I’m looking for recommendations.
I have run Linux on my own computers off and on for the last 10 years. I’m not an advanced user, but I’m comfortable enough playing around with different distros and settings to find a good fit for myself and my own devices, and problem-solve as needed.
But now with the end of Windows 10 looming, I need to upgrade a family member’s computer to Linux. This device is only used by people whose attitude toward computers is “if it doesn’t just work, it’s too hard and I can’t engage”. So this needs to be something that both is not going to break on its own (e.g. while doing automatic updates) and also won’t be accidentally broken by the users. As well as not being too steep of a learning curve for Windows users. (Their needs are uncomplicated - mostly just LibreOffice and Firefox, both of which they already use.)
Mint is often recommended for inexperienced Windows refugees. But I’ve had several things break in the process of getting Mint installed and updated on this machine. That wouldn’t be an issue if it were my own computer, but it’s not filling me with confidence that this is going to meet the ongoing “just works” requirement for this device. There’s no way I’m going to be able to handle long-distance tech support if things break more than once in a blue moon.
Which other distros would you recommend for this use case?
Thanks in advance.
Debian Stable. Get it installed, get everything working right and configured the way this person likes it on a reasonable DE with default themes, and more likely than not, you won’t have to touch this thing for years.
The setup’s not necessarily for noobs, but if you’re the one doing the setup, you should be able to get it into a place where it will pretty much never break for them.
You should probably give them KDE or GNOME (probably KDE, as it’s more Windows-like and less my way or the highway than Gnome). As much as I love XFCE, it’s probably a good idea to give a layman a feature-heavy DE so that nothing is likely to be missing; also, it’s way too easy to accidentally delete panel items or entire panels on accident and a little annoying to restore things back to the way they were. KDE’s panels implementation mitigates these issues.
I’m currently playing around with Debian on an old laptop of mine. If I can get the setup to a place where it feels sufficient for me to take my hands off, it could be the answer for this other computer.
(Thanks for DE recommendations. It does my head in trying to keep straight which ones are suited to which uses.)