As the title say’s, my Windows 10 install broke, but I’m still unsure whether or not to reinstall Windows 10 or install Linux.
Context:
A few months back, Windows 10 updates started to fail on my desktop. I had considered just reinstalling the OS but as my machine was working just fine I simply tolerated it.
Today, when my machine auto-updated it broke something. At first I thought the update worked. But soon I realized that the taskbar was acting odd. All the shortcuts I had placed on my taskbar were working as usual, but when I right clicked them nothing would happen. I clicked on the start menu and the search bar but nothing happened. Most of the widgets on the right side of the taskbar weren’t working such as Volume, Wi-Fi, Date & Time, and Notifications. I assumed it was just the taskbar that was broken but when I tried to use the windows key to open the settings menu, it didn’t work either, nor did it’s keyboard shortcut.
It seems the update had broken some apps that, though didn’t prevent Windows from starting, made navigating it a lot more difficult.
I’ve used Linux before. I had a Linux Mint, and EndeavourOS virtual machine installed on my computer. More recently, I installed EndeavourOS on an old laptop I had lying around, and have been using it daily for about a month now. Although I’ve had my difficulties, I’ve been loving my experience.
Though I’m still a Linux newbie I’ve been meaning to give Linux a real shot on my desktop for a couple weeks now, but as my machine was working just fine I didn’t really feel any necessity to make the switch.
But with my Windows install breaking, I feel like its time to give Linux a real shot.
My Questions:
I want to install Fedora on my desktop but I still have a few questions pertaining to Linux and my desktop specs.
I’m running a GTX 1660. I’ve heard a lot of bad things about running Linux with an NVIDIA GPU so I’d like a few things clarified.
- How would I install NVIDIA drivers?
- Does Wayland work with NVIDIA?
- A lot of distros are moving to Wayland. How would I ensure I stay on an Xorg session?
- I enjoy modding Bethesda games. Does Mod Organizer work fully on Linux?
- I’ve had difficulties running my steam games through proton on my laptop. Does proton work with Fedora?
- With said difficulties with proton, would installing Steam as a flatpak work or will it cause issues?
- Can you really not play any games with anti-cheat?
If you believe Fedora wouldn’t be the best distro for me I’m welcome to hear any suggestions, though I’m not enthusiastic about running anything Debian based nor installing vanilla Arch.
I’m sorry if I’m coming off as lazy for not doing my research. I’ve tried to research many of these questions before but found no concrete answers.
To all those who took the time to respond to my post.
Thank You!
Edit: I’ve made a new post
I would suggest, whatever you try, that you make sure to write down your windows key and then deauthorize your PC. That way, if it doesn’t work out and you want/need to go back, you can reinstall windows and not deal with the unlicensed copy BS.
Go for it. Switching to Linux has never been easier than it is today. I still keep a Windows virtual machine for when I need to use specific Windows applications, but aside from that I have been running Linux on my work and gaming machines for two years now with zero issues.
I’m surprised to hear you had problems with Proton - in my experience it has been seamless, although there are still some titles that don’t work so well with it. I don’t play any games that require anti-cheat, though, so there is that.
It’s never easy to say which distro is best, because every user and every machine is different. I personally recommend Nobara instead of Fedora, as a lot of the post-install tweaking is already done for you and it should even install the latest Nvidia drivers for you as well.
Just to clarify on the proton thing, its an issue I faced on my old 80TJ Lenovo ideapad. I assume it’s a hardware issue as Vulkan doesn’t seem to work, and it has 4 gigs of ram. There’s also the fact its over 9 years old.
I’m not really searching for a solution to my laptops problems, but thanks for the insight.
If you don’t mind me asking what difficulties would I face switching desktop environments/ window managers as I’d like to experiment a bit(on my desktop).
Ah, ok.
As far as DE-hopping, it does come with some problems. At the very least, you will have a ton of different apps installed, as each DE will want its own file manager, terminal, etc. At worst, you will get conflicts and it can end up a right mess.
I would personally keep a separate virtual machine or Ventoy USB separate from your main machine, as it will give you the freedom to mess around with different desktops to your heart’s content. If that isn’t an option for whatever reason, then at the very least make sure you create a separate user account for each separate WM/DE you install so that shit doesn’t break.
I highly recommend, as a beginner and a windows user, using fedora kinoite
It’s immutable, which means you can’t break the system unless you try very hard, and even then, it’ll give you a list of previous setups to boot from, and updates can’t break it.
It also keeps the system separate from your apps by using flatpak, the intricacies aren’t really important as a beginner but basically this means you’ll have an absolutely stable rock solid system that you never have to do weird maintenance for
I would highly recommend trying it out, and i’m absolutely willing to help with any issues you run into, feel free to message me on matrix @communist:mozilla.org or here.
try it, you can always install windows again
Mod organizer has a linux install script on github that I’ve used without issues before. I play skyrim on Ubuntu 23.10 with well over 100 mods and it’s been largely just the same as on windows.
I’m sorry, I don’t have time to address your questions individually but you should check out Nobara Linux, it is Fedora modded heavily for gamers and they have a version with Nvidia drivers pre installed. It works near perfectly out of the box, I haven’t tried mod organizers but Lutris works great for any game that doesn’t run thru Steam Proton.
How would I install NVIDIA drivers? https://rpmfusion.org/Howto/NVIDIA
Does Wayland work with NVIDIA? (I don’t know)
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A lot of distros are moving to Wayland. How would I ensure I stay on an Xorg session? GNOME now defaults to Wayland. Instructions to use xOrg instead: https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/quick-docs/configuring-xorg-as-default-gnome-session/ I’d other desktop environments will similarly have mechanisms switch, at least during a transition period.
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I enjoy modding Bethesda games. Does Mod Organizer work fully on Linux? Your mileage may vary, but it looks likely: https://github.com/rockerbacon/modorganizer2-linux-installer
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I’ve had difficulties running my steam games through proton on my laptop. Does proton work with Fedora? I suspect it will. Steam has been pouring money into making it’s catalog Linux ready, https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/gaming/proton/
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With said difficulties with proton, would installing Steam as a flatpak work or will it cause issues? In principle it ought to, but there appears to be an issue with it currently. https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/gaming/proton/
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Can you really not play any games with anti-cheat? Anti cheat software generally works by looking for irregularities that detect if there’s any program besides Windows that’s intercepting system calls. It is unfortunately by exactly this mechanism that allows Proton to work (as Windows isn’t present).
This is extremely helpful. Thank you for the links!
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You’re getting a lot of good advice. Whatever distro you decide to use, try to find a live CD that lets you use it on the PC without installing it. That should ease your mind tremendously.
How do I install Nvidia drivers
On fedora it’s simple, you enable 3rd party repositories during install and then you install it from the software center.
Does Wayland work with Nvidia
Your experience will vary, it works fine for some and not so fine for others afaik.
Most distros are moving to Wayland, how do I ensure an Xorg session.
Distros that are moving to Wayland still provide an Xorg session and probably will do so for the foreseeable future.
Will proton work on fedora.
Yes. Proton is distro independent, it’s a tool, provided by steam and it doesn’t really care what distro you are running. Remember to enable steamplay for all games from the steam settings before you do anything else.
Will installing steam as a flatpaks work?
Yes. I’ve heard that some people have had issues with the steam flatpaks, but I personally haven’t, it should work fine.
Can you not play anticheat games.
Entirely depends on the game you wanna play. Some anticheat games work, others don’t. Check the game you wanna play on protondb to see if it works. That being said, afaik anticheat support outside steam is basically a non existent, so if you like playing valorant (you poor, poor soul) or Fortnite for example, you’re kinda out of luck, unless you wanna dual boot.
Note: Try the distro before installing, live ISOs exist for a reason.
Note 2: Take a look at ventoy
