come back here if you need to understand something about it

Most of the Ubuntu guides online should work for you if you’re using Mint. (Unless you’re using Mint Debian Edition, but even then a lot will work.)

if you use obs for streaming i’ve had better stability out of it on linux than on mac or windows. probably says more about obs than those oses though.

new vegas is gold support listed on protondb, so it probably works fine

do a dual boot install so you can go back when you need to. that means before you install inux, chkdisk, defrag and turn off bitlocker.

make a backup.

Typically recommended guides:

https://easylinuxtipsproject.blogspot.com/p/1.html

https://linuxjourney.com/

Have a good transition and if you stick with Mint, I’d recommend the official forums for any questions: https://forums.linuxmint.com/index.php

Hey, friend. I just wanted to let you know that I couldn’t get New Vegas to run on my (up to date) Linux PC until I installed the custom Proton version called “Proton GE.” The GE stands for Glorious Eggroll, which is the username of the developer. There’s guides on how to install it on the GitHub’s readme. I know it may sound complicated to someone new, but you can do it!

Here’s a link to the read me: https://github.com/GloriousEggroll/proton-ge-custom?tab=readme-ov-file#manual

Scroll down to the “native” install instructions.

Of course, you can ignore this if New Vegas just works for you as it seems to for many others. My system is MX Linux, not Mint.

I see you got your answer, but I’m adding on for anyone else that comes across this.

For me, I learned the most when I had a disposable and replaceable system. When I was dual booted I was too scared to touch anything in case it fucked everything up. Once I started poking round on a Pi, LiveUSB, etc it was a lot easier to learn because I could always restart.

Id start there with something like Mint or Ubuntu. Then set it up in a way where you can easily replace your OS so you can reset it often and fuck around. Then just learn as you go.

Hallelujah, another soul saved!

Personally I’d recommend Mint. It’s intuitive and things tend to work out of the box. There are many others that’ll do just as fine, but the large Mint userbase makes it easy to google any problems you might stumble into.

I’ve been primarily a linux user for almost two decades now, and I still run mint, simply because I sometimes just want something simple that does its job without much hazzle.

Since you chose Linux Mint—good choice btw—something to keep in mind is that Mint is based on Ubuntu. While you’re learning and searching the interwebs for how to do x, y, and z, if you don’t find an article or guide specifically about Mint, try searching the same phrase replacing “mint” with “ubuntu.” There’s far more content out there about Ubuntu than Mint, but since Mint is based on Ubuntu, 9 times out of 10 the same solution on an Ubuntu forum works in Mint.

Good luck!

Yeah just boot it up and fuck around. You’ll eventually want to do something that isn’t obviously doable, and then you’ll look it up. A series of rabbit holes later and you’ll have learned a bunch of stuff. Maybe not the thing you originally wanted to, but some other stuff!

Hey, others have already replied to a lot of things and you’ve already downloaded Mint (which is what I would have recommended also), so I would like to point out some things I always tell newcomers and some specific things for what you said.

First of all: Linux is not Windows is the hardest lesson to learn, there are a lot of things you’re used to doing one way, but that doesn’t make that way correct. The main example is installing software, looking on the internet and downloading a binary from a website is NOT how you do it, the example I always give is that of a smartphone, it’s just as ridiculous to do in Linux than on a smartphone and for the same reasons. Instead use the package manager of your distro, that should work like the play/app store (except it’s free), and if something is not there maybe you can add a repository to it, or maybe the program doesn’t exist on Linux, only as a last resource should you do it manually.

Partitions and drives: Linux doesn’t have the concept of a C: or D: drives, instead drives/partitions are mounted onto regular folders, so navigating through them is seamless. This means that if for example you were t mount the folder that contains all of your personal user data (/home) into a different partition from the root of the system (i.e /), you could format and change the system entirely without losing any personal data. This is very useful because it’s very likely you will poke something and break stuff, with much freedom comes much power to break things, so being able to reinstall your system without worrying about your personal data is a good thing.

Drivers: mostly you shouldn’t worry about drivers on Linux, unless your GPU is Nvidia, if so you should worry about drivers a lot. Nvidia’s work best with the proprietary nvidia driver (instead of the default open nouveau driver), but the fact that the driver is proprietary makes it a pain in the ass to deal. You should 100% use it since you’re gaming, but you should steer away from distributions that use Wayland (nevermind what this is for now) instead of X11 (Mint so far uses X11). If you have a Radeon you shouldn’t worry about this.

I use my PC mainly for streaming

Be careful, afaik not all streaming software/sites are compatible with Linux. But that’s not a world I dabbled much, I know OBS works excellently, but other than that don’t know much.

downloading torrent files who’s copyright you don’t need to worry about

We all have torrent downloaders, for our Linux iso which are distributed via torrent of course

and light gaming. Usually just messing with New Vegas mods.

Iirc new Vegas is not on the supported list on steam, so you need to go to settings and enable Proton compatibility for all titles. I’ve never put mods so not sure how to do that, but you might need to read something before because the game is being run through a compatibility layer, so the files are not exactly where you would expect, and if you need to run a binary to find those files it needs to be in the same profile as new Vegas (each game creates their own profile based on steam ID, and each profile is in a different folder). Other than that New Vegas works perfectly on Linux, I’ve played it a long time ago, and now with the TV show I’ve started again.

Last but not least: Welcome!