I’m on the market to buy a new laptop, and Lemmy has successfully coaxed and goaded me to give Linux a serious try.

I’ve never used *nix as my personal OS.

Which hardware/laptop do you recommend? And which OS to pair it with for a Linux newbie?

I’m a software engineer, and quit my job to pursue an MSc in AI. So my uses will be:

  • programming
  • study
  • browsing lemmy
  • gaming
  • SendPicsofSandwiches@sh.itjust.works
    332·
    9 months ago

    Linux runs on literally anything. The hardware doesn’t matter too much these days, but which distro you pick does. I would say to just load a flash drive with a live image of a distro you think looks cool and see how you like it on a trial basis. Try a couple of them before you reqlly make a decision and then load the full image

    • cm0002@lemmy.world
      51·
      9 months ago

      The hardware doesn’t matter too much these days

      WiFi, Bluetooth and Nvidia graphics have entered the chat

      • agelord@lemmy.world
        6·
        9 months ago

        The proprietary Nvidia graphics drivers works pretty well in most distros. Just go to your distro’s driver manager and enable the proprietary driver.

        • cyberfae@lemmy.worldEnglish
          1·
          9 months ago

          Nvidia cards can still be tricky, especially on optimus laptops. It’s not nearly as problematic as it used to be, but I still run into occasional issues with it. If I ever buy a new computer for gaming, I’m going to go with AMD.

      • averyfalken@lemmy.blahaj.zone
        5·
        9 months ago

        WiFi and Bluetooth yeah, if you run Linux mint setting up the proprietary drivers us literally like 2 buttons in the drivers menu

    • muntedcrocodile@lemmy.world
      4·
      9 months ago

      I use manjaro xfce but i would reccommend fedora or mint if ya starting out. Fedora seems to just work most of the time hardware wise.