Like the title says, my partner’s laptop was still running Windows 10 and they got infected with a backdoor malware. We’ll need to reset her computer. It’s an Asus Tuf Gaming A15.
She’s been using Windows 10 for as long as she could but support is running out. At her work the computers are on Windows 11 and she hates it. Plus she’s fervently anti-AI and wants none of that forced Copilot bullshit and privacy eroding features of Windows 11. She’s seen me use it for over a year now and I also installed it on our old OG 1st gen MS Surface Pro table and she sees how well it’s going. So now she wants Linux on her laptop.
After careful consideration and comparisons, I’ve decided to go with Zorin OS. I thought of Linux Mint, but it just looks so dated. There are inconistencies in the looks and I feel it lacks some features that I found that Zorin OS has. (It’s essentially Gnome with QoL extras.) My only concern is that Zorin has Snaps out of the box but I don’t think that’s a concern for her. I’ll install it on a BTRFS partition with automatic snapshots and grub-btrfs to recover from snapshots. And I’ll schedule monthly backups of her files through rsync, or whatever the built-in backup tool does, onto an external drive.
I’ve tried Zorin on a VM and it was already outstanding. On the live USB session it was able to detect her NVidia card and recommend either the nouveau or NVidia proprietary driver. Everything worked out of the box. So I’m fairly confident everything will work well. One concern I have is she uses her personal laptop for work, and needs to connect to her work’s Microsoft account. I see there’s an accounts section in the settings where this can be set up, but I’ve never used it, so that’ll be a first. Her work also requires Cisco AnyConnect VPN client. There is a Linux client, but you need a Cisco account to download it, and her work IT department does not support Linux, so I don’t know if she’ll be able to get it. One of the IT people has Linux on his machine and was able to set it up so maybe we’ll rely on him for that part. She’ll also need MS Office which uses a work license. I wonder how that will work on Bottles. We can try with Libre Office but I know the spacing and fonts get all wonky when you open a MS Word document or a Powerpoint presentation. Every other app she uses is open source apps like Gimp, Inkscape, Audacity, etc. And she doesn’t game much, but I know this will work just fine. And the Gnome-Network-Displays will allow her to cast her screen onto our NVidia Shield device for watching movies.
Is there anything else I should be concerned about? Maybe hardware wise? Or anything to so with Snaps that could cause issues?
I understand the concerns on how long some of these might last, like Nobara, but now that it’s been a couple of years and some of GEs work is being used by Steam/Valve, I think it’s safe enough to recommend.
Normally I would have instead recommended Bazzite, as others here have, since she doesn’t seem like a power user. But because of those other uses she might need, it’s a bit riskier to have to work in a more locked down system in case you yourself have to rig something up for her for work, hence I didn’t recommend an immutable distro.
PikaOS I understand is more niche though, but it is still Debian based and Debian is pretty stable, even Sid is. It’s more of you preferred a Debian option.
The reason I mentioned the gaming focused OS’ isn’t because they’re gaming focused, but because they likely have good driver support for her laptop out of the box, and controller etc support as well. I wouldn’t say either really has a heavy “gamerz” aesthetic to them (Pika if anything is just cute Neytirix vibes), and they come with KDE options which can be customized however you like. I think you’ll like it as a power user, and their updater is handy too. Also they set up Discovery to already have access to Flathub as well.
Now for the main reason I’d recommend against Zorin.
The issue is they’re update model + how they have things set up. Gnome + extensions can be prone to messing up with updates, and Zorin doesn’t usually do the longest of updates unless you go with the paid editions. It’s also heavier on system resource use. It’s not the worst option, but it’s not the best either, especially since she has someone who understands Linux decently with her too. But most of all, if you really want something to look like Windows, you can get a better result on a cleaner distro with KDE than you can with Gnome and extensions. Here’s some links - from Windows XP to Windows 10.
https://store.kde.org/p/2136378
https://store.kde.org/p/1407086
https://github.com/AlexcomX/Windows-8-Dark-Theme-for-KDE-Plasma
https://github.com/yeyushengfan258/Win10OS-kde
If you really want to make it feel like a seamless transition for her, that last one might be it, though there’s other variations of it too. It’s much more Windows-like than Zorin, all while making it easy to avoid snaps entirely and Ubuntu dependency.
It’s your choice though, and if you do end up going with Zorin, well, that’s still kilometers better than Windows 11. Just want to make sure you know all the options out there for switching someone away from Windows. I’ve done Fedora KDE + Windows 10 theme in the past for an older family member that wasn’t too tech savvy that couldn’t update to 11. Just told them it was a new update and they thought it was still windows, though they really liked how the new “update” really sped up their computer a lot.
@Lumisal @ZombieCyborgFromOuterSpace what is your opinion about systemd? is it good or bad for gnu/linux?
Bad. It’s a big black box. I wish we could go back to SysVinit
@ZombieCyborgFromOuterSpace why
I appreciate your feedback. But here are my counter arguments 😉
Nobara and Bazzite are very niche.
Nobara is a personal project that’s provided to the greater public that gained in popularity. But what happens if G.E. decides to stop working on it? If he suddenly becomes disabled or dies? Maybe someone else will pick it up, maybe not.
Bazzite is even worse because it is heavily gaming focused. I tried it and it had way too much gaming stuff that I didn’t really need or asked for out of the box. And I really hate the idea of an atomic distro. I’ve tried it and hated it. I’d recommend it for anyone wanting to use a gaming device like the Steam Deck, Asus ROG Ally X, Lenovo Legion GO or something similar. But for a PC as a desktop workstation I think it’s a bad idea. I don’t want to have to go mess around config files only to install software or system components that doesn’t come as a flatpak. And that would be a terrible suggestion for a first time Linux user for personal and working laptop used mainly for editing documents, browsing the web, streaming movies, doing video conference calls and the occasional game.
Now I’m not shitting on these distros. I think they’re amazing at what they do. I’d heavily consider Bazzite if I bought a gaming device or Nobara for a gaming box. But they’re not adapted for a standard desktop PC where you’re only trying to find a Windows alternative that gets out of your way.
Zorin has great hardware support out of the box. Our PCs are already a few years old now and we don’t have fancy gaming hardware. Heck all my gaming devices were recognized and worked right away with Kubuntu 24.04. I never had issues with Nvidia either. All my games worked great also. And with Zorin being Ubuntu based, I doubt there will be any issue there. And about your concerns regarding the updates breaking the extensions and stuff in Gnome, the extensions provided with Zorin are developed and maintained by the Zorin dev team. So I’m expecting them to ensure they work from one version to the next. Much like Canonical have been doing with their customizations in their default Ubuntu desktop.
I agree KDE is more Windows-like. Kubuntu was my 3rd choice actually. It’s what I’ve been using for ages. Snaps won’t be an issue for her. I think I can pretty much disable snaps without causing too much harm to the system. But I want to give Zorin a shot. KDE might have too much customization and it might end up being a turn off. Zorin might be just right in that regard.
Anyway, we’ll see. And thanks again for your feedback and recommendations! :)
No problem! But um, I think you meant the Bazzite part for someone else - I also said I didn’t recommend it in this case because of the reasons you listed with it being too restrictive (or any atomic distro for that matter), especially since there’s a chance she might need some more obscure software than what a Flatpak can provide, or might need something that doesn’t come as a Flatpak. It’s usually good for lightweight users, but this wasn’t the case so I was also against the idea of atomic distros like Bazzite that others were recommending.
What I mean to clarify was my final recommendation per the last comment was Fedora/Debian + KDE + a Windows skin.
You make a good point with Nobara, in that it’s not run by an organization though, even if it has had years of stability. That could be problematic in the long run.
As for KDE customization - it has many options, but they’re completely optional - you’d have to go into the settings to mess with that. I’d say it’s about on par as Gnome extensions, only more popular because it’s easier for people to make new customizations for it compared to Gnome (you don’t really need to know much about coding is why).
And as I stated, Zorin is still an improvement over Windows anyway, so either way can’t go wrong. From my past personal experience with Zorin however, it did use more system resources and did have issues with the extensions after certain updates, but that was a few (3?4?) years ago in fairness, when I was replacing Windows 11 for my wife too when she was getting sick of Microsoft’s antics. My logic was similar to yours then. In the end, she’s ended up happy with Fedora KDE, even though I use mostly Debian myself. She even figured out customizations on her own even though she’s not too tech savvy, but then she is also an artist so maybe it comes naturally to her. And since then I usually go that route for others in my family switching as well.
Hopefully it all works out for you though and the transition goes smoothly! At least we can both agree Mint was not the best choice here XD (just a mention since so many usually recommend it for beginners but I think Mint is riding on legacy - its UI feels a bit dated and driver support doesn’t seem as good as other distros these days).
That’s cool my dude! :)
Yeah the bazzite part I must got confused with another comment.