I’m looking to turn an old laptop into a home server. What distros make sense to use for that? Use a server dedicated distro like Ubuntu Server or is a regular desktop environment like Mint fine too?
Edit: TL;DR use Debian
You must log in or register to comment.
I use Debian for my home server, and for my vps. And on my laptop. It’s been great so far, no real complaints after using Debian for 15 years.
Fedora or Debian, but it depends on what you’re going to be using it for.
Maybe you want a NAS OS instead? Maybe a media system like Open Filevault? If just runnings VMs and Containers, maybe something geared towards that.
Fedora does have some nice preconfigured stuff like Cockpit and several helper automations by default. Yes, they can be installed on Debian, but it’s extra steps.
Don’t use frigging debian. It’s 2026. Use something atomic and for containers like openSUSE MicroOS.
Debian still exists today because of the stability provided by older-but-perfectly-fucntional packages. Older ≠ bad
Not everyone needs an atomic OS. Not everyone wants to use containers for everything. Because while those have value, they also add a layer of complexity and an additional learning curve.
And debian isn’t the eternal answer to everything. It will require more maintenance. Most people are just stuck on what they have always done and don’t want to change.
Thank God I didn’t listen to all the people regurgitating that I should use debian.
You’re right–like I said, an atomic OS has its benefits, and containers are great. They’re just not a place I would point a beginner.
It’s easy for those of us with more experience to forget what the learning curve is like. Sure, there are a handful of people out there who would enjoy starting out with Alpine or Arch, but there’s good reason most people start with Fedora or Mint or Ubuntu.
Maybe I misread his experience.
When I started with Linux, I started with Ubuntu in 2005.
But when I started self hosting, which was just last year, I went straight to MicroOS and podman and never regretted it.
Well, that’s my recommendation at least. In the end, either will work.
And possibly more clock-cycles, leading to higher energy usage.
And maybe even more RAM.
I would recommend Debian or OpenSUSE LEAP (not Tumbleweek). Both distros work fine headless, as they are rock-solid and give you control over your update & maintenance timings. .
Since everyone already mentioned it, I recommend Debian.
Personally I just throw Debian my servers. It’s a rock.
Yes, Debian is slow to change or break. Slow to change sucks on the desktop pretty often. But on servers not breaking and not changing is typically what you want.
Second this. Everything I have runs on Debian or OpenWRT.
what kind of server?
That’s the only question that matters.
The kind that is beginner friendly, where I can host some stuff like Jellyfin, some storage, git or similar, etc. Just for me and friends/family to access.
So, a file server, mostly. A laptop is fairly inadequate for that, but will work for small loads.
There are specialist distributions for that purpose, but you seem to want something more “generic”.
You have a choice of trendy (what the forums like), or industry standard what’susedon real life servers) basically.
Just run debian with a DE. I have a beefy server that I got out of sheer luck and I run it with a DE. Everything else is just SSH but I wanted a DE to fuck around with openjdk on the minecraft server cause Java is a bitch. Like someone tell.me why it updated from openjdk8 to 21 when I installed 8 manually.
Debian. With
unattended-upgradesinstalled. I ssh monthly just to update the docker images and clean up old logs.use NixOS it’s perfect for it
there is nothing special about debian
good luck
Ubuntu or Debian. I’m using Ubuntu and it has never failed me.
I use Mint. I tried Ubuntu several times and ran into dependency issues. Mint has extra stuff you won’t need, but it “just works”. And no Snap.
Debian, imho. I use it on all my servers except for a few work-related use cases that actually require Centos
I use Ubuntu Server on my home servers. Been running it on them for years without issue. I know Canonical/Ubuntu get a lot of hate in the linux community, but for server side things, I think it’s great.
- If you use an LTS (24.04) version, you can get super long term security updates, meaning you don’t have to worry about a full os upgrade for 10-15 years (via the free Ubuntu pro).
- It’s super solid, boring, and dependable, which is what you want out of a server os
- If you need it, there’s a TON of documentation/support information out there for Ubuntu.
Same. I also find it faster to get set up and operational.
Definitely. It’s easy to get a server up and running in about ten minutes.
Arch.
Minimal, rock solid, good documentation.
If you feel the need for containers, that could be installed too.
Whatever you use… understand it and do backups. Something will break.
