Linux Distro Suggestions

terpsy said:
Am I the only one who likes KDE and Plasma Desktop?
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Not even close. It's always my go to and despite the ancient hardware in my sig I never have any slowdowns or other issues with it. Running it on Manjaro and haven't had any problems.

I said it before and I'll say it again, I was quite surprised and taken with Manjaro. For whatever reason I have never liked Debian and Debian based distros. I can't tell you what it is about them I don't like but it's always something no matter how many I've tried and with many different DEs. I simply don't like them. openSUSE was actually my main go to for my use and I still run openSUSE Leap on my server but definitely love Manjaro on my main system. Despite not having any issues with Manjaro I don't foresee myself ever running that as my server OS and plan to stick with openSUSE in the future yet.
 
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SmokeRngs said:
Not even close. It's always my go to and despite the ancient hardware in my sig I never have any slowdowns or other issues with it. Running it on Manjaro and haven't had any problems.

I said it before and I'll say it again, I was quite surprised and taken with Manjaro. For whatever reason I have never liked Debian and Debian based distros. I can't tell you what it is about them I don't like but it's always something no matter how many I've tried and with many different DEs. I simply don't like them. openSUSE was actually my main go to for my use and I still run openSUSE Leap on my server but definitely love Manjaro on my main system. Despite not having any issues with Manjaro I don't foresee myself ever running that as my server OS and plan to stick with openSUSE in the future yet.
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I find myself doing basically the same thing. Manjaro for my everyday. Suse for stuff I need to be rock solid and don't care if I have the latest version of MESA running or not. ;)

Manjaro is imo the perfect power user distro. Its stable enough to never worry about thanks to their testing hold. I can choose to install from the testing (arch) repos if I require something a bit sooner. Have full access to the AUR... and for the most part have the latest version of everything by default. Rolling with weekly updates instead of daily is perfect. its just a solid no fuss distro.

SUSE has always been a personal fav though. To me its a nice in between of Cent and Fedora. Its RPM based but quite the full backport happy RHEL/Cent. :) Leap is a great distro.
 
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ChadD said:
I find myself doing basically the same thing. Manjaro for my everyday. Suse for stuff I need to be rock solid and don't care if I have the latest version of MESA running or not. ;)

Manjaro is imo the perfect power user distro. Its stable enough to never worry about thanks to their testing hold. I can choose to install from the testing (arch) repos if I require something a bit sooner. Have full access to the AUR... and for the most part have the latest version of everything by default. Rolling with weekly updates instead of daily is perfect. its just a solid no fuss distro.

SUSE has always been a personal fav though. To me its a nice in between of Cent and Fedora. Its RPM based but quite the full backport happy RHEL/Cent. :) Leap is a great distro.
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I used to think that SUSE was going to take over Debians spot, but the winds seem to have shifted again. I think if you are working in IT, you should have a Cent/Fedora system somewhere since Red Hat is almost exclusively what is used in the corp. world.
 
KarsusTG said:
I used to think that SUSE was going to take over Debians spot, but the winds seem to have shifted again. I think if you are working in IT, you should have a Cent/Fedora system somewhere since Red Hat is almost exclusively what is used in the corp. world.
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Ya you can't help but see Fedora in the world. Its a good solid distro.. and I have supported centos installs as well. Not every company pays Red Hat.
Going forward it will be interesting to see what IBM does with RH. Hopefully not much changes... that doesn't sound like IBM though. The shifting ownership was one knock on SUSE for awhile, and their ownership is changing hands this year as well. Hopefully neither RH or SUSE see any real changes.

SUSE does have a pretty strong foot print in Europe though. RH is for sure #1 in the North American. Both are strong distros.
 
ChadD said:
I find myself doing basically the same thing. Manjaro for my everyday. Suse for stuff I need to be rock solid and don't care if I have the latest version of MESA running or not. ;)

Manjaro is imo the perfect power user distro. Its stable enough to never worry about thanks to their testing hold. I can choose to install from the testing (arch) repos if I require something a bit sooner. Have full access to the AUR... and for the most part have the latest version of everything by default. Rolling with weekly updates instead of daily is perfect. its just a solid no fuss distro.

SUSE has always been a personal fav though. To me its a nice in between of Cent and Fedora. Its RPM based but quite the full backport happy RHEL/Cent. :) Leap is a great distro.
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Well, I'm over to Manjaro now. Still on cinnamon. What a beauty. And on the latest kernel. This ought to hold me over for a while until I get the itch to try another flavor again
 
Does anyone else run an AM4 and 1070ti on Manjaro? I cannot get the distro to run well at all. I have constant screen flicker and corruption. And when I try to install the nvidia driver, it hoses the whole install.

When I go back to Ubuntu (any flavor) there is no issue. Linux mint is also hit and miss, have to install with no 3rd party drivers, and then add them manually afterwards.
 
I've done Manjaro with an AM4 and Nvidia. It was a 550, though. My 1070ti is in an Ubuntu box.
Went pretty easy for me with the 2600 and the 550. No issues

I'm sure someone will post up some solution tactics.
 
terpsy said:
Does anyone else run an AM4 and 1070ti on Manjaro? I cannot get the distro to run well at all. I have constant screen flicker and corruption. And when I try to install the nvidia driver, it hoses the whole install.

When I go back to Ubuntu (any flavor) there is no issue. Linux mint is also hit and miss, have to install with no 3rd party drivers, and then add them manually afterwards.
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DogsofJune said:
I've done Manjaro with an AM4 and Nvidia. It was a 550, though. My 1070ti is in an Ubuntu box.
Went pretty easy for me with the 2600 and the 550. No issues

I'm sure someone will post up some solution tactics.
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Maybe, just to get the conversation going:
Using free or non-free drivers? Some notice differences between the two. Also, for older hardware (I personally know that FM2 socket falls into this category), the official driver from AMD dropped support. Now, that shouldn't mean much since you're running an nvidia GPU, and that's separate. And, should have it's own driver, etc. Maybe try swapping between free/non-free drivers, if you haven't already
 
FNtastic said:
Maybe, just to get the conversation going:
Using free or non-free drivers? Some notice differences between the two. Also, for older hardware (I personally know that FM2 socket falls into this category), the official driver from AMD dropped support. Now, that shouldn't mean much since you're running an nvidia GPU, and that's separate. And, should have it's own driver, etc. Maybe try swapping between free/non-free drivers, if you haven't already
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I have always stuck to the non-free driver for installation. I know, it goes against everything Open Source, but I have always had the best results straight from GangGreen. I have tried the free driver as well to rule it out.
 
terpsy said:
I have always stuck to the non-free driver for installation. I know, it goes against everything Open Source, but I have always had the best results straight from GangGreen. I have tried the free driver as well to rule it out.
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Don't feel bad. I always did as well, until recently. The free drivers arguably perform better. Good that you tried both to rule that out.
 
If your running nvidia in general install using non-free. If your running intel or amd use free.

The AMD and Intel open drivers are the official drivers.

I have only installed a couple systems nvidia. I choose non-free and in general have no issues. Same deal with Mint that allows you to choose non-free at install.

Not sure why you are having issues with a 1070... I'll see if I can find anything specific to that or the AMD chipset. The NV GPU systems I have installed where all on Intel... perhaps the issue is something with the AMD setup. Will do some reading.
 
I have tried on a X370 and B450 chipset motherboard. Have used a 1600X and 2700X cpu.

Weird as heck to be honest. I will say though that even Ubuntu 18.10 had some quirkiness, and 18.04 has been rock solid.

Perhaps Mint 19 and 19.1 issues reside with the 18.10 kernel
 
I did have an odd quirk with 18.10 and my 1070ti. It did an update and the framerates became a slideshow. Even at desktop.
I did a command line update of the nvidNv non free and all was well again.
 
terpsy said:
Does anyone else run an AM4 and 1070ti on Manjaro? I cannot get the distro to run well at all. I have constant screen flicker and corruption. And when I try to install the nvidia driver, it hoses the whole install.

When I go back to Ubuntu (any flavor) there is no issue. Linux mint is also hit and miss, have to install with no 3rd party drivers, and then add them manually afterwards.
Click to expand...

Have you tried any of the steps listed here?
 
Wow, the Ubuntu box with the 1070ti likes proprietary 390 drivers, and nothing else. When I try and switch to the nouveau free or 396, 410, or 415 nvidia driver, I get a slideshow and only one of the two monitors work.
I guess I'll be troubleshooting Friday when I have more time.
 
DogsofJune said:
Wow, the Ubuntu box with the 1070ti likes proprietary 390 drivers, and nothing else. When I try and switch to the nouveau free or 396, 410, or 415 nvidia driver, I get a slideshow and only one of the two monitors work.
I guess I'll be troubleshooting Friday when I have more time.
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I had the same problem on my 5510. Arch or Arch based distros worked far better for me thus why I'm on Manjaro right now.
 
DogsofJune said:
Wow, the Ubuntu box with the 1070ti likes proprietary 390 drivers, and nothing else. When I try and switch to the nouveau free or 396, 410, or 415 nvidia driver, I get a slideshow and only one of the two monitors work.
I guess I'll be troubleshooting Friday when I have more time.
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What version of Ubuntu?

I am running the latest 41X version of Nvidia drivers on 18.04
 
I thought I had. Need to check to verify this eve.

Well, I checked. When I swapped out a GTX 670 for the 1070ti, I had added the repositories. It seems though since going to 18.10, it's all default repositories. No Nvdia stuff, Wine or others I had added.

Which is fine I suppose. Updating and trying out 415 drivers now.....
 
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I feel like pretty much any distribution I've used in the last several years meets your needs.

You'll probably want to choose a distribution that is either Debuan/Ubuntu based or Fedora based, as these are the most common, so you'll have an easier time finding pre-configured packages and repositories for everything.

Personally I am a huge fan of the apt-package manager, so this keeps me in the Debian/Ubuntu side of the family.

Ever since Ubuntu switched to the Unity interface as their default desktop, I have been using Linux Mint, most recently the Cinnamon edition.

Under the hood it is essentially the same as Ubuntu which means you get the Ubuntu optimized kernel and drivers, as well as the Debian derived apt package manager, It just uses a Desktop that at least I find more pleasing.
 
Frobozz said:
1) I saw a blurb about Plex being available as a snap. Should be stupid easy to get it installed. https://snapcraft.io/blog/plex-arrives-in-canonicals-snap-store Disclaimer - I have never used Plex.
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I don't know if I trust snaps. Something about the concept just bothers me.

One of the biggest benefits of Linux is having all of your software in a single unified package manager. Snaps break that, and are counter-productive IMHO. I would never put them on any system of mine.
 
Once I get my main desktop out of moving boxes I plan on trying out a new distro or two (I have a new 2 TB drive to work on so my Windows 10 Insider Edition doesn't trash anything or vice versa). While I have a decent workstation already out of storage that can handle virtual machines just fine it has a dirt ancient video card on it and that limits the flashier distros from installing without issue.

I thought a snap was a self-contained and containered (aka sandboxed) application that could run without needing your particular distro to have prerequisites installed nor touch the main operating system. If that isn't what it is I could see some concern (as in not knowing the underlying prerequisite software running without permission).
 
My understanding is the SNAPs running sandboxed in kind of a sudo virtual environment. I think they have a place. It definitely makes dependency management easier
 
DeChache said:
My understanding is the SNAPs running sandboxed in kind of a sudo virtual environment. I think they have a place. It definitely makes dependency management easier
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Sounds like all it is doing is statically compiling in all of its dependencies. That is hardly efficient. :/
 
Algrim said:
Well, if you want efficient you should be running Gentoo...
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I ran Gentoo for many years. (~2001-2006?) It's supposed efficiency is pretty much fiction. Sure, system specific optimizations were cool, but they were still compiled on the plain old boring GCC compiler which doesn't result in very fast code, no matter how many optimization flags you use. In benchmarking it was pretty much never practically faster than a binary distribution.
 
Zarathustra[H] said:
I ran Gentoo for many years. (~2001-2006?) It's supposed efficiency is pretty much fiction. Sure, system specific optimizations were cool, but they were still compiled on the plain old boring GCC compiler which doesn't result in very fast code, no matter how many optimization flags you use. In benchmarking it was pretty much never practically faster than a binary distribution.
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I wonder how clear linux gets compiled? They do some crazy optimization with that but the last time I read about how they build the OS, it sounded very strange.
 
KonaKona040 said:
I wonder how clear linux gets compiled? They do some crazy optimization with that but the last time I read about how they build the OS, it sounded very strange.
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No idea. Not familiar with them.

It would be interesting to compile a distribution from source using a higher performance compiler, like the Intel compiler and see if that makes a bench arkable difference.
 
Clear Linux is Intels distribution.
https://clearlinux.org/
https://clearlinux.org/documentation/clear-linux/concepts/swupd-about

What they are basically saying is they don't update packages. So most distros have a versioning list. So you could say update X package but nothing else. With Clear linux they do update bundles. That bundle may have 100 updated files or 2000... but if your running bundle 1001. Then every version of everything you are running is known... caue bundle 1001 includes everything. There is no option to go and update one package.

It means you can't as a user only update one or two things. Its full update or bust.

Clear Linux isn't a distro I would suggest most people use as a regular driver. Its more of a test distro made by Intel for 100% Intel hardware. It is super fast as a distro becaue Intel hyper optimizes everything for Intel x86 hardware. There optimizations can also completely ignore potential versioning differences... cause they can't be with their bundle system. So there are some optimizations that look great on benches but they aren't practical for a regular distro.

The best thing about Clear Linux... is they do upstream plenty of great performance optimisations that filter out into every other distro.

Intel... as a PC user there are plenty of reasons to hate them. As a Linux user they make it real hard. There support of Linux is second to no one in the hardware game.
 
Spent the weekend banging my head on Ubuntu 18.10 new install and trying to get WoW to work... any help is appreciated

Installed Ubuntu 18.10
Installed Nvidia 415.XX drivers
Installed Wine (4.0 stable)
Installed Lutris
Installed DXVK libraries
Battle.net installs, WoW installs

Launch WoW, and the screen just sits there :(

It doesn't seem to launch, sure it has something to do with wine 4.0

Tried Staging as well

Turned off preferred libraries in the advanced options as well

Anyone?
 
terpsy said:
Spent the weekend banging my head on Ubuntu 18.10 new install and trying to get WoW to work... any help is appreciated

Installed Ubuntu 18.10
Installed Nvidia 415.XX drivers
Installed Wine (4.0 stable)
Installed Lutris
Installed DXVK libraries
Battle.net installs, WoW installs

Launch WoW, and the screen just sits there :(

It doesn't seem to launch, sure it has something to do with wine 4.0

Tried Staging as well

Turned off preferred libraries in the advanced options as well

Anyone?
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I don't play wow... and this may be a crazy suggestion.

Now that Valve allows you to add any software to Linux steam to be launched using proton. Have you tried adding WOW to steam ? Not sure but if you already have wow on your system perhaps its worth a try. See if the default proton / dxvk setup in steam launches it.
 
ChadD said:
Clear Linux is Intels distribution.
https://clearlinux.org/
https://clearlinux.org/documentation/clear-linux/concepts/swupd-about

What they are basically saying is they don't update packages. So most distros have a versioning list. So you could say update X package but nothing else. With Clear linux they do update bundles. That bundle may have 100 updated files or 2000... but if your running bundle 1001. Then every version of everything you are running is known... caue bundle 1001 includes everything. There is no option to go and update one package.

It means you can't as a user only update one or two things. Its full update or bust.

Clear Linux isn't a distro I would suggest most people use as a regular driver. Its more of a test distro made by Intel for 100% Intel hardware. It is super fast as a distro becaue Intel hyper optimizes everything for Intel x86 hardware. There optimizations can also completely ignore potential versioning differences... cause they can't be with their bundle system. So there are some optimizations that look great on benches but they aren't practical for a regular distro.

The best thing about Clear Linux... is they do upstream plenty of great performance optimisations that filter out into every other distro.

Intel... as a PC user there are plenty of reasons to hate them. As a Linux user they make it real hard. There support of Linux is second to no one in the hardware game.
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Ah, that makes sense. Kinda foreign... but makes sense.

It seems to perform well on AMD as well, based on stuff done by Phoronix. Surprisingly doesn't seem to bias Intel CPUs, from what I recall.
 
KonaKona040 said:
Ah, that makes sense. Kinda foreign... but makes sense.

It seems to perform well on AMD as well, based on stuff done by Phoronix. Surprisingly doesn't seem to bias Intel CPUs, from what I recall.
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Ya I have read some of that as well... its aimed at Intel stuff, but should really run on anything. I think some of the optimizations could potentially slow things down on non intel hardware... but mostly it shouldn't.

Its an interesting distro, kudos to Intel for making their own distro to try and lead with Linux development. Intel is one of the biggest corp supplier of Linux kernel commits and I'm sure a bit part of that is all the time and money they spend on developing clear linux. :)
 
ChadD said:
I don't play wow... and this may be a crazy suggestion.

Now that Valve allows you to add any software to Linux steam to be launched using proton. Have you tried adding WOW to steam ? Not sure but if you already have wow on your system perhaps its worth a try. See if the default proton / dxvk setup in steam launches it.
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I think the Proton is more for Windows installed games and wrappers.

I do not think any windows games will run magically in Proton. That installing locally and using wrappers as Lutris is still as good as it gets besides for native Linux installers.
 
ChadD said:
Ya I have read some of that as well... its aimed at Intel stuff, but should really run on anything. I think some of the optimizations could potentially slow things down on non intel hardware... but mostly it shouldn't.

Its an interesting distro, kudos to Intel for making their own distro to try and lead with Linux development. Intel is one of the biggest corp supplier of Linux kernel commits and I'm sure a bit part of that is all the time and money they spend on developing clear linux. :)
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Sure enough, look what got posted today:

https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=clearlinux-main-desktop&num=1

I don't imagine it'd be fun to run that in the long term, with having to upgrade all of your packages at once...
 
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