You have both Windows and Linux set up and require guidance.
You have both Windows and Linux set up and require guidance.
In short, everything @parasite_avi mentioned applies to Arch-based distros too. Just like Mint and other Ubuntu versions, you need the package to be available in your repositories. If it doesn’t exist, apt or pacman won’t find it and will show a not found error. TimeShift is a great backup solution—useful since even with perfect setup, Nvidia might release a driver that breaks your games. Installing it can help recover from issues like the Nvidia 495.44 driver problem I faced, which forced a full system rollback. Pre-installing Timeshift is another reason I prefer Garuda for newcomers to Linux—it simplifies things and reduces the chance of breaking your installation. Setting up permissions and dealing with system files can be tough for beginners, so Linux’s strict access controls add an extra layer of safety.
Finally, a moment to brag about my Tiling Window Manager setup! @A literal rat so, just like @thedarthtux points out, the vast majority of r/unixporn is filled with various Linux distros that people put a 3rd-party Tiling Window Manager on. Some distros come with these things already configured to be used out of the box, but as far as I'm aware, most of these are community editions; which is not bad at all, mind you! However, in most cases you will have to do some configuring and tinkering yourself. I use Arch Linux (obligatory btw) with i3-gaps (a fork of i3wm with some extra configuration options to allow using those fancy gaps between your windows), with polybar as my taskbar/statusbar, and will tell you about my particular setup because I can speak from my own experience and be more helpful that way. First of all, you have to understand the fundamental difference between Tiling Window Managers and so-called Desktop Environment. A Desktop Environment (DE for short) is a set of applications an daemons that revolves around, well, a desktop, where you can put your shortcuts, files, folders and such. It also comes with a lot of stuff pre-configured for you, and some applications that allow you to further edit your configuration: things like fonts and icons and color scheme and lots of other wonderful things Linux-based distros let you customize. To a degree, you can customize it to your needs and select which applications will run at startup, which will be default for certain files and all that. Tiling Window Managers (TWMs for short) essentially allow you to do all the same, but I don't think they typically come with a lot of applications pre-installed, let alone daemons, and are not that much pre-configured. Some of them do come with a default configuration file that you may edit to suit you better, like i3wm/i3-gaps, and some of them are supposed to be used by very seasoned users that like to take as much control over their setup as possible, and are pretty difficult to start with as a beginner. Nonetheless, the shtick is that you don't interact with your desktop; you may even not have desktop at all - you are supposed to see all of your open windows at once, arranged (or tiled) automatically for you. For example, if you open your web browser, it typically will take your entire screen; when you open another window, it will most likely split it in half so that both of those windows take an equal amount of space on your screen. Things like that are, of course, customizable, with some TWMs letting you choose master-slave stacks or whatever, where one half of the screen is the master with the window you put there taking up that half all of the time, and the other half gets further divided into smaller regions to not get in the way of your master window. Again, keep in mind that those things vary greatly from one TWM to another, and more importantly, those are not set constants that you won't be able to change - you can turn a very simple to use TWM into something more sophisticated or boil down a complex and difficult one into something extremely basic. i3-gaps is, I believe, the easiest entry to the TWMs because of how simple it is to configure and use. When you first install the thing and boot into it, it will prompt you to generate a configuration file and fill it with most stuff you will need to get started. There is also a nice FAQ you can find on the internet and it has a lot of helpful info to get started painlessly. What I mean here is this: i3's configuration file is, well, a text file that is easy to tinker. For example, to set a certain hotkey combination to execute a particular program or action, you just put it there, in the file, and that's it. You can change those keybindings to whatever works best for you, you can introduce new ones, you can remove whatever exists there - it is yours to play with. What also makes it easy to use is the lack of pre-configured stacks that automatically arrange your windows for you (like the master-stack example I described above), meaning you basically learn how to manipulate your windows mostly manually. Basically, i3 splits your screen into containers that you can further split into sub-containers, and they can be either vertically- or horizonallty-aligned, and moreover, you can resize them all you want, manually creating a layout that suits your needs at hand. I may have missed something about i3 in particular or TWM in general, though, because the key point here is, it's all very subjective and you don't need to be a master guru to use any Linux distro you want or whatever thing you can put on it. You just run it for some time and see it if sticks, learn some ropes and see what's possible. So to conclude, don't be afraid - there's plenty of people that have already provided a lot of info either in form of some documentation, or on forums and in communities as answers to other people's questions. Myself included! Feel free to drop a DM or post another question here, I'll try to assist you where I can. All this learning is part of the fun!
Hello, welcome to the Linux community! I’ve booted dual systems for a long time and here’s what I’ve learned: IT REALLY IS PROBLEMATIC! Every Windows update crashes GRUB, which is the tool that lets you pick your operating system before startup. The best approach is to install on separate drives and use F12 during boot to select the correct one. This isn’t a Linux problem at all—it’s a Windows issue. Microsoft frequently breaks GRUB during updates. If you have any ideas before diving into fancy desktop environments and mods, consider starting with a solid, well-supported desktop until you’re comfortable. Once you’re confident, go all-in and tweak your distro until you hit a snag—then troubleshoot and improve. For your home folder, using a separate partition is smart; if everything fails, you can reinstall in minutes without losing files. As for wallpapers, check out this Linux alternative: https://peterlevi.com/variety/ and explore more options. A helpful tip for newcomers: avoid installing Windows software initially—try Linux instead! Look into ITSFOSS for alternatives.
In the last couple of weeks I used Pop OS and faced numerous problems to list, inconsistent frame rates, toxic users in support groups, and Discord slowing down my games to a stop. I’ve also switched to Linux for the near future, which is disappointing since many of its features were great, including updates while still supporting the PC (until I added something that broke Pop Shop and prevented updates). It was a challenging beginning, but if you’re a serious gamer, Linux isn’t quite there yet.