Really want an honest answer here and not a full blown Linux cult answer.
I’m a new dad (kid is 1.5months old) who used to game pretty hard and do music production in cakewalk and ableton, but the crotch goblin is getting in the way. With windows 10 support coming to an end, I’m faced with a choice to either jump on the Linux train or take the safe way out and eat win11. Please keep in mind that I run a super clean machine (no porn (that’s what mobile is for) or tormenting or anything sketch) and have no intention of doing anything unclean. I have a lot of music prod data that I don’t want fucked and a steam library that I want access to but don’t really care about the data associated with them (saves, profiles…i could care less). So it’s really my ableton and Cakewalk files I want to keep. There was a time I college 2010-2011 where I borrowed a CS majors Ubuntu laptop for a few months to just get work done (just webbrowsing and office app stuff). Shit was annoying and difficult to understand but I was able to make it work-ish.
I’m savvy enough where I can adult Lego a PC together but struggle when it comes to software and troubleshooting and really don’t have the time for that stuff.
Basically, I’m not in the position right now to learn a distro and struggle around with all that crap and I need to keep my music shit. I also despise Microsoft and AI in general but I’m perfectly fine just eating it for simplicity. Is there a low effort Linux solution to my situation? Looking for automatic updates where I just click “express install i don’t fucking care” and im not searching for drivers every day.
My build is basically what’s shown below minus the SLI’d 1080s and with 32gbDDR4. Any upgrade apart from the gpu would essentially mean a wholesale at this point. I used the 2nd card to build my wife a pc since SLI is effectively useless now.
EDIT: Didn’t notice your system specs at first. While it looks like your motherboard technically supports the TPM 2.0 requirement for Windows 11, it also looks like your processor might be too old to be supported by Windows 11. Check to be sure before going down the path below. You might only have an option of going to Linux in this case.
Unpopular opinion from a user who uses Linux as his daily driver for everything:
If you’re using stuff like Cakewalk/Ableton and want to be able to do so again in the foreseeable future, stick with Windows. You said you’re not super savvy at troubleshooting, so I wouldn’t want to send you down the path of trying to get Windows software running on Linux through WINe because it’s sometimes pretty finicky. Especially with a rugrat in the mix, you just don’t have the time to be fucking with it.
Windows 11 Activation: https://massgrave.dev/ (In case you no longer have a free upgrade path)
WIndows Debloat: https://github.com/Raphire/Win11Debloat (A powershell script for getting rid of bloatware, telemetry, and other crap from Windows)
How To Set Up Windows 11 Local Account: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qlhyl3P5Dxw (to avoid having to use a Microsoft account to log in)
Also, I strongly suggest a clean wipe instead of upgrade, as the upgrade path leaves a lot of weird stray stuff that can be annoying. Back up everything that’s important to you on an external drive (or really any drive except the one your OS lives on) and re-install the OS, set up a local account during install, use Massgrave to activate Windows, and then use the Debloater to get rid of bloat.
But isn’t ableton works fine in bottles as I remember they have autoinstaller of it.
That’s still asking for them to learn to use something entirely new that they might simply not have the time to learn about: Bottles. This person said they’re not savvy at troubleshooting. The last thing they need to be confused about is even getting Bottles running and then installing Ableton.
If its difficult to boot up I’ll prob never record music again. The struggle is real.
Ableton and Cakewalk only work with Windows. Unless you have two PCs (one normal PC with Linux, and one workstation for audio-only, without access to the internet with Win10), then it’s best to get a Win11 PC/solution.
Go with windows. Especially because of your abelton use, you will not be able to keep it. With steam if you play multiplayer competitive games then it won’t work either on Linux.
If you move to Linux, you gotta be committed. I didn’t learn Linux until I said “fuck it” and forced myself to use it exclusively.
You will run into problems. You’ll have some days where you’ll spend 10hrs fixing something that no other person on the entire planet has encountered before, only to realize you needed to type in 1 very simple command to fix it.
As much as people hate AI, it can help with Linux troubleshooting. There’s also wikis and manpages.
If you switch at all, pick something that won’t break. Debian will run on your hardware just fine. You won’t have the latest and greatest packages, and as a newbie you DO NOT WANT the latest and greatest.
Nvidia drivers are a hassle, be prepared.
If all that sounds doable, send it.
Well said.
Are you intent on ableton and cakewalk (holy shit I haven’t heard cake walk in a minute)?
For ableton, I’d even consider Mac.
I have never personally used ableton and I was not very advanced with FL studio, but at least LMMS seemed to be FL studio like .
Cakewalk is what i learned on. It’s a dumpster but it’s my dumpster. Ableton is what my buddy and I decided to move to because he’s on mac and it works for both of us.
There are different DAW’s if you’re open to it on linux. You’d (probably) lose your ability to edit your existing files, but you could also dual boot for that
Zorin linux - the closest thing to Windows you’ll get. Highly recommend. Installed it on several computers for family members who just want a computer that works.
Rather than leave another long reply to read, I’ll leave my thoughts simple: if you have another computer you’re not using, try Linux mint and see if it fits your needs. If it’s too much and you can’t get the time needed to figure things out, 11 might be the choice (for now).
But either way, keep Linux on the second and learn a little bit as you get time to! :)
A lot of Linux distros are set it and forget it these days. Nvidia can be finicky though, so i suggest a distro that installs proprietary nvidia drivers for you—I think Linux Mint and Bazzite do that, though I’m not personally familiar with either.
The other thing is music prod which I am not familiar with. I’ve heard that there’s a lack of Linux software for music prod but hopefully some other users who know more can explain what the situation is like on Linux these days.
Steam won’t pose a problem. Steam does something called Proton, a compatibility layer allowing Linux users to run Windows game, and the vast majority of Windows games run flawlessly with Proton. Similarly, you shouldn’t have to worry about losing saves, as Steam Cloud should save and transfer them all automatically.
Stay on win10, if so the choice comes. Just get it debloated and maybe a better protection. If you are sure, get mint or other stable distribution, which I would recommend if you can have some spare time to figure out your setup. Most of the stuff should work out of the box
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No idea about Cakewalk etc but your Steam games will almost all be fine and Linux is honestly great right now and always getting better.
Having used Linux Mint, Windows 10, and Windows 11, I can honestly say that Win10 is okay and Win11 is annoying dogshit. I’d recommend taking the Linux plunge of course, but if you’re desperate for Windows I think paid extended support for 10 might be a thing?
But like I said 11 is dogshit and there’s no time like the present to just grab 3-4 USB sticks at Microcenter, download a bunch of ISOs and Rufus or Balena Etcher, and just dick around. Linux Mint with Cinnamon or KDE will probably give you one of the slickest Windows-like experiences OOTB. Only recommendation: some wifi cards (with certain chips, I forget which) in my experience have required me to go hunt down a driver, so check reviews for any card you’re looking at to see if people report it working out of the box.
Only recommendation: some wifi cards (with certain chips, I forget which) in my experience have required me to go hunt down a driver, so check reviews for any card you’re looking at to see if people report it working out of the box.
With Linux mint, with one machine, I had to explicitly open the driver manager and tell it to use the drivers for the wifi. It wasn’t obvious but I’d read it on some random forum and remembered. Once I knew that was a thing, it was easy. Opened the driver manager, plugged in the install media (USB stick) when it asked, and then told it to use the proprietary drivers.
Your lack of time is the biggest issue, followed by your music needs (which are not impossible but I also know its not plug and play).
I would recommend going with win11 for simplicity and times sake. I would also recommend at least trying out ameliorated windows11. https://ameliorated.io/
Basically their stock run book makes the OS far more secure and private by setting up an admin account and then making your account a standard user (the way it should be done). Then it strips out all the bloat, restricts services, and installs open source alternatives like libre office and libre wolf. It also drastically changes the UI, which most of it I like and some is meh, but its all much better than the crap stock UI. I run this as a VM for all the stuff I still need windows for and I love it. Nothings ever going to make windows not windows, but this is pretty close and a simple click install. I highly recommend it.
How safe is this to run on an existing Windows install, without going through a VM? I’d love to run this on my home machine.
I’m not sure I can answer that in detail. Also, “safe” is kind of vague so I’m not sure what your threat model is.
But I will say that I would 100% be running it as my home windows if I wasn’t using Linux. Do I think it’s the equivalent? No. Do I think there’s a possibility of Microsoft turning things back on with updates? Yes. But its far easier than running O&O and a bunch of power shell scripts to try to remove bloat and telemetry hoping you got everything. I have no complaints.
Dad of 4 kids here, I would say use the system that let you concentrate more on the kid and less on tinkering the OS.
Fedora could be a nice successor since it runs extremely stable, best way to be clean and safe are doing the updates, but I say this with 15 years of Linux experience.
Better stay on win 10. Family first.
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Dad of 4 kids here, I would say use the system that let you concentrate more on the kid and less on tinkering the OS.
Dad of 3 here with 20something years on Linux already. This is the correct answer. Just go for win11 if that’s the simplest route for you, Linux will be there once you have the capacity to learn it. With a new baby you’ll be exhausted, you have a crapload (sometimes quite literally) new things to learn already and you just won’t have the time to do all the things you used to (as you already know). Making things more challenging for you by switching to something completely new just eats the very little time you have for yourself.
My work laptop has 11 running on it and it’s good enough. OS on that thing is not my call anyways, but at least on my workload it gets the job done.
Running daws on linux is bad. Just go to win 11
if you’re going to be too time pressured to have fun with Linux, probably don’t for now
Your easiest way is to upgrade windows normally and if you dislike all it’s bloated software, just install Atlas OS on top of it. It’s just a software that will go through your windows and debloat it as much as possible. Simple as that. Easier done than reinstalling windows for an LTSC version. I personally have a dual boot with a win 11 with Atlas OS specifically for the software I can’t install on Linux.
