Say a friend is looking for a new system, and said person is not particularly savvy with technology, what system would you point them toward?
this post was submitted on 11 Feb 2026
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If this average user doesn't need to use Microsoft or Apple software, Fedora Workstation Linux. My dad, who is 78 and of average intelligence can use it, anyone can.
Linux can run on older, used hardware, has no AI, no Apple or Microsoft account required.
Bazzite. Fedora + drivers + immutable + gaming works out of the box.
Bazzite?
Really, you would recommend a young, gaming focused distribution for a non-tech person?
I'd want something stable and trusted rather than something new and hip
Yes. I've been switching non-tech people to Linux for 17 years. Ubuntu used to be the go to, but it has a steep learning curve for the average user, sucks, and has gotten consistently worse. Everyone eats their shit over Mint, and Cinnamon is nice, but I'd still field a lot of complaints. Pop! OS is awesome, but still only 90% of the way there (and also people hate the name).
Bazzite is feature complete, requires zero tinkering on their end or mine, and 'just works' the way people expect a modern desktop OS to. I've converted just under a dozen people and several of my personal machines and haven't had an issue yet. So yes, I would recommend a young, gaming focused distribution to a non-tech person. Isn't Steam OS also young and gaming focused? And yet it's arguable that most non-tech people start their Linux journey there. bazzite is just an improvement on Steam OS. So yeah, I like it. I don't understand all the ire in this thread for my answer to the question. Everyone has their opinion, I have field research.
I fail to see how gaming has anything to do with my retired dad.
I didn't realize OP's question was 'What desktop operating system would you recommend to Scott's dad?' I guess I need new glasses.
I don't get the appeal of immutability. System files are read-only for users for a reason already. Don't modify them as root unless you know what you're doing and you'll be fine.
What am I missing?
(Also gaming for a 78 year old, meh.)
Making them immutable for everyone protects users who enter their password in prompts without thinking.
How can the system be upgraded at all if not even the root user has access though?
The updater downloads an updated copy of your root system and saves it next to the one you're running.
When you reboot the next time, the bootloader boots from that new system image.
Userspace applications are installed as flatpaks and sit in a writeable directory.
And "the updater" is what? A program running as [not root]? How does it have write access if nothing does?
It's the package manager. And it doesn't have write access to your installed root either.
It doesn't change anything on your installed file system at all, it installs a new system next to it.
So it installs a whole new filesystem? Interesting. That feels like it sets limitations on how well you can take advantage of the full space of your hard drive.
And this action can only be performed by the package manager running under some magical God user that sits above root? Or some other mechanism?
It utilizes the copy-on-write functionality of the BTRFS file system.
So it doesn't need double the disk space, it only actually writes the differences between your installed system and the new one.
And it runs normally with sudo, not some special god user.
You could do it manually, too.
So root still has write access to the system then, gotcha. Then it's not really immutable per se, the package manager just has a different way of writing to the filesystem that simulates immutability, I guess?
I get the feeling you're deliberately trying not to understand.
Maybe read up on how it works yourself, since I don't seem to get through to you.
The hell? I'm trying to confirm whether I understood correctly or not. You are definitely mistaken.
Never mind, I'll find someone more polite.
What you're missing is that the question was what would you recommend to the average user.
Exactly, so there should be no reason to edit sensitive system files in either case. Great, further to my point.
Okay? I don't understand this reaction in this context. I'm just making statements lol. Not yelling at you.
I'm not an immutable guy, but from what I heard it's more of a way to address programs and dependency hell, less the user modifying system code. Correct me if I am wrong
If you pick the correct hardware. Which is a crap shoot per distro, bazzite included.
People keep saying this but I've not had a single solitary issue getting Bazzite working on a myriad of older and newer devices.