you're not running debian anymore.". Its a whacky OS and I love it, but daily drive it only on my server.
Arch puts everything on their repo straight away. And if its not there, you're downloading code from AUR and building it yourself. I actually appreciate this since it complies with the philosophy that you can't really trust your applications unless you read the source and build it yourself. Awesome, but the general public shouldn't be doing this... I don't mind applications being distributed in binary form. I am able to trust linux community maintained repositories. Arch is for the geeks imo.
I found Fedora to be a good middle ground, since it gets package updates straight away while still maintaining fixed OS releases. No need for snap or flatpaks since their repo has everything and is updated. Its also widely supported by software vendors (just like debian). Id go with it as a recommendation, but still note that its philosophy is free software only and this can potentially mean tinkering with additional stuff from RPM fusion, especially if you dance with nvidia and watch videos encoded with non free codecs.
It takes a bit of time to find the right distro and that is the biggest obstacle to linux imo.
I avoid containerized desktop apps (snap, flatpak) so I couldn’t run Debian as a daily driver.
Wat? this is the dumbest take of the day.
Feel free to chose either one, but avoiding Debian for this reason is just plain wrong.
Out of curiosity, why avoid Flatpak? I get snap or AppImage, but Flatpak is generally great.
why avoid Flatpak? I get snap or AppImage,
Objectively, they all frustrate validation the same. When comparing with a SLSA3-compliant setup where every installed artifact has a signed checksum in a signed bundle from a signed resource on a signed repository, and the endpoint to this is readily available from something like authenticated SNMP into the single source of truth, they all tends to compare poorly.
The chart below completely ignores that Debs are consolidated into a single source of truth as well, and I feel violating SSoT should cost significantly because of dependency holes when artifact registry is incomplete, but SLSA doesn't care about that part.
| Ecosystem / Format | Estimated SLSA Level | Update Reliability / Model | Trust Chain & Provenance Comments |
|---|---|---|---|
| (withheld) | 3–4 | Very high; repo-based, transactional updates | Strong: signed packages + signed repo metadata + central DB; distros enforce reproducible builds. |
| OCI containers (hardened pipeline: cosign + Tekton/in-toto) | 3 | High if using automated CI/CD and policy enforcement | Strong if you use signed images + non-falsifiable provenance; this is rare but achievable. |
| DEB (distro repos) | 2 | High; repo-based, APT handles dependencies | Medium: repo metadata signed, but per-package signatures not mandatory; weaker checksum chain. |
| Flatpak runtimes (Flathub) | 2 | High; centralized runtimes, predictable updates | Medium: signed OSTree commits; build infra more centralized, but not full end-to-end provenance. |
| Flatpak apps | 1–2 | High; repo-based, automatic updates | Mixed: OSTree signing helps, but build provenance varies by publisher; no uniform SLSA guarantees. |
| Snap (strict confinement) | 1–2 | High; centralized store, auto-updates | Centralized signing by Canonical, but opaque build pipelines; trust is “trust the store operator.” |
| OCI containers (typical public images) | 0–1 | Medium; pull-latest model, tag drift common | Usually unsigned; mutable tags; no guaranteed provenance—trust is mostly social and reputation-based. |
| Snap (classic confinement) | 1 | High; same store/auto-update model | Same store trust, but classic snaps bypass sandbox; even more reliance on publisher integrity. |
| AppImage | 0–1 | Low–medium; ad-hoc self-update or manual downloads | Almost no chain of custody; signatures optional; no central repo or provenance expectations. |
| npm (JavaScript) | 0–1 | High frequency, but low reliability of safety; semver + lockfiles | Registry accounts can publish arbitrary tarballs; no default signed provenance; transitive deps explode risk. |
| PyPI / pip (Python) | 0–1 | Similar to npm; pip + requirements/lockfiles | Tarballs/wheels from arbitrary maintainers; no mandatory signing; provenance work (e.g., PEP 740) is emerging but not standard. |
| Composer / Packagist (PHP) | 0–1 | Good tooling, but same “trust the registry” model | Packages pulled from Packagist/VCS; no mandatory signatures; dependency graph trust is social, not cryptographic. |
| CPAN (Perl) | 0–1 | Mature ecosystem, but manual/legacy in many flows | Historically minimal provenance; mirrors and authors are trusted by convention, not by SLSA-style attestations. |
| Other language registries (RubyGems, crates.io, etc.) | 0–1 | Similar to npm/PyPI; lockfiles help reproducibility | Central registries, but no default SLSA provenance; integrity is mostly TLS + registry operator trust. |
Man, I really need to check out "(withheld)"
Seriously though, nice table!
Not parent poster, but this is a detailed explanation for the big ideas.
Wow, thanks for the link! I'm a huge Flatpak fan and always thought they were awesome. I still do, but a lot of the issues in that blog were news to me. Thanks for sharing, it was a really good read!
It takes a bit of time to find the right distro and that is the biggest obstacle to linux imo.
It’s also the greatest benefit. Vanilla stuff works out of the box for most, but once you need more, there’s a paved runway headed in any direction you want to go (some in better shape than others to be fair).
Windows and OS X are certainly wider runways, but there are cliffs off the side of you want to change direction.
Good things usually take time, but you will know where you are when you get there.
Can have fast Debian with ceres [1] ~ er, I mean with sid. And experimental staging area even beyond that.
Can have slower more stable (~?) arch with manjaro.
While neither are gentoo, they (/ the community) have availed at least that much choice.
[1: that's Devuan's]
PS, speaking of
Its a whacky OS and I love it
look at this old wacky thing I love (and have been daily driving since).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MuYMBCcgs98
Gets around those quandries of having to pick which one, like between bleeding edge rolling and LTS stable, or between arch and debian, or whatever other pair of otherwise seemingly mutually exclusive criteria that otherwise seem inescapable from compromise. Nope. No quandry. Can haz both. ;)
Shshsh. ;) Linux's best kept secret. Hehe.
Not OP, but this is a fantastic answer, and I wish I'd read it before installing Deb on my wife and friend's computers!
I use CachyOS, but decided "bleeding edge" would be more of a nuisance than help for them, so opted for "very stable", then immediately ran into challenges trying to get apps, and needed to get containerized apps for everything. I should have gone with something Fedora-based or just stuck with what I know, CachyOS.
what apps did you need to install containerized?
Stremio was the big one, but maybe I just didn't try hard enough.
Getting Wine/Bottles working with a niche work remote desktop streaming app was a huge pain, too, while in CachyOS it's 1-click to get it all set up from the Hello app.
On my CachyOS desktop, I use Docker images for a couple things: my mesh wifi network controller server (Omada) and for ripping Kindle books to .epub with a specific Windows setup that still works (I need to read with TTS and Kindle broke native Android TTS when they implemented their own shitty TTS option, so I .epub everything.)
I don't think I use any other containerized apps, aside from my work Windows VM (which is only required for SharePoint integration in Explorer.)
Stremio has a native Debian package right on it's download page.
And as to all the other stuff, that is super specific and is hardly a reason to not recommend debian to a random person.
I've been a Debian guy for a long time for one reason, stability. I don't game a lot, but haven't had an issue in years, my son uses arch and games way more than I do, but he also has to fix a lot more stuff that updates seem to break.
If you are under 30 I almost want to encourage Arch as you'll be forced to learn a bit more over time and learning is never a bad thing. If you might game some, but value a rock solid system, go Debian.
Fedora is a middle ground between the two.
If you don't care, go with Mint. Fast, secure, simple.
If you have some special thing like an old slow computer, uptime or specific security needs and so on, check out all the other good answers here in the post.
I mean, you can install each in a VM if you want to play with them.
In my experience, Debian has been way simpler, more intuitive, more stable, and cleaner. Start there. If you need the absolute latest bleeding edge drivers or software, consider arch, then probably just run it on Debian because the software is still available, just not preinstalled.
Teach good debugging practices early
Yup. I'm late to this. My first rubber duck ordered days ago, due for delivery.
Depends a bit on what you want to do.
Debian stable tends to have rather old versions of everything, but Debian testing (currently codename Forky) is really nice. I installed it a few months ago on my ThinkPad, and it's running beautifully.
I'm not in it for the uptime, so I shut down whenever I'm done and when I shut down, I do an update / upgrade, and there's always something being upgraded. I've had zero issues with stability or performance.
I have no experience with Arch, so I can't really compare.
Debian Testing doesn't get timely security updates.
Oh, I didn't realise that! Apparently security updates come to unstable and stable before they go to testing.
I kind of like having up to date packages. Now I'm not sure whether I should rather switch to Sid, or watch the vulnerable source package list.
Plan9
I use Arch btw. Arch is amazing, but you need to be willing to learn a few things. No shame in wanting an easier distro that just works.
I know its tough to see through all the noise. Everyone tells you what you should do and to not listen to the others. But what I want you to focus on is that they are all nobodies. Randos you don't know and never will. But I'm Magnum PI, you know me, so listen to me and forget what everyone else has said.
Go with Debian.
Hell yeah, I knew Magnum ran Deb
Hell yeah brother
If you want your system to be reliable, stable and in essence boring: Debian.
If you want to be hands-on, on the bleeding edge and updating daily: Arch.
Debian user that reccomends it. I don't game or need latest gizmos. I want and have a computer that is very reliable and maintenance free.
For those warning you away from Arch, it doesn't have to be like that anymore.
I installed Garuda as a Linux noob and it has been petty straightforward and problem free. You don't have to build Arch by yourself in a cave from scraps anymore. Garuda supports Nvidia too.
Just make sure you have pamac installed, it's the one thing my build didn't do and it made software installation and updates way easier.
Is how I moved to gentoo. Used convenient gentoo based respin first to get familiar. ... And also learned the trepidation was unfounded, and should not have listened to the "it's hard" hype, and just have a go straight away.
Arch even has a convenient installer these days I hear. ... So you don't even need to do the pesky inconvenience of reading the wiki guide and learning about your system. Now you can remain ignorant and still say "arch btw".
I highly recommend Mint Cinnamon, especially if this is your first foray into Linux.
EndeavourOS (Arch based)
I like Arch. It's a rolling release distro with a nice community. However there is no installer. You have to install it by hand. That's why many people who never touched Arch themselves keep telling it's "too hard to install". Actually the process is well documented. You'll need like an hour for it, but in return you get a system, that's slim and perfectly tailored to your needs.
https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Installation_guide
However, if you just want to do casual things like browsing the web, debian is absolutely fine. But be aware, that the packages are antique. Also I never survived a dist-upgrade once in my live. There was always broken configs afterwards.
As any fule kno, the true answer to this is Haiku. Particularly as it's now officially* supported on M-series Macs.
_
"As any fool know?
Sorry if that's obvious.
Meh, not relevant.
I did actually misspell it, but it's a reference to Nigel Molesworth.
Take debian & if you are into headaches take Arch
Arch is a challenge, be prepared to spend more time learning and tinkering than using your computer for the first few months (and forever). It's not impossible, but you will most likely have to reinstall a few times as you learn. If thats what you enjoy, great. Go for a distro made for the lay person like Mint or Bazzite. There's a backup program called Timeshift, it will replace windows snapshots and can help you recover from mistakes without having to start over.
If you put your home drive on a separate partition/drive it will be easier to distro hop as you try different ones. Still, make sure your data is backed up, ideally put the backup on an external drive that you can unplug while installing new a OS.
Idk, I never reinstalled anything and just installed a bunch of packages and followed some configuration guides for Arch and the respective packages. Took probably 5 hours or so to get the whole thing set up to a place where I could use it for 95% of things I usually do, which is gaming and browsing.
try one for a week, switch to the other for a week, and if you feel like it, switch to any other whenever you want
@festnt@sh.itjust.works @CarlLandry357@lemmy.world arch is a bit more of an advanced distro
Neither. Void or OpenBSD. Not hating on SystemD, but I aint lovin it...
If you want to go with bsd, just make sure your hardware is supported
Why is this a issue btw? I get that porting Linux drivers also requires manpower. But no wrapper or automatic patcher chain for them?
It's an issue because your hardware won't work. Last time I tried bsd it had no support for aquantia nics, so I had no networking
free as in free beer: literally any distro other than winux/linuxfx/wubuntu free as in libre: trisquel
Much depends on what you want out of life. Your choices are about as far apart in philosophy as you can get.
Do you wear tweed or have a sport coat with elbow patches? If so, then Debian is as staid and stable as you are. Slowly evolving and the mother of many other distros. Or do you have dyed hair and piercings? Do you live in your mother's basement? Arch might be a great fit for you. Arch is often wild and barely house broken and will pee on your floor as soon as it can. It can be tamed if kept under tight control. But it's a wild ride on the edge if you let it.
There is a middle ground that can draw from both worlds. Ubuntu and Fedora and SuSe are that middle ground. If this is your first time sailing the Sea of Distros, then somewhere in this middle is perhaps the best place to start.
Use FreeBSD. It literally has FREE in the name.
What do you mean by free? Why did only those two make your list?
In general, I recommend Fedora KDE Spin (or Fedora Kinoite if you know what containers are)
For your question, I would go for debian. But the answer also depends on your use-case. Software dev? CLI user? Gamer?
Fedora KDE is not a spin anymore. Fedora embraced KDE fully now. Which is nice.
I feel somewhat bad for using Fedora (IBM Redhat and all), but it has been unmatched on keeping up with current applications while being absolutely painless to use.
I have updated this laptop through three major versions and I have not had a thing to do yet. It is as up to date as my Cachyos laptop with zero effort.
Not like using Fedora gives money to IBM. At least if it's backed by a corporation I know there's paid people in charge of maintaining it.