Linux

In terms of games and programs, it's best to look for/ask about the specific ones. Things have improved a ton with Steam/Proton, but just make sure there isn't a deal breaker in there somewhere. Otherwise, there's great distros out there that are EZPZ for normal everyday computer tasks (web surfing, file browsing, office shit).

In terms of games, modded minecraft runs perfectly for me and so does steam with proton. Theres probably more user friendly distributions that have some sorta GUI to update the OS, but on my machine a shell command is the only way. In terms of security, unless you copy-paste a malicious command into the shell or download malicious software from an untrusted source, you'll be fine. Package managers are probably the best way to download software. Someone probably offers antivirus for Linux somewhere but I don't use anything like that 🤷‍♂️ . As for what would be the best distro for you, I've never used it but I've heard Mint Linux is a good place to start.

Can Linux run programs that rely on frameworks like .NET or other Windows-specific libraries?

Isn't .NET open source and cross platform now? Isn't there an official Linux runtime? Or is it just the most basic subset of .NET without any of the GUI libraries or other things Windows .NET apps routinely depend on?

Can I mod games as freely and as easily as I do on Windows?

It depends a lot on the game, but in my experience not always. Running games straight from steam works really well with a small number of exceptions, but a lot of the sometimes weird tools for patching exe:s and so on that some games use can sometimes be a pain to get running. Not necessarily impossible but yeah this is a reason for why I still keep around my windows installation for dual booting.

just get an extra ssd, install mint or pop (or both on separate partitions) and try

there is a learning curve, and there's always new stuff, more depth, but imo the above two are fairly easy to understand. pop is more osx-like both in looks but also, it's somewhat locked down, which can feel limiting but it keeps things simple. i've been using it in the last few years daily. i was using mint before that, i started daily driving linux with it, but i managed to mess it up enough that every game was struggling to run lol, but i played hl:alyx on there without an issue for example

nvidia doesn't make the best linux drivers, but some think they are completely unusable but actually it just means that there are some games that are glitchy or slow, for instance forza horizon runs better on my steam deck than my rtx 2080. although recently it went from 20-30 fps to 30-40, so it will get better at some point
edit: actually, the above was last week, there were some updates and it's a sputtery 60 fps now

next build will have an amd card for sure, but nvidia is mostly usable too. the "anti-cheat" blockade is more frustrating imo

And also, what distro might be best for me?

• For gaming and if you just want things to work without being bothered, Nobara. It's a Fedora base, which is good for gaming because you will have updates more quickly than other distros, but not so quick that you will get bad updates breaking stuff. It's Fedora but heavily modified for gaming, and has a lot of stuff already set up that you would need to do manually to improve gaming on another distro. It uses KDE as a Desktop Environment which is pretty good and similar-looking to Windows (a task bar on the bottom, a start menu, a system tray, etc) and you can customize it extensively.

How does digital security work on Linux? Is it more vulnerable due to being open source? Is there integrated antivirus software, or will I have to source that myself? Antiwhat ? Just kidding.

• You're not installing softwares by running executables found on random websites, so you at least have less chances of accidentally installing malware that way (not saying that happened to me a lot on Windows... but not saying that it didn't 😅 ).
• The best known antivirus on linux is clamAV, but it's command line only. It's not very complicated to use, but if you want a graphical interface there are several applications that are clamAV frontends (clamAV still does the actual scanning and such, but the application gives you a graphical interface to interact with it)

Will my ability to play games be significantly affected compared to Windows?

• For Steam games, the Steam app has Proton, which enables you to play Windows games on Linux, and most will work just fine. There will always be a few games that require tinkering, or that won't work at all, but not many. You can check ProtonDB to see if your games run well with Proton (https://www.protondb.com/ ) and if a game won't run, you can check it to see if people have posted solutions (sometimes it's as easy as copy-pasting a command into the game's launch options, and poof, there goes the DirectX error !
• For GoG games, and also games from other stores (EA, Epic, etc) you can install Lutris which will use Wine to make your non-Linux games work on linux. As will Proton, there will be a few games that won't cooperate. All in all, I'd say less than 5% of my games don't work or require tinkering, and I have a lot of them.
• If you play multiplayer online games that use kernel-level anticheats, you might be fucked (though I'd argue that it's a good thing, because the game not working is much preferable to the security risk posed by kernel-level anticheats...). Some games are still playable without the anti-cheat activated, you just can't join competitive servers without the anticheat, while other games won't work at all.

Just as a note, NVIDIA on Linux is not bad, BUT IS REALLY ANNOYING because you will get some random bugs that are only exclusive to NVIDIA cards. Like this one: https://forums.developer.nvidia.com/t/non-existent-shared-vram-on-nvidia-linux-drivers/260304

If you have a low VRAM NVIDIA GPU and you want to play a modern game, you will have a bad time. (However, AMD and Intel should work just fine lolol)

Will my ability to play games be significantly affected compared to Windows?

That will depend on the games you play, and what platform you use. If you are using Steam, you can enable the proton layer have more access to games, but if the game in question uses any type of kernel level anti cheat chances are it's not going to work.

Can I mod games as freely and as easily as I do on Windows?

Depends on what you are used to, if you are using mod managers and which ones.

If a program has no Linux version, is it unusable, or are there workarounds?

A lot of work has been done with WINE, games on Linux, and Proton. You'll need to do a little bit of reading to see if it can work on Linux, but the community can often be awesome and already have found a solution. There are also a lot of great alternatives to Windows/Mac only software you can try.

Can Linux run programs that rely on frameworks like .NET or other Windows-specific libraries?

Depends on your distro but most can install .net, you'll need to do a bit of reading.

How do OS updates work in Linux? Is there a “Linux Update” program like what Windows has?

Yes, there are package managers that you can use to install and update software, some distro's even have a shop like interface.

How does digital security work on Linux? Is it more vulnerable due to being open source? Is there integrated antivirus software, or will I have to source that myself?

I've only ever had to use a virus scanner twice in my Linux journey and both of those times it was on a server. Because Linux is open source everybody can see what is going on in the code and this way bugs or security issues can be found and patched quicker.

Are GPU drivers reliable on Linux?

Depends, if you are using AMD you should be fine, Nvidia has functioning drivers as well, I can't speak for Intel ARC support because I've never used it..

Can Linux (in the case of a misconfiguration or serious failure) potentially damage hardware?

I've never broken my hardware, but I've broken my system a few times by ignoring the warnings the system gave me, always got it to work again.

And also, what distro might be best for me?

Linux Mint might be a good one, the Cinnamon is great for beginners, but there are many flavors you can choose from. Start with a live system which will not require you to install anything just yet, but you'll get a feeling for how everything works. After trying it out live you can decide if you would like to install it. But remember that when trying it live you are limited in what you can do.

Will my ability to play games be significantly affected compared to Windows?

Depends on the game. In general no, unless it has kernel anticheat, which Linux will not allow because that's a glaring security risk.

Can I mod games as freely and as easily as I do on Windows?

Yes.

If a program has no Linux version, is it unusable, or are there workarounds?

Most Windows software can be run on Linux using Wine. But there are advantages to using Linux-specific alternatives - they are often lighter and faster.

How do OS updates work in Linux? Is there a "Linux Update" program like what Windows has?

Yes, each distribution has its own update tool. They also install and update software (like in Android, where Google Play installs and updates all apps and not just the OS). No need to download exe files from random websites.

How does digital security work on Linux? Is it more vulnerable due to being open source? Is there integrated antivirus software, or will I have to source that myself?

Linux is generally much more secure than Windows, because it is open-source. Most internet servers and supercomputers use Linux partly because of its security.

Are GPU drivers reliable on Linux?

Nvidia is notoriously bad but getting better. AMD is good.

Can Linux (in the case of a misconfiguration or serious failure) potentially damage hardware?

No.

And also, what distro might be best for me?

Linux Mint. It is stable, reasonably up to date and does not make confusing changes every update. It also tends to work on most systems.

Oh, also the biggest difference between Linux and Windows is that you don't go to different websites to install new software. In general you use your distribution's package manager. Think of it like a software center.

Going to a website to download software is a last ditch effort if your distribution doesn't have what you are looking for.

.NET applications using .NET Core or later are intended to be cross-platform, so technically, Linux can run .NET apps. (The use-case I know is running .NET sites on Linux servers)

So I'm going to caveat this that I'm not an expert so if I get some details wrong, people should correct me.

Your ability to play games will be effected to some degree, but not as much as it used to be. Because of Valve's work on Proton, about 80% of the games on steam work. You can usethis website to check a community maintained list. Most of the remaining games that don't work are games that the developer went out of their way to not work on linux. This is usually by having an anticheat that doesn't work with linux, or not enabling linux support for an anticheat that does. For playing games not on steam, it requires a bit more effort, but there is Lutris and Heroic for that. Feel free to look into them or ask for more information.

For modding, I don't have as much experience but I have done it and you can. I think how well it works varies game to game, but then again, modding is like that anyway. One piece of advice I've heard is that if you are going to be molded, make the folders not case sensitive. This is because on windows folder names aren't case sensitive, but on linux they are. EG /Folder/ vs /folder/ are the same on windows, and by default different on linux.

For software without a linux version, you can usually find an open source or web app alternative. Microsoft Word doesn't have a linux version, but you can use Libre office, or use the browser version of it, or use Google Docs. For most intents and purposes, this is what you should do. However, you can use a program called WINE to run a lot of Windows software on linux. WINE is what Proton(see first paragraph) is derived from. Similar to Proton, there are limitations, but most come from the developer side these days from my understanding.

The good news is the .NET is on linux, officially supported. I habent checked in a while but i dont think its at 100% parity yet. And a good amount of software frameworks are also available. I've never run into a library or framework that didn't work on Linux that doesn't have a good alternative that does, but I'm not the most avid programmer so someone more experienced can chime in.

All versions of Linux have a program called a package manager, the specific one varies(apt, yum, etc), but they are the primary way you install software one linux. They are like an app store. It installs the software for you and updates it when you tell it to. Core system packages, like the kernel, are also updated through the package manager. Most of the time there is a GUI version or wrapper for package managers in case you aren't fond of using the terminal.

So this is another area where I don't know too much on, but my understanding that linux has fewer viruses and it being open source is a double-edged sword. There are fewer viruses for desktop linix because of the smaller user base. Why would someone making software to harm people not aim for the platforms with larger user bases like windows and Mac? This being said, I think there are more viruses for servers that target linux because of the dominance of it in that space. As for being open source being a double-edged sword, this means security exploits are easier to find because there are more people looking at the code. Both by those who wish to patch them and those who want to exploit them. All my friends and I don't use an anti-virus on our linux machines and just keep them up to date, but there does exist anti-virus for linux.

GPU driver are reliable in my experience, but more so for AMD. NVIDIA has proprietary drivers that some distributions don't let you install for ideological reasons, but they do work most of the time. My computer does run NVIDIA and while I have had issues getting started with the drivers its usually not a problem agyer you get past that stage. Again, AMD is better here and basically painless.

Not to my knowledge, no limux can't damage your hardware. But I'll leave this for someone with more knowledge than me.

The distro I tell beginners to start with is Mint. Installing NVIDIA drivers was easiest on that from my experience, and largely just works out of the box. It has a windows like UI but this is both a good and a bad thing. Good that it will be familiar; bad that you will sometime fall into windows behavior that doesn't make sense on linux. In the past ubuntu filled this niche, and mint is based on ubuntu, but canonical, the company behind ubuntu, has made some questionable choices.

Anyway wish you the best of luck and welcome to the linux community.

If you have any App you used before and isnt available on Linux: You can try to install the .exe-file with a Tool named "Bottles".

Each Programm you run with that tool gets its own virtual Space, so if you mess something up, you can throw that one bottle away and just create another in its fresh New environment.

It has a clean UI and you can play with all kinds of different configs to get your Bottle to run. You can choose between different Windows Versions for example.

Under the hood it uses Wine and Proton.

Pro-Tip: Start Programms via the UI in "Terminal-Mode" so you can See potential Error-Messages which you would normally not see, if you just run the Programm.

My whole life with computers the fanbois du jour told me we had reached excellent usability. We’re talking GEOS, FVWM, the shit Sun and Digital Equipment Corp threw at us, up until Windows 10 and KDE or what have you: there will always come a point when you need or want to have a look under the hood. And there things can be alien, overly complex and very inconsistent and undocumented. That is the path every real user will walk one day, and it’s not pretty. Best of luck on your journeys!

Honestly it is going to take you longer to read all answers here than try yourself!

Get an extra HD, even a slow external one if you must, put Linux on it, install Steam and some games, try, decide for yourself.

Overall yes you can work and play on Linux comfortably, I've been doing it for year. No you don't need to be an expert to use Linux BUT it can be an amazing empowering moment to actually learn how a computer work BECAUSE you are free to do whatever you want with it. Just back up your data first THEN go nuts. Break stuff and learn, it's even more fun than gaming.

Will my ability to play games be significantly affected compared to Windows?

A lot of stuff runs with windows emulation as if it's native. It's the same method the steam deck uses and so Valve actively do work to keep it working. The main problem is games with heavy anti-cheat.

Can I mod games as freely and as easily as I do on Windows?

Generally, yes. I think so.

If a program has no Linux version, is it unusable, or are there workarounds?

See above.

Can Linux run programs that rely on frameworks like .NET or other Windows-specific libraries?

There's .NET libraries for Linux, but things have to be recompiled to use them.

How do OS updates work in Linux? Is there a "Linux Update" program like what Windows has?

The distribution maintainer will issue updates on a regular basis. Update procedure is different for different distros, but all have a push-button update scheme. It's pretty solid these days.

How does digital security work on Linux? Is it more vulnerable due to being open source? Is there integrated antivirus software, or will I have to source that myself?

Keep your system up to date with security updates, and you'll tend to be fine. Smaller user base tends to mean that there's far less malware. Antivirus isn't necessary.

Obviously phishing scams don't care what OS you're on, so mind what you click.

Are GPU drivers reliable on Linux?

AMD ones are very solid.

Nvidia ones can be a pain from what I hear, but I don't buy green.

Can Linux (in the case of a misconfiguration or serious failure) potentially damage hardware?

No.

That said... You can always wipe a disk when you install an OS.

And also, what distro might be best for me?

Download a few Live-USB images and try them out. You don't need to install them to get a desktop and a browser up. You can see if there's any compatibility issues with your hardware.

Whichever works for you, go with it.

Can I mod games as freely and as easily as I do on Windows?

For the most part, yes. I've modded Skyrim, with SKSE and haven't run into any mods I couldn't add. Satisfactory has linux support for mods through the community-built mod launcher, so I haven't had any problems there. If you are comfortable copying files around, sometimes editing text files, uncompressing files, and other like tasks then you'll be fine. The only troubles I have had are running trainers that run alongside the game and connect to the running executable. There is one of the Resident Evil 2 remake I wasn't able to get going. I think there are methods to do this, I just haven't looked into them in detail yet.

For most things involving games in Linux, you need to have a small amount of tweaking skills, and that's it. You might have to copy a launch string into the Steam launch setup, or you might need to download a tweaked copy of Proton to get something running well (Glorious Eggroll builds). If you have those skills or can learn them, you'll be fine. It's kind of fun, too. If you don't have those skills or want to learn them, you'll be restricted to not being able to get the best experience when running some games and there will be the occasional game in your backlog that won't run at all without it.

Not trying to scare anyone off, but that's been my experience with Linux gaming. I'm comfortable enough on Linux that it hasn't been a problem, but some people might find it more of a hurdle to get over.

Hello there 1- It really depends on your build, distro and drivers being used. Some benchmarks show Ray tracing causes performance drop compared to Windows.

2- There are mod managers here and there but, honestly I don't mod so I don't know anything about it.

3- If a program doesn't have Linux version, there might be Linux alternative. Those alternatives sometimes might not be on par with their counterparts though. Adobe products are one bit example.

4- Applications developed with .NET may be built on Linux through Mono framework, as long as they are developed as portable. For native Windows programs, there is a compatibility layer named WINE, but it won't guarantee that every program will work. It may support games as well, but for games Proton is more preferred. Proton is Valve's official tool anyway.

5- Distributions' package managers will manage updates, either application updates or system updates. Most distros will also notify users about updates, however installing them is up to user's decision. Universal package managers like Flatpak are responsible their own updates.

6- Linux is way more secure than Windows for being what it is. Being an open source does not inherently mean that it's secure. But open source softwares are generally peer reviewed by public and they are often recommended fixes thus if there is any vulnerability, it's fixed more quickly. Antiviruses are not needed, not because there is not Linux viruses though. There is ClamAV anti-virus, also there are proprietary AV applications, if you still need. AV's are mostly ineffective in today's technology.

7- AMD drivers, for example way more reliable than their Windows ones. Nvidia also made a lot of progress in recent years, so yes. There might be still some issues, lack of features.

8- No, it cannot.

9- For a beginner, Linux Mint is and always has been best choice for start, in my opinion.

It's literally be just as simple as choosing a distro, preferably a just works one or something thats piss easy to install like Linux Mint, Fedora or OpenSuse.

Then you choose your Desktop Environment, from which you can choose either KDE Plasma, XFCE, GNOME or the new COSMIC desktop environment (still currently in beta so not recommended js yet) which you can choose when installing your distro or while choosing your distro. You can always change it once you've chosen.

KDE Plasma's infinitely customisable, yet also really user friendly, with a lot of incredible software included by default, including phone compatibility software similar to what you'll find in apple's ecosystem. XFCE's really lightweight and power efficient. GNOME's very macOS like by default, being a lot less customisable than KDE but really user friendly. They each have their own versions of software.

You should know what your distro's package manager is and how to use it, which is basically what you use to install updates and install and uninstall software. That's literally the only thing you'll need to use your terminal for, it's basically just a text based file manager which can run programs/software. That's basically it, just make sure to frequently update your system, they are voluntary unlike Windows updates and don't require reboots or crash your system, and you should be good.