Posted January 10, 2019
high rated
A few years ago I wrote a beginner's guide for Linux Mint as part of a Linux-themed giveaway to encourage & help more people to consider trying it out. I've tidied it up and updated it to reflect changes since then and I intend to continue updating it every so often; the link to download it can be found below.
Now is a great time to use Linux; it's easier to use and better supported than ever, and it's constantly improving. I started using Linux over eleven years ago with no prior Linux experience and it has been much better than I expected - since 2013 all of my PCs have been Linux only and I have no plans to ever return to Windows.
While GOG's Linux support has sadly declined in favour of their increasing focus on Galaxy (seemingly at the expense of everything else, including their own customers who don't use Galaxy regardless of OS choice), Valve/Steam have put a lot of resources into supporting Linux which has resulted in significant benefits for all Linux gamers via improvements to the Linux kernel & graphics drivers, development tools and documentation, engine and library support, as well as many enhancements to Wine.
In my experience the learning curve was roughly comparable to when I switched from Windows XP to Windows 7. Some systems may have issues (most often hardware/driver related) but things have been improving as the Linux userbase continues to grow and things become better supported as a result. It's completely free and you can use the live environment and/or a virtual machine to play around with it without any risk, so there's nothing to lose.
Feel free to post in this thread if you have any questions or need any help- despite GOG's diminishing support there are quite a few experienced Linux users on these forums because DRM-freedom and Linux naturally go together :)
You can find my updated Linux Mint beginner's guide at GitLab: Adamhm's Linux Mint Beginner's Guide
Read more about & download Linux Mint from https://www.linuxmint.com
I have also updated my common libraries meta-package for Linux Mint and that too can now be found on GitLab: Common libraries meta-package for Linux Mint
Now is a great time to use Linux; it's easier to use and better supported than ever, and it's constantly improving. I started using Linux over eleven years ago with no prior Linux experience and it has been much better than I expected - since 2013 all of my PCs have been Linux only and I have no plans to ever return to Windows.
While GOG's Linux support has sadly declined in favour of their increasing focus on Galaxy (seemingly at the expense of everything else, including their own customers who don't use Galaxy regardless of OS choice), Valve/Steam have put a lot of resources into supporting Linux which has resulted in significant benefits for all Linux gamers via improvements to the Linux kernel & graphics drivers, development tools and documentation, engine and library support, as well as many enhancements to Wine.
In my experience the learning curve was roughly comparable to when I switched from Windows XP to Windows 7. Some systems may have issues (most often hardware/driver related) but things have been improving as the Linux userbase continues to grow and things become better supported as a result. It's completely free and you can use the live environment and/or a virtual machine to play around with it without any risk, so there's nothing to lose.
Feel free to post in this thread if you have any questions or need any help- despite GOG's diminishing support there are quite a few experienced Linux users on these forums because DRM-freedom and Linux naturally go together :)
You can find my updated Linux Mint beginner's guide at GitLab: Adamhm's Linux Mint Beginner's Guide
Read more about & download Linux Mint from https://www.linuxmint.com
I have also updated my common libraries meta-package for Linux Mint and that too can now be found on GitLab: Common libraries meta-package for Linux Mint
Post edited February 09, 2024 by adamhm