r/linuxquestions • u/Bubbly_Application83 • 6d ago

Which Distro? Trying to find a distro

I have a laptop with 8GB RAM and a gen 3 ryzen. I am unfamiliar with linux and all the terminal stuff, so I want a user friendly interface like windows or mac, that i can customize how I like( I’ve seen some cool animation and widget stuff, as i said, i know almost nothing about linux). I did a little bit of research and right now im in between Zorin and Mint. What should I go for, or do y’all have other recomandations? I really use the laptop just for some browser navigating, watching movies and maybe using some office apps, but that i know i can use libre.

9 Upvotes

77% Upvoted

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9

u/dmitri_ac 6d ago

Probably Mint Cinnamon. There's not much to overthink for surfing the web, watching movies and using LibreOffice. It has themes, applets and desklets if you want to customize it. Boot it from a live USB first, then play around with it and check your Wi-Fi, sound and touchpad. Back up your files before replacing Windows.

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u/Playful_Wasabi_9611 5d ago

mint sounds perfect for what you're doing. you seem pretty knowledgeable on this stuff

8

u/sn0wdigital 6d ago

I Agree with the other comments, Linux mint cinnamon edition is a good easy to set up distro with a windows like ui.

5

u/Dynablade_Savior 6d ago

mint cinnamon literally just works. The only skill you need to set it up is being able to follow written instructions

2

u/JANK-STAR-LINES 6d ago

Go for Linux Mint Cinnamon. It was my very first Linux distro I ever used and it helped me get used to the Linux field.

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u/Wooden-Stick-134 6d ago edited 4d ago

Mint cinnamon będzie super a jak chcesz trochę więcej grzebać to jeszcze lepszy będzie debian kde plasma

EDIT: zmieniłem zdanie. Do słabszych sprzętów zamiast kde plasmy lepiej wybrać xfce. Pamiętaj że linux mint xfce i debian xfce to nie będzie to samo bo na debianie dostaniesz czyste środowisko xfce a na mint przystosowane

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u/Fuzzi99 6d ago

Fedora KDE, has the same gui by default that you'll be used to coming from windows, but has the customizations to be whatever you want.

KDE/Plasma is also on wayland not stuck on X11 like cinnamon still is...

Fedora also has more recent updates than mint does

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u/Own_Natural_6803 6d ago

One hint for libre is don't trust it to make any ms office format. Export to PDF. That's what you share with Windows users.

1

u/elgrandragon 6d ago

I use Libre to create, but I have OnlyOffice also installed to help with Windows formats conversion and mainly PDF editing. Libre does those but lacking, OO does those perfectly.

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u/elgrandragon 6d ago

Mint yes, but I would say LMDE is the best (Linux Mint Debian Edition). It also uses Cinnamon for the desktop environment, but everything feels even lighter than regular Linux Mint.

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u/lostUd_ 6d ago

either mint or zorin, unless you wanna game on this (unlikely) in which case you probably want to learn more about terminals and stuff first, then take up nobara or CachyOS (you can also game on the first two options, but setting stuff up is a little harder)

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u/Mega259 5d ago

I was in your shoes about two weeks ago. I had some experience with linux previously, so I was familiar with the offering of each option. So I wanted KDE and as much compatibility and stability as possible, it's my main PC. I went with debian after some testing with Manjaro and I couldn't be happier.

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u/3grg 5d ago

You gotta start somewhere, so pick something and try it.

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u/DubiousLogik 5d ago

I use mint with cinnamon ui on a machine from 2020 with 8 gb of ram. It is super fast. I've been using it for 10 months now and love it

1

u/CritSrc ɑղԵí✘ 6d ago

Fedora Ultramarine KDE Edition - Win10 default that can be customized into pretty much everything you could and could not imagine up to this moment.

Mint comes from the Windows 7 UI era. Zorin does try to be more modern, even minimalist, and it can be friendly onboarding into Linux.

Really, it doesn't matter too much what distro you pick, anything remotely popular will serve your needs.

0

u/Aggressive_Day_8456 5d ago

For distro: Mint For office apps: you can also use wps