i like gaming,browsing(brave),im open to using open source software like gimp,libreoffice,qbittorrent etc i don’t really care about specific software other than brave.
i don’t use steam,i use pirated games so they should work on whatever distro i will use.
i have no problems with learning more,searching,or posting about linux to learn. and im open to using terminal i already like it somewhat on windows.
my laptop that i will install linux on is msi gf63 with gtx 1650,i5-10500h,16gb ram,1tb ssd sata and 256gb ssd nvme.
so should i switch to linux? i feel like i don’t exactly like where microsoft is taking windows to,but im not sure if my games will work on linux.
you can ask me more questions to see if my usage is supported or not by linux. im open to any easy distro. i don’t relay on microsoft office or adobe apps or any of these things. my usage is pretty generic.
Yes
If you are going to try Linux from a USB drive as suggested by others here try and get a USB3 drive. Most of the cheap USB drives are USB2 which is really too slow to be of use.
Sure you can, but gtx 1650 is not cutting it if you wanna play modern “AAA” games even on low settings 1080p unless you sacrifice resolution, as for everything else you should be fine
Use something else instead of Brave
Personally I still use Brave because Firefox still doesn’t have tab groups on mobile and it’s more private than Chrome
Firefox did add tab groups to desktop, which is dumb because they already existed. They’re called windows. And they’ve been stringing the community along regarding mobile tab groups for years.
Until Firefox get their heads out of their asses, they’re a non-starter as far as I’m concerned
Just try and see how it goes - it’s not like you can’t go back
If you have to ask then no.
Hey OP, I did not read your post but the answer is “hell yes”
Yes.
Grab a few usb sticks and put different images on them to try some different OS’s. Get a feel for how easy they are to install / config / use.
Then put your favorite on your internal drive, and maybe keep a couple of specialized sticks for whatever: troubleshooting, browsing, streaming, gaming, office…
or use ventoy which allows to boot from as many images as the space on the usb allows
Seconding ventoy for installation media. It’s awesome
Should perhaps add that you can generally run Linux distributions off of a USB stick for that first impression.
Just follow a tutorial for how to install Linux and when you see the actual installer on screen, you can just close the installer without installing and then click around in the UI.
It will be slow, because it’s running off that slow USB connection, but otherwise this is pretty much the operating system as it is when fully installed.
no it doesn’t sound like you’d be able to handle switching OS, sorry
why?
No spaces after commas in lists
Playing pirated games is going to require some thinkering. If you buy them on Steam is a much better experience.
Anyways, you should try Heroic Games launcher, there are other options but it’s the best one to me
The switch or dual boot is up to you. I can lay out some general steps in case you want to have an overview. Please do not be scared off by it. Depending on the distro, most things work out of the box or with very little effort.
- familiarize
- look up some distros, I personally like to go Arch-based, but feel free to use whatever seems good and popular enough (please no Ubuntu)
- try virtual machine and then live ISO
- verify compatibility
- this one is a bit more work, basically try all functionality in the live ISO, or at least things like display, mouse, keyboard, touchpad, Wi-Fi, storage
- install
- you probably won’t need to look into this super deep, default installers handle this pretty well
- formatting and partitioning (look into ArchWiki guide, you probably don’t need swap partition)
- if you are going to be reinstalling look into using efibootmgr to possibly clear up old and fix existing boot entries (i had to enable boot flag after setting up dualboot, because macOS installer overwrote the previous settings, thanks Apple :-) )
- configure missing/not working OS stuff
- look for missing drivers and system management software for either your specific hardware or some more general ones
- best sources are wikis like ArchWiki (even if you don’t use Arch), forums and some software search sites like AlternativeTo
- in some cases the software does not meet the requirements for a wiki page to be up (Xlibre being notable example - feel free to look up the whole story)
- you may have to put some time into getting GPU fully working, since nvidia has several driver options depending on the GPU
- I personally had to fix USB autosuspend config, only look into it if devices plugged in after boot are not being detected
- use
- installs and updates are done using package manager (windows has winget, btw)
- for windows games use Wine or rather some of its forks
- most people here already shared their recommendations for this part
edited
- familiarize
Unfortunately, no.
Due to the year of the linux desktop, new user applications have been closed. The overwhelming positive response has just completely bypassed the available seats.
I’m sorry, but we’re full.
Give it a go, playing your pirated games is more effort to setup a wine container for them but if you don’t like it then you can go back.
Use Proton, not wine. Just run them through a launcher like Faugus Launcher
Heroic launcher works as well
Proton is wine with a Steam dependency.
Proton definitely does not require Steam, if that’s what you’re suggesting.
I’m aware that it originally stemmed from wine, but it has come a very long way and is specifically made to work with games.
If you’re trying to play Windows games on Linux in 2026, you don’t use wine
It sounds like you would enjoy Linux though you should at least know that running your games will need additional hoops comparing to Windows since they’re Windows games, nothing something wild and will be mostly about changing the default WINE to Proton if you use Lutris or Heroic for them. However sometimes you will probably need to troubleshoot for some game time to time, but you’ll get used to that once you learn the idea.
Linux Mint is likely the safest choice here. Zorin is also fine for newbies.
Also note that, a lot of things will be different than Windows, though you can always search for an equivalent for something you used. At least the structure is much more beautiful on Linux, unlike Windows’ chaotic nature.
