Hey folks. Iāve had an on-again, off-again relationship with Linux for over 20 years. Usually, my attempts to use it are either thwarted by issues installing, issues booting, or general problems while using itā¦ leading to ācatastrophic failureā that I canāt fix without digging into hours of research and terminal commands.
Windows 11 (even 10) are rock solid for me, even as a very heavy multitasker. No crashes. No needing to reboot, unless Iām forced to with an update, and really no issues with any hardware or software I was running.
But with Linux, I just canāt believe how unstable it is, even when I do the absolute basic things.
Iām trying to learn why this is, and how I can prevent these issues from coming up. As I said, Iām committed to using Linux now (Iām done with American software), so Iām open to suggestions.
For context, Iām using a Framework laptop, which is fully (and officially) supports Fedora and Ubuntu. Since Fedora has American ties, Iāve settled with Ubuntu.
All things work as they should: fingerprint scanner, wifi, bluetooth, screen dimming, wake up from suspend, external drives, NAS shared folders, etc. Iāve even got VirtualBox running Windows 11 for the few paid software that I need to load up from time to time.
But Iām noticing issues that seemingly pop out of nowhere on the software/os end of things.
For example, after having no issues updating software, I get this an error: āsomething went wrong, but weāre not sure what it is.ā
Then sometimes Iāll be using Firefox, Iāll open a new tab to type in a search term or URL, and the typing will ālagā, then the address bar will flicker like itās reloading, and it doesnāt respond well to my mouse clicks. I have to close it out, then start over for it to resolve.
Then Iāll open a different app, sometimes it might open, sometimes it wonāt.
Or an app will freeze for no obvious reason, and Iāll get a popup asking to wait or quit.
Another time I left my computer while I went out for a walk, came back, and it was like I just rebootedā¦ all my work was gone, and it was starting fresh from the login screen.
Iām trying not to overload things, and Iām doing maybe 1/5th of what Iād normally be doing when running windows. But I donāt understand why itās so unstable.
Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
FWIW, Iām not keen to switch away from Ubuntu, because I do still want official support if thereās ever a problem with getting hardware to work.
UPDATE: Wow, I did not expect to get so many responses! Amazing!
Per suggestions, I ran a memtest86 for over 3 hours and it was clean.
I installed Fedora 41 and am now setting it up. Seems good so far, and elevated permissions can be authorized with biometrics! This was not something I had to. Ubuntu, so awesome there!
Any specific tips for Fedora that I should know? Obviously, no more Snap packages now! š
UPDATE 2: Ok, Fedora seems waaaay more stable than Ubuntu (and Mint). No strangeness like beforeā¦ but not everything works as easily. For example, getting a bridged network adapter to work in virtualbox was one-click easy on Ubuntuā¦ not so much on Fedora (still trying to get it working). And Virtualbox didnāt even run my VM without more terminal hackery.
But the OS seems usable, and Iām still setting things up.
One thing I have noticed, however. When I search for how to fix or do something, nearly all websites and forums reference Debian/Ubuntu commands, so the fragmentation there is a little annoying
That doesnāt sound right.
Start with Linux Mint. Iāve helped Boomers use it. My dad has been using it as his daily driver for almost 5 years and he doesnāt know the difference between an OS and a Word Processor (he keeps calling LibreOffice āLinuxā).
On this laptop, Mint was even worse, unfortunately!
I do have it running on a miniPC hooked up to my TV, though. Very basic stuff like video streaming. :(
It runs my TV too, which is a 7-year-old Dell All-in-One touch screen that works great.
Interesting, Iāve had terrible experience trying to get a stylus-supporting touchscreen to work on Mint.
Works perfectly on my Asus Zenbook.
I donāt use it much, but it works.
I honestly think mint is an outdated suggestion for beginners, I think immutability is extremely important for someone who is just starting out, as well as starting on KDE since itās by far the most developed DE that isnāt gnome and theirā¦ design decisions are unfortunate for people coming from windows.
I donāt think we should be recommending mint to beginners anymore, if mint makes an immutable, up to date KDE distro, thatāll change, but until then, I think bazzite is objectively a better starting place for beginners.
The mere fact that it generates a new system for you on update and lets you switch between and rollback automatically is enough for me to say itās better, but it also has more up to date software, and tons of guides (fedora is one of the most popular distros, and bazzite is essentially identical except with some QoL upgrades).
How common is the story of āI was new to linux and completely broke itā? thatās not a good user experience for someone whoās just starting, itās intimidating, scary, and I just donāt think itās the best in the modern era. Thereās something to be said about learning from these mistakes, but bazzite essentially makes these mistakes impossible.
Furthermore because of the way bazzite works, package management is completely graphical and requires essentially no intervention on the users part, flathub and immutability pair excellently for this reason.
Cinnamon (the default mint environment) doesnāt and wonāt support HDR, the security/performance improvements from wayland, mixed refresh rate displays, mixed DPI displays, fractional scaling, and many other things for a very very long time if at all. I donāt understand the usecase for cinnamon tbh, xfce is great if you need performance but donāt want to make major sacrifices, lxqt is great if you need A LOT of performance, cinnamon isnāt particularly performant and just a strictly worse version of kde in my eyes from the perspective of a beginner, anyway.
I have 15 years of linux experience and am willing to infinitely troubleshoot if you add me on matrix.