If you have the time + know how to keep up with Arch, and want the latest packages or need the latest drivers, then go for it.

If you only want an Arch install experience, then fire up a virtual machine and stick with Endeavor or switch to a stable release like Debian on bare metal.

But most importantly, if it brings you value (in productivity or experience) then whatever you decide isn’t a stupid decision.

I’ll add one more grip: Amazon integration. It’s been resolved for like 7 years now, but I still hold it against them a bit for placing Amazon search results in my desktop all those years back. Not that I don’t have an Ubuntu server running as we speak, but it still does taint them a tad in my eyes (and probably acts as an anachronism to the “it’s a corporate distro” theme of dislike around here).

Is it wireless? If so, and the controller supports it, try using it in wired mode. Sounds pointless, but have had issues with wireless controllers that worked fine when connected via USB.

Bringing back memories of my own. Mandrake in 2004 was a but before my time, but I’m sure I’ve still got my Ubuntu discs I downloaded at the local library and burned myself almost a decade after this Mandrake disk.

As others are saying, that’s not really an option unless you’re really dedicated. IF it has an unlockable bootloader you could technically get to compiling and tinkering to get everything built, but in order to get a phone all set you’d need to get the right drivers and do a whole lot of tinkering (like full time job levels of building and tinkering) kind of deal to get it built. Phone’s aren’t so plug and play like computers.

If you there’s no rom support and/or a permanently locked bootloader but you want an OS without x y and z you can always try to fire up ADB bridge and disable stuff. You could also accomplish the same by rooting, though it’s a bit of a security risk (though not as overblown as some people say IMO).

I disagree with this post being downvoted. Manjaro has had a number of issues, including forgetting to renew a cert a few times, accidentlly Ddosing Arch, holding back repo updates but not AUR updates breaking systems, and some allegations of missused funds.

If you’re searching for something, I would also personally reccomend against Manjaro, simpy for the reason that you are less likely to wind up with something broken on most other distros. I do know some people who swear by Manjaro though, and if you’re using it or set on it then that’s fine too (the best OS is the one that brings you the most value).

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To acutally answer the question above, though, the best distro is the one that you prefer. Platforms like Steam manages it’s own updates and software so the stable/rolling debate doesn’t really apply here. Same with anything installed with distro agnostic package managers (Flatpak, Snap, Appimages). As far as most gaming setups drivers are the only real difference between distros (and you can always change that yourself manually).

I believe so, though I went without swap for a while myself and never noticed any issues. When in doubt a 1gb swap partition can’t hurt.

• Calibre - eBook manager/reader
• Gparted - disk tool
• Keepass - password manager
• VLC - the greatest video/music player
• Waydroid - run android apps

Debian or Alpine would be perfect. Debian has bigger repos, better hardware compatibility, and maybe a bit more stability. Alpine is scary lightweight and a small ISO download.

By the way, the US prison population today is higher than the Gulag population of the entire Soviet Union at its peak.

Well being worked to death and/or being strait up shot tends to keep those numbers down. And how many of those “hoarders” were quite literally starving but they had a tiny bit on hand? And how many more were in there for “anti-soviet behavior” instead of anything related to hoarding or destroying food.

“Gulags” is not a gotcha

Gulags, concentration camps and the like are definitely a “gotcha” as much as a “gatcha” can exist.

“Or some other other solution to be determined by the state in question”

Gulags, generally speaking

My 2c would be yes only if you’re specifically seeking out the bleeding edge and don’t mind or enjoy doing the neccesary tinkering.

Alsp you have time in between now and a re-install I’d highly recommended trying to do you’re day to day stuff in an Arch VM for a bit and see if it works for you.

Lol, cheese DRM. Just when I thought more DRM was impossible.

I don’t like that this video is so downvoted, but I do see where the downvoters are coming from. I too use Firefox (or more specifically, the Gecko engine at least) because it lacks app the Google pushed stuff (e.g. WEI, Manifest V3) and is better for privacy, but have had a bone to pick with Mozilla too on occasion.

So many features have been broken or intentionally disabled for periods of time (e.g. saveing pages as PDFs or desktop extensions on mobile being locked behind the Dev options). So many “features” have been implemented that I don’t like (e.g. ads, tracking, pocket), and so many critical features (e.g. PWAs) don’t exist entirely.

Their money making methods are also not my favorite. Ads, data collection, payouts from Google, and selling repackaged services (e.g. Mulvad VPN resold as Mozilla VPN). I know they gotta make money so I’m torn on if I should dislike that they’re doing that. But even Brave with Brave ads and Bat are opt in, in order to disable all ads, data collection & telemetry, and unwanted extensions in Firefox you need to go into about:config.

I also have mixed opinions of their activist work. Despite what the video says they do actually use their money and resources in the free software space to perform audits and offer grants to products. They’ve also always been anti open web to a certain extent. Back when they were doing podcast and some Nazi sites got taken offline through domain providers they took a cautiously pro stance to that. I’ve no love for Nazi’s but when you start using the Internet’s centralized powers to nuke non-illegal content from the internet itself it sets a bad precident and is certainly anti open web. Even though that’s an edge case, and the slippery slope fallacy is technically a fallacy, it’s still continuing onwards as they argue bloggers and individual creators should be de-ranked out of the fear they could be providing information counter to “official” information; and that they should be outright censored if they do go against said official information.

(yes I don’t believe the earth is flat or that lizard people control the world - but look back in history and think about all the times the “official” narrative was wrong. WMDs come to mind. Open debate is important)

Again, I’m saying this as a person who uses FF and would like them to claw back a huge share of the marketplace. It’d take a lot to get me to switch to Chrome. At the end of the day though, I don’t want the Libre option to have a huge list of drawbacks. But at the end of the day, how many non-technical users will think the same way, and if the market share drops too much more and if Google makes even more changes how much will Firefox even work on the web without it becoming unusable.

But I come at this, and assume the video does as well, from the point of “I hope this thing I use and like becomes better”.

Virustotal is great to scan anything you download that does not contain sensitive information, and ClamAV + TK will work locally to scan anything that contains sensitive information (e.g. documents sent by others) or things too big for Virustotal.

Like others are saying, there’s less of a need for antivirus on Linux since there’s less easy entry points (e.g package manager over downloading an installer) and less (but far from 0) malware made for Linux. But we all probably download app images or get documents related to job searches at some point and I personally prefer to scan almost file that I get from a remote computer.

That, and like others mentioned their flexibility, plus the fact that they’re fairly reliable (maybe less than some good Iaas providers but a fair bit more than your consumer vps places). Moments ago I went to the hetzner site to check them out and got:

Status Code 504 Gateway Timeout

The upstream server failed to send a request in the time allowed by the server. If you are the Administrator of the Upstream, check your server logs for errors.

Annoying if it’s you nextloud instance down for a minutes, but a worthy trade off if you’re paying 1/4 of the price. Extremely costly for big business or even risking peoples’s lives for a few different very important systems.

Glad to hear you like it :)