Nervous about breaking shtuff.

[Whiskeyz]

Basically, like most people who don't like being bullied, I have hated windows for years. But I am an idiot when it comes PCs. IDK shtiff about stuff.
I have wanted for so long to swap to Linux, but the idiot part of me says "I Jus caint do it.".
Honestly I don't even know what or how to ask the questions in my brain. Ugh, the struggle is too real.
I play games on this machine, I don't email or browse much on it. I have a phone for all that shtuff. Blizzard, EA and Steam, the standard platforms.

My Rig:

Processor AMD Ryzen 9 5950X 16-Core Processor (3.40 GHz)
Installed RAM 64.0 GB
Graphics card NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Ti (12 GB)
Storage 2.12 TB of 3.64 TB used
System type 64-bit operating system, x64-based processor
Pen and touch No pen or touch input is available for this display

Any ideas on what would be a foolproof OS for a guy like me?

And thank you for any advice good or bad in advance ;-]

p.s. Pancakes > waffles

 

[Condobloke]

G'day Whiskeyz, Welcome to Linux.org

what would be a foolproof OS for a guy like me

'foolproof' .....there is probably no such thing.

I play games on this machine, I don't email or browse much on it. I have a phone for all that shtuff. Blizzard, EA and Steam, the standard platforms.

You are a gamer. There are more than a few people on this forum who game. Lots of them in fact.

I will mention one guys name here (he will be notified, nothing for you to do) @f33dm3bits , who really knows his way around the gaming scene.

From my point of view (non gamer) you would do yourself a favour to download the .iso file for Linux Mint, 'attach' it to a usb stick using balena etcher (this make it bootable) and then, Boot to the usb stick. that will give you the 'Live' version of Linux Mint which will be running in your 64 gb of RAM (NOT on the main drive)....
What does this mean?
It means you can fool around with it, navigate all over the place, give it a real work out (even if you dont know what the hell you are doing)
Even if you manage to 'break it' (its actually reasonably hard to do that) you simply pull the usb stick out........plug it back in again, boot to it and continue (good as new)

(DO NOT double click on the icon on the desktop named "Install Linux Mint"

@f33dm3bits may not be on for a while, international times play a part here....some people asleep some not etc etc.... he will make an appearance.

In the meantime, other souls are sure to chime in with their 2c worth

Enjoy your Linux. You have taken the first step

 

[Mike-BTU]

Worried about breaking Linux? That's what backups are for. Break something? Just restore your recent backup.
I use Ventoy to boot the latest Foxclone from a USB drive, and the backups are saved to an external USB3 5T drive.

May I suggest that your browse this site and learn first.

Before installing Linux, you can boot an .iso from the same Ventoy USB stick.

 

[Condobloke]

And, there is an app named 'Timeshift' (free of course....this IS linux.....everything is free....even the frustration)

Timeshift 'snapshots' (backups of the system only) are saved to an external drive (which is where you should store your music, games, data etc etc anyway)
If/when you screw up (hint...we ALL do it) you simply restore to a recent timeshift snapshot and carry on as if nothing has happened.

Yes, it actually works. ( I have used for the past 13 years and it regularly saves my bacon)

 

[f33dm3bits]

I play games on this machine, I don't email or browse much on it. I have a phone for all that shtuff. Blizzard, EA and Steam, the standard platforms.

My Rig:

Processor AMD Ryzen 9 5950X 16-Core Processor (3.40 GHz)
Installed RAM 64.0 GB
Graphics card NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Ti (12 GB)
Storage 2.12 TB of 3.64 TB used
System type 64-bit operating system, x64-based processor

Almost a year ago I recommended a long time Windows user and someone who I've know for a long time who wanted to switch from Windows to Linux, I recommended him PikaOS. I've checked with him several times and he's still happy with PikaOS. So I would recommend the same to you because it has the newest and latest drivers and software which is nice to have for when gaming and it's Debian based so if you run into something it will be familiar enough for you to get help.

PikaOS Linux

PikaOS - Your new Linux distro for gaming and beyond!

wiki.pika-os.com

What @Condobloke mentioned about Timeshift is also useful which you can also just install on any Linux distribution.

 

[bob466]

Welcome to the Forum.

Once you install your Distro and get it the way you want...create an image with either Foxclone or Rescuezilla.

Should anything happen...you break something or the worst possible case Drive failure...nothing is lost.

 

[CaffeineAddict]

Any ideas on what would be a foolproof OS for a guy like me?

It doesn't really matter for gaming, which distro (OS) you use matters for other things.
For gaming maters to install latest GPU driver and to know how to set up games.
I play games on debian and have no problems at all, even though no gamer is going to recommend it to play games.

As for breaking the OS, always have an extra USB with OS installer on it so that you can reinstall if needed.
For backups I use external HDD, old fashioned but reliable.

 

[f33dm3bits]

It doesn't really matter for gaming, which distro (OS) you use matters for other things.
For gaming maters to install latest GPU driver and to know how to set up games.
I play games on debian and have no problems at all, even though no gamer is going to recommend it to play games.

Also I wouldn't recommend Debian to a new Linux user as it can be confusing when needing to setup a third party repo for getting the latest Nvidia drivers on Debian, while with something like PikaOS based on Debian you get them from the default repos.

 

[NicWelds]

Welcome to the world of Linux.

I'm on Xubuntu and do a lot of gaming, mostly on Steam. everything works well and it's easy to use. All the Ubuntu flavors are quite user friendly.

As for breaking stuff, I don't think any OS is completely foolproof. If you keep good backups and exercise a bit of patience when you experience problems you can mitigate a lot of frustration.