Moving to Linux advice

[yn404]

Hi everyone. For the past couple of weeks I've been planning to move to linux from my current windows 11 workflow. I read a lot of info considering overall linux usage, as well as the best setups for gaming (on nvidia card specifically).

 

I am planning on installing openSUSE Tumbleweed with KDE, however, I am not quite sure about some things. So I thought it would be a good idea to ask here about what you think is close to the best choices considering these questions.

 

1. I have 2 drives, which I use in my windows installation (C: and D:). I know that Linux has a tree-like filesystem, so I want to preserve my windows filesystem setup on linux. This means that all system-related files and main programs should be on the first ssd, while my game files and personal files should be on the second ssd.

2. During the installation process of openSUSE (as well as on other distros) different filesystem types can be choosed. As far as I'm concerned, ext4 is the most performant one, while btrfs is more stable due to supporting snapshots. Which filesystem would work better for my use case?

3. I have an nvidia card and, as far as I know, the nvidia support on linux gets better. However, KDE uses Wayland as stock, and I know that wayland can be unstable with nvidia cards. So I am seeking ways to configuring it as good as possible to provide more stable experience. I was also thinking about installing Hyprland, but sadly it lacks great support for nvidia cards, so I better use KDE to start.

4. As part of my academic study I use MS Office and other programs which are windows-only. I was planning on setting up a VM on my future linux setup, so I can use windows programs without pain.

 

At the moment these are my most important questions/concerns.

 

I would love to get any help possible!

Thanks in advance!

[Haswellx86]

20 minutes ago, yn404 said:

openSUSE Tumbleweed with KDE

I have no experience with openSUSE. Why not go something more mainstream, like maybe Ubuntu, Pop OS, Manjaro, Fedora, and if you dare, even Arch?

 

20 minutes ago, yn404 said:

1. I have 2 drives, which I use in my windows installation (C: and D:). I know that Linux has a tree-like filesystem, so I want to preserve my windows filesystem setup on linux. This means that all system-related files and main programs should be on the first ssd, while my game files and personal files should be on the second ssd.

So you mean you want to have Windows and Linux on the same drive? I would rather have both of them on different drives. But if you still want to go that way, nothing is stopping you from partitioning your C drive for Linux.

 

20 minutes ago, yn404 said:

2. During the installation process of openSUSE (as well as on other distros) different filesystem types can be choosed. As far as I'm concerned, ext4 is the most performant one, while btrfs is more stable due to supporting snapshots. Which filesystem would work better for my use case?

I haven't tried BTRFS, but EXT4 works just fine. In my experience, it has descent error recovery, and know for performance and reliability, making it a great choice for normal desktop use. Maybe BTRFS is better for data critical storage.

 

20 minutes ago, yn404 said:

3. I have an nvidia card and, as far as I know, the nvidia support on linux gets better. However, KDE uses Wayland as stock, and I know that wayland can be unstable with nvidia cards. So I am seeking ways to configuring it as good as possible to provide more stable experience. I was also thinking about installing Hyprland, but sadly it lacks great support for nvidia cards, so I better use KDE to start.

Nvidia just had an event where they discussed that they will be improving Wayland support. For now, I am not sure how good is Wayland on Nvidia. You can give it a try and if it doesn't work out, there is always an X11 version as for the current KDE Plasma 6 today, but I have experienced bugs and performance issues on Plasma 6 on X11 with Intel graphics. If that happens, I would honestly suggest Gnome. Some people hate it, and even I hated it at first, but after some experience, I find it the most polished out desktop environment for Linux. It is also quite customizable.

 

20 minutes ago, yn404 said:

4. As part of my academic study I use MS Office and other programs which are windows-only. I was planning on setting up a VM on my future linux setup, so I can use windows programs without pain.

I haven't used MS office clones, but aren't libreOffice, FreeOffice, and especially, WPS Office quite similar to MS Office? You might want to try them.

[Donut417]

Just now, Haswellx86 said:

haven't used MS office clones, but aren't libreOffice, FreeOffice, and especially, WPS Office quite similar to MS Office? You might want to try them.

While these can work. Some times there are formatting issues. Or other compatibility issues. Because it's for school, professors can be dicks about formatting or not being able to open the documents. 

 

24 minutes ago, yn404 said:

while my game files

Ive used both Windows and Steam OS, Steam will allow you to install games on any drive. I think most other launchers will also do the same. 

[yn404]

6 minutes ago, Haswellx86 said:

So you mean you want to have Windows and Linux on the same drive? I would rather have both of them on different drives. But if you still want to go that way, nothing is stopping you from partitioning your C drive for Linux.

Not quite that. I just want linux to be on both of my drives. Just to kinda divide different files between 2 SSDs.

7 minutes ago, Haswellx86 said:

Nvidia just had an event where they discussed that they will be improving Wayland support. For now, I am not sure how good is Wayland on Nvidia. You can give it a try and if it doesn't work out, there is always an X11 version as for the current KDE Plasma 6 today, but I have experienced bugs and performance issues on Plasma 6 on X11 with Intel graphics. If that happens, I would honestly suggest Gnome. Some people hate it, and even I hated it at first, but after some experience, I find it the most polished out desktop environment for Linux. It is also quite customizable.

Thanks for the explanation!

 

8 minutes ago, Haswellx86 said:

I haven't used MS office clones, but aren't libreOffice, FreeOffice, and especially, WPS Office quite similar to MS Office? You might want to try them.

Well yes, but as @Donut417 mentioned later these alternatives could have compatability issues. I even tried LibreOffice for Windows and wasn't the fan of it.

 

Anyway, thanks for your answers. Appreciate them a lot!

[yn404]

7 minutes ago, Donut417 said:

While these can work. Some times there are formatting issues. Or other compatibility issues. Because it's for school, professors can be dicks about formatting or not being able to open the documents. 

Exactly!

 

7 minutes ago, Donut417 said:

Ive used both Windows and Steam OS, Steam will allow you to install games on any drive. I think most other launchers will also do the same. 

Alright. So I do not need to partition the drive for this? Steam will do that for me?

[CosmicEmotion]

29 minutes ago, yn404 said:

Hi everyone. For the past couple of weeks I've been planning to move to linux from my current windows 11 workflow. I read a lot of info considering overall linux usage, as well as the best setups for gaming (on nvidia card specifically).

 

I am planning on installing openSUSE Tumbleweed with KDE, however, I am not quite sure about some things. So I thought it would be a good idea to ask here about what you think is close to the best choices considering these questions.

 

1. I have 2 drives, which I use in my windows installation (C: and D:). I know that Linux has a tree-like filesystem, so I want to preserve my windows filesystem setup on linux. This means that all system-related files and main programs should be on the first ssd, while my game files and personal files should be on the second ssd.

2. During the installation process of openSUSE (as well as on other distros) different filesystem types can be choosed. As far as I'm concerned, ext4 is the most performant one, while btrfs is more stable due to supporting snapshots. Which filesystem would work better for my use case?

3. I have an nvidia card and, as far as I know, the nvidia support on linux gets better. However, KDE uses Wayland as stock, and I know that wayland can be unstable with nvidia cards. So I am seeking ways to configuring it as good as possible to provide more stable experience. I was also thinking about installing Hyprland, but sadly it lacks great support for nvidia cards, so I better use KDE to start.

4. As part of my academic study I use MS Office and other programs which are windows-only. I was planning on setting up a VM on my future linux setup, so I can use windows programs without pain.

 

At the moment these are my most important questions/concerns.

 

I would love to get any help possible!

Thanks in advance!

 

OpenSUSE is an amazing distro but definitely not the most user friendly out there. I would go for something like Bazzite if I started using Linux today.

 

 

1. Linux can only install apps on the main SSD. For your personal files, make a new Directory under Home and use KDE Partition Manager to mount your second SSD partition to that Directory.

2. EXT4 is not the most performant one. One of XFS or F2FS probably are if memory serves right but If you decide to go with OpenSUSE EXT4 should be fine.

3. The latest version of the Nvidia driver runs phenomenally even on Wayland. No more issues. You can install Hyprland alongside KDE so why not have both?

4. A VM for Office should be pretty easy but I would try something like OpenOffice. It's pretty compatible for most Windows files so you should have no issues aparting from learning a new workflow. Worst comes to pass you can use Office Online in a browser, should be more than enough for school projects.

 

As I said better start with Bazzite to get your feet wet in the Linux world. The downside to this is that you probably won't be able to install Hyprland but after you're more familiar with Linux and how it works you can go for OpenSUSE which won't seem so daunting by then.

[CosmicEmotion]

4 minutes ago, yn404 said:

Exactly!

 

Alright. So I do not need to partition the drive for this? Steam will do that for me?

If you want to play your games in Linux don't put them on an NTFS drive, they won't' work. Use any other filesystem.

[yn404]

2 minutes ago, CosmicEmotion said:

For your personal files, make a new Directory under Home and use KDE Partition Manager to mount your second SSD partition to that Directory.

Got it!

2 minutes ago, CosmicEmotion said:

The latest version of the Nvidia driver runs phenomenally even on Wayland. No more issues. You can install Hyprland alongside KDE so why not have both?

I can have both at the same time? That's great.

3 minutes ago, CosmicEmotion said:

As I said better start with Bazzite to get your feet wet in the Linux world.

Yes, I heard that Bazzite and Nobara are both go-to distros for gaming. I don't quite get the differences between them though, as they both based on Fedora.

[yn404]

3 minutes ago, CosmicEmotion said:

If you want to play your games in Linux don't put them on an NTFS drive, they won't' work. Use any other filesystem.

I will for sure reformat both of my drives to ext4. Because anyway I am planning on storing backups of my personal files on a external ssd.

[Donut417]

11 minutes ago, yn404 said:

Alright. So I do not need to partition the drive for this? Steam will do that for me?

No you still have to format the drive to EXT4. Steam will ALLOW you to create libraries on any drive. You set up a Steam Library on D:, then proceed to install games in that library. This works exactly the same as Windows in terms of installing and moving games between secondary libraries. 

[Donut417]

17 minutes ago, CosmicEmotion said:

If you want to play your games in Linux don't put them on an NTFS drive, they won't' work. Use any other filesystem.

Im pretty sure you can game off of an NTFS formatted drive in Linux. It's just a pain in the ass to get working. It's basically not recommended but it does technically work. 

[xAcid9]

2 hours ago, yn404 said:

2. During the installation process of openSUSE (as well as on other distros) different filesystem types can be choosed. As far as I'm concerned, ext4 is the most performant one, while btrfs is more stable due to supporting snapshots. Which filesystem would work better for my use case?

EXT4 is fine. 

2 hours ago, yn404 said:

3. I have an nvidia card and, as far as I know, the nvidia support on linux gets better. However, KDE uses Wayland as stock, and I know that wayland can be unstable with nvidia cards. So I am seeking ways to configuring it as good as possible to provide more stable experience. I was also thinking about installing Hyprland, but sadly it lacks great support for nvidia cards, so I better use KDE to start.

I used Hyprland with 980 Ti until a month or 2 ago. It work fine with minimal issue since Nvidia introduced explicit sync fixed for wayland in their driver. I'm on Manjaro though. 

 

1 hour ago, Donut417 said:

Im pretty sure you can game off of an NTFS formatted drive in Linux. It's just a pain in the ass to get working. It's basically not recommended but it does technically work. 

Yes it work. Just need to set proper mount option and use ntfs-3g. 

[madseason]

Support of nVidia also depends of the device you have as I can see with my last journey with Asus laptop, but with dekstop it should be much easier.

 

In general - on my desktop I have all AMD, and 3 SSDs - OS / games / other files. If you reinstall the system - all will be still there (if you select right drive ). Especially if you are newcomer, you will most probably distrohop. Just use time machine after you do some good base config in case you would need to restore.

 

As I have learned over the weekend Bazzite in the last months made crazy progress and this is what I would recommend for you. They put a lot of effort to integrate handheld and other gaming hardware. It is games oriented with very nice implementation of drivers, select what you would like to have on their website. nVidia/KDE is what you probably want.

After you do the initial setup: "ujust setup-virtualization" and proceed with config

It will do it all, and you will get Virtual Machine Manager with QEMU KVM - as simple as that. Select ISO and install windows in VM. I think it is even possible to do GPU pass-through. But I am new to it - I used to use virtualBox for last few years.

It is also immutable - much more difficult to break it.

 

Second one would be Nobara, I have it on my 3 desktops, 2 are nVidia ones - all works fine, also has nVidia dedicated version.

 

And if my knowledge is up to date - Mint still uses X11 - if you are into this, still great support for nVidia.
PopOS - it is more GNOME (or maybe cosmic already?) I personally think gnoome is made for tablets, but that's just me