Basically the forced shift to the enshittified Windows 11 in october has me eyeing the fence a lot. But all I know about Linux is 1: it’s a cantankerous beast that can smell your fear and lack of computer skills and 2: that’s apparently not true any more? Making the change has slowly become a more real possibility for me, though I’m pretty much a fairly casual PC-user, I don’t do much more than play games. So I wrote down some questions I had about Linux.

Will my ability to play games be significantly affected compared to Windows?

Can I mod games as freely and as easily as I do on Windows?

If a program has no Linux version, is it unusable, or are there workarounds?

Can Linux run programs that rely on frameworks like .NET or other Windows-specific libraries?

How do OS updates work in Linux? Is there a “Linux Update” program like what Windows has?

How does digital security work on Linux? Is it more vulnerable due to being open source? Is there integrated antivirus software, or will I have to source that myself?

Are GPU drivers reliable on Linux?

Can Linux (in the case of a misconfiguration or serious failure) potentially damage hardware?

And also, what distro might be best for me?

  • Communist@lemmy.frozeninferno.xyzEnglish
    0·
    8 months ago

    And it still is. Being expected to use slightly different software when you’re using a 10+ year old hardware setup is not weird. Furthermore, this is an issue with the nvidia driver support, which is proprietary, the open source drivers have no such problems. And again, this will be nearly completely solved once steam/proton stop needing xwayland.

    • Fatur_New@lemmy.mlEnglish
      1·
      8 months ago

      Being expected to use slightly different software when you’re using a 10+ year old hardware setup is not weird

      Yes, it isn’t weird. The problem is you want people to leave Xorg meanwhile NVK hasn’t finished yet

      • Communist@lemmy.frozeninferno.xyzEnglish
        0·
        8 months ago

        …the vast majority of beginners do not have 10+ year old hardware.

        I want everyone except those who use 10+ year old hardware to move, and in fact, that’s exactly what i’ve recommended in the past.

        here I am making that exact recommendation:

        https://lemmy.frozeninferno.xyz/post/53716147/18224187

        We shouldn’t be recommending things for a tiny niche, we should be recommending what’s best on average, and as we learn about the specific needs of a user, then recommend things specifically for that user.