I’ve been using Linux as my main OS for a couple of years now, first on a slightly older Dell Inspiron 15. Last year I upgraded to an Inspiron 15 7510 with i7-11800H and RTX3050. Since purchasing this laptop I’ve used Manjaro, Debian 11, Pop OS, Void Linux, Fedora Silverblue (37 & 38) and now Debian 12. I need to reinstall soon since I’ve stuffed up my NVIDIA drivers trying to install CUDA and didn’t realise that they changed the default swap size to 1GB.
I use this laptop for everything - development in C/C++, dart/flutter, nodejs and sometimes PHP. I occasionally play games on it through Proton and sometimes need to re-encode videos using Handbrake. I need some amount of reliability since I also use this for University.
I’ve previously been against trying Arch due to instability issues such as the recent GRUB thing. But I have been reading about BTRFS and snapshots which make me think I can have an up to date system and reliability (by rebooting into a snapshot). What’s everyone’s perspective on this, is there anything major I should keep an eye on?
Should also note I use GNOME, vscode, Firefox and will need MATLAB to be installed, if there is anything to do with those that is problematic on Arch?
Edit: I went with Arch thanks everyone for the advice
You haven’t really identified any of your reasons for leaving the previous distros behind. Did they fall short somewhere? If it was simply to try them all out, then by all means, add a notch on your belt for Arch too. You can always install yet another distro down the road if it doesn’t pan out.
I’m a former Arch dev, and once upon a time I created its logo. I love the project, and it will always be dear to me. That said, I use Fedora Silverblue for most of my host systems now, and Arch containers for my everyday tasks.
As you likely already know, Fedora provides one of the best GNOME experiences available. I like the additional stability, flexibility, background updates, and easy rollbacks that Silverblue provides, but I can also appreciate that the flatpak and containerized workflow isn’t for everyone.
I’ve previously been against trying Arch due to instability issues
Skip Arch and go straight to NixOS if you are worried about that. Gives you most of the same advantages (huge up to date package collection) with none of the disadvantages (everything can be downgraded, patched, rolledback, etc. with ease).
Yeah once I’m brave enough to move OS on my server (currently running Ubuntu server) I want to switch it to NixOS.
I’m spinning up a VM first to better understand it.
Installing the Nix package manager on another distribution is also an easy way to get familiar with it without making the full switch.
Didn’t even cross my mind. So I can install it on my current Ubuntu server to get familiar with it. Def gonna try.
Last year I upgraded to an Inspiron 15 7510 with i7-11800H and RTX3050. Since purchasing this laptop I’ve used Manjaro, Debian 11, Pop OS, Void Linux, Fedora Silverblue (37 & 38) and now Debian 12.
A distro-hopper. *Noted*.
I need to reinstall soon since I’ve stuffed up my NVIDIA drivers trying to install CUDA and didn’t realise that they changed the default swap size to 1GB.
Prefers starting from scratch instead of fixing. *Noted*.
I use this laptop for everything - development in C/C++, dart/flutter, nodejs and sometimes PHP. I occasionally play games on it through Proton and sometimes need to re-encode videos using Handbrake. I need some amount of reliability since I also use this for University.
General-use and reliable. *Noted*.
I’ve previously been against trying Arch due to instability issues such as the recent GRUB thing.
Understandable, but not entirely justified.
But I have been reading about BTRFS and snapshots which make me think I can have an up to date system and reliability (by rebooting into a snapshot).
Fair.
What’s everyone’s perspective on this, is there anything major I should keep an eye on?
It is almost common knowledge at this point that this approach has serious merits. That’s why we find it on a myriad of rolling release distros. From Manjaro to Garuda, from SpiralLinux to Siduction. Heck, even Nobara -which is not strictly a rolling release distro- has it. I wouldn’t even use/recommend a rolling release distro if not for (GRUB-)Btrfs+Timeshift/Snapper. But, while by itself it is already very powerful. It still benefits a lot from testing. Which, when utilized by openSUSE in particular, manages to elevate their Tumbleweed to a very high standard. So much so, that it has rightfully earned to be named the stable rolling release distro. But not all distros are as rigorous in their testing… if at all…
Should also note I use GNOME, vscode, Firefox and will need MATLAB to be installed, if there is anything to do with those that is problematic on Arch?
Nah, that’s absolutely fine. *Noted*.
Should I give Arch a shot?
So there are some glaring issues here:
- You’ve set some parameters and asked us if Arch satisfies. Which it does, but so do a lot of other distros. Which seems to tell me that this will become yet another chapter of your distro-hopper-phase. Which -to be clear- happens to be totally fine. I’d even argue that it’s preferable to do it sooner rather than later. Though the mindset of a distro-hopper might deter you from being satiated…
- As previously alluded, Arch is yet another distro that satisfies your needs. You didn’t mention what attracted you towards it, nor why you’d prefer it specifically over all the other available options.
- Btrfs snapshots, while powerful, are not 100% fail-safe. Sure, nothing actually is as a random SSD crash might loom around the corner. And I’d be one of the first to tell you that using Btrfs snapshots to rollback to is an exponentially better experience than without. But we’re still able to improve upon it (mathematically speaking) infinitely times, to be more precise; some systems allow us to decrease the complexity from uncountably infinite amount of states (which therefore become “unknown states”) to countably infinite or (better yet) finite amount of states (which therefore actually become “known states”). The reduction of complexity that this offers and its implications to system reliability are far more impactful than the simple use of Btrfs snapshots.
Consider answering the following questions:
- Are you a distro-hopper? Or did you have very legit reasons to switch distros? If so, would you mind telling us why you changed distros?
- Would it be fair to assume that it boils down to “I messed up, but instead of repairing I will opt for reinstalling.”
- If so, is this something you want to work on (eventually) or doesn’t it bother you at all?
- Would it be fair to assume that it boils down to “I messed up, but instead of repairing I will opt for reinstalling.”
- Why Arch?
- Would you like to setup Btrfs yourself? Or would you prefer your distro to do it for you? Or don’t you actually mind regardless?
I might be a distro hopper. Every distro just niggles me after a while, Silverblue wasn’t flexible enough, didn’t like GNOME 3.38 on Debian 11 after using 4x on Manjaro. Manjaro was buggy and had poor reputation. I didn’t like Pop Shell, however, there was good support for Optimus laptops on Pop OS. Before Debian 12 I gave Ubuntu another go and it kept crashing. Main problem with Debian 12 is Firefox ESR which doesn’t work with some sites I need and that the packages will be significantly out of date within a year.
I thought Arch because it is almost always up to date and seems to be widely recommended.
It’s not like I haven’t tried fixing the issue, I just don’t know what to do outside of uninstalling and reinstalling the drivers or waiting for NVIDIA to provide a repo for Debian 12 for CUDA. As for the swap I would rather have a partition for it than have some combination of swapfiles and swap.
I had a go at installing Arch today in a VM using archinstall and set up BTRFS with Timeshift and grub-btrfs and it all seemed fairly straightforward.
Thanks for answering! Much appreciated!
I might be a distro hopper. Every distro just niggles me after a while
Perhaps you’ve yet to find the one 😜. Your criticism to the different distros is fair though.
I thought Arch because it is almost always up to date and seems to be widely recommended.
Yup, it’s by far the most popular rolling release distro. Though, I’d argue that openSUSE Tumleweed -while not as popular- is definitely worth checking out as well. They’re, however, quite different from one another. Arch offers a blank canvas, while openSUSE Tumbleweed is relatively opinionated; though it does offer excellent defaults. You would have to make up your own mind whichever ‘style’ of maintaining a distro suits you best.
I had a go at installing Arch today in a VM using archinstall and set up BTRFS with Timeshift and grub-btrfs and it all seemed fairly straightforward.
Well, that sure does sound promising!
Thanks for taking the time to read my comments, really appreciate it! I’ve had a bit of a look into Tumbleweed and it sounds like it’s similar to Fedora in how it handles packaging of proprietary software which I found pretty annoying, but I could be wrong.
OP was relatively verbose so I act accordingly. Don’t feel compelled to read larger pieces if you’re sensitive to wasting your time. I don’t recall forcing you to read it, so it’s entirely on you. While information density might have suffered, “little info” is too harsh. Though, as long as there’s even one sentence of ‘original’ information (compared to all the other comments) a piece of writing of that length is worth reading IMO. Though, thinking otherwise is definitely justifiable.
Though, as long as there’s even one sentence of ‘original’ information […] a piece of writing of that length is worth reading IMO
No. You are just confirming it.
I’ve previously been against trying Arch due to instability issues such as the recent GRUB thing.
But you used Manjaro? 😂
Go for it. If you use archinstall, it is incredibly simple to get up and running. The difficulty around Arch is quite overblown except perhaps when talking about people brand new to Linux. Even without archinstall, you are just following a guide in the wiki.
Some people don’t like to associate Manjaro with Arch since it has different repos and a bad reputation
is quite overblown
The wiki installation doesn’t go through repartitioning your drive (like splitting a partition into two and moving the content to a single part of them), I wouldn’t try that using the Arch ISO, no sir
Arch is what stopped distro-hopping for me. Well, mostly. Sometimes I try some distros on separate install just out of curiosity.
If you use Linux for couple of years, there shouldn’t be too many obstacles. Just read through the Wiki carefully and you’ll be good.
As for reliability, I’d say Arch is fairly reliable for my 10+ years experience with it (apart from my-fault breakages, I remember something unexpected happening maybe 3 times in all that period), but if you want to secure your butt in mission critical situations then 1) don’t yolo upgrade your OS if there’s anything important at the moment. Find the right time for it 2) setup a snapshotting solution to have that quick rollback ability. And it’s not just about Arch, I’d say the same for every distro (maybe apart from immutable ones).
Other than that, remember to have fun!
