This is a pointless conversation man. There are clearly plenty of Linux zealots on Lemmy. Noobs like me have had a hard time with Linux. I’ve never understood the argument that “my experience was different, so your experience is invalid”. Once someone learns about something, they forget what it’s like to have no knowledge of the thing.

The Linux community was reacting like this when Linus (from LTT) installed PopOS and tried to install Steam and it somehow wiped his desktop environment. Shit happens in Linux and the noob experience is brushed aside, while touting “the year of Linux”. I really don’t get it.

While you’re at it… Try Newpipe sponsor block on your Android phone.

I’m glad it works well for you.

OpenSUSE is what helped me get past even more basic problems with getting my PC up and running, that’s why I stuck with it because I couldn’t even get this far on other distros. I’m on CachyOS now and can manage better now that I’ve learnt to troubleshoot some of the main issues.

Horizontal page scrolling. I want to be able to read massive documents by scrolling through side-by-side pages rather than scrolling up/down.

I’m glad it worked smoothly for you and it sometimes is a smooth effortless experience for some people; but if you want to “convert” people then you’ve got to be honest about the fact that people commonly face difficulties. I’ve commented about my Linux issues before and I can paste the comment again here to give an example:

One of the first issues I had problems with was figuring out what was wrong with Street Fighter 6 giving ultra low frame rates in multiplayer, but working fine in single player. It needed disabling of split lock protections in the CPU.

A recent update in OpenSUSE made the computer fail to boot half the time and made the image on the right half of the screen garbled. I rolled back to before the update and am using it without updating for a few weeks to see if the GPU driver problem gets ironed out (AMD GPU).

I installed VMware Horizon for my job’s remote work login and it fucked up my Steam big picture mode and controller detection. I didn’t bother trying to figure that out and just uninstalled VMware remote desktop.

I managed to install my printer driver, but manually finding the correct RPM file to install would not be tolerable for normies. Update: I’m using CachyOS now and the Brother website says Arch plainly isn’t supported. When I install the driver from AUR that’s specific to my printer, then it doesnt print and just spews out endless blank pages.

I still can’t get my Dualshock 3 controller to pair via Bluetooth despite instructions on the OpenSUSE wiki. I’ve stopped trying to troubleshoot that and use my 8BitDo controller instead.

I still can’t find a horizontal page scrolling PDF app.

Figuring out how to edit fstab to automount my secondary drives is not a process normies would be able to execute. I still can’t figure out how to use this to auto-mount my Synology NAS.

Plasma added monitor brightness controls to software and these seem to have disappeared for me now, and I can’t figure out why. It reappears intermittently, but then disappears when it feels like.

My KDE Plasma task bar widgets for monitoring CPU/GPU temp worked till I reinstalled OpenSUSE, and I can’t figure out why they’ve decided to not work on this fresh install. System monitor can see the temperature sensors just fine still. Update: this seems to have fixed itself (maybe through am update?).

Flatpak Steam app wouldn’t pick up controllers for some reason. Minor issue, but unnecessary jankiness.

My laptop fingerprint reader plainly isn’t supported.

Trying to set up dual boot kept destroying (I.e. making unbootable) either the Linux install or the Windows install. I have up eventually as I couldn’t figure out how to fix GRUB from the command line.

I’ve been trying to find a solution for keeping a downloaded synchronised copy of my online storage (Mailbox.org). Can’t figure out rsync. I get an error with Celeste and it doesn’t sync after the initial file install. Having a 2 way sync for online storage could be considered a pretty basic requirement these days and something Mailbox can easily suggest an app for in Windows.

People do not tolerate this amount of jankiness. And this doesn’t include the discomfort with relearning minor design differences between OS’s when switching. Linux is a bit of a battle with relearning and troubleshooting things that would never be problematic on Windows. I know we all love Linux, but allow people to be honest rather than being dismissive. I had over 2 decades of experience with Windows and it had its quirks and problems, but my preexisting familiarity with it made it much easier to use and troubleshoot.

Sure I know I’m a noob and not doing this right. But that’s the point…can someone with limited knowleddge still work this OS?

Linux is perfect for hardware that is old as hell.

I was you 18 months ago. It’s certainly achievable, even with a crazy busy schedule. Highly recommended that you go for it.

Here are the unpopular opinions that attract downvotes:

• adopting Linux is painful. Stuff breaks. Stuff doesnt work. You will be battling uphill, but hopefully you’ll find it worthwhile in the end.
• moving to Linux permanently wouldn’t have been possible for me without AI. Now you can ask AI and it will almost always solve the problem for you. In the old days, you’d just have forum posts saying “just compile the driver and do a 10 step process with terminal that you need to figure out from the wiki…noob”. But now, these previously system breaking problems are now easily solvable without spending the whole weekend on a single issue.
• don’t let go of Windows to start with. Put Linux on a secondary machine. Do not dual boot, you will break your installation and won’t be able to troubleshoot it and will have to do a full wipe (along with the time and data loss that comes with that).
• Don’t get caught up in the distro wars. Pick Linux Mint, or a similar very beginner friendly distro. I prefer KDE desktop so I would recommend something else… But don’t go for anything with even moderate difficulty.
• Check protondB.com for the games you play. Some don’t work on Linux (e.g. Apex Legends).

Are you committed to using the R.Pi1? You could emulate on your computer or phone (connected to the TV) to have way more options.

How adept is your little one with games? My 4 year old loves any and all Mario games. He plays sitting on my lap. I celebrate his successes and he passes me the controller when he gets to a section too difficult for him. This is mostly with Mario 3D land (3DS) these days.

Specify what “reasonably priced means”.

I’ve recently bought a Retroid Pocket 4 Pro (£120) and would highly recommend it. Emulates up to PS2 and Wii, and amazingly emulates many Switch games. Comes with Android so this open up the option for loads of native Android games with controller. This plays GameCube games well, has great battery life, great portability, WiFi and Bluetooth, halls effect joysticks, nice buttons and d-pad and is a great all-rounder. I neglected my Steam Deck for a couple of months after I got this. It cost £120 on eBay (you might be able to bargain down further if you’re patient and keep a look out).

Prices are dropping because the Retroid Pocket 5 is out and is a huge upgrade (this is the console I would recommend if you’re looking for a stronger and more future proof option, but it costs about £200). If you’re looking to save a few bucks then you could go for the Retroid Pocket 4 (non-pro) or Retroid Pocket 3+…but I wouldn’t recommend those as worthwhile savings.

The other commenter is correct in saying your cheapest existing option will be your current phone with a controller.

The other recommendations for £300+ devices makes no sense to me, but that depends on how far you want to push your budget and if you want the console to do other things.

OpenSUSE is so amazing and doesn’t get recommended enough. I’ve switched to CachyOS now. Still don’t get this meme.

This is a PlayStation Portable (PSP) gaming console, not a sat nav device.

What I’m not sure about is: this isn’t a game I’ve seen before. I don’t know if the screen is showing an image, a game or some sort of genuine hack to make this into a satnav device.

Use alternativeto.net … not necessarily for just Windows programs alternatives; but it is also great for looking at popular utilities for any task in Linux.

Some programs I use a lot were not suggested anywhere else (e.g. Pluma as a basic text editor and Pinta for basic image editing).

Steam Deck + Retroid Pocket 4 Pro for me. The RP4 is a recent addition and it blows my kind how capable this cheap tiny thing is.

Only my family, friends and work. But I’m working on cutting them out of my life.

There was a big uproar amongst normies when the WhatsApp TOS changed…but people forget quickly and prefer convenience. That was our one chance to convert everyone over.

I’m forced to use WhatsApp chat so I keep it installed begrudgingly. But who the fuck is using WhatsApp stories?

Its amazing how quickly you realise that you don’t need something when you’re forced to stop using it.

There are 2 types of people who wear sunglasses indoors: the blind, and assholes. - Larry David