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Sorry Arch (EndeavourOS), it's not working out any more and hello Fedora

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There comes a time when everyone has to sit and think about what they use on their PC, especially if you're on Linux. For me, Arch Linux (via EndeavourOS) just wasn't working out any more and so I've moved to Fedora.

While I was reasonably happy with Arch Linux, it's just not stable enough for me personally. It's a very subjective thing of course, and highly dependent on what hardware you use — along with how often you update. For me, it just messed things up a bit too often, and last night was the final straw.

I updated either that day, or the day before, and just before a livestream was due to start, my SteelSeries headset no longer worked. No matter what I tried, following guide after guide about PipeWire, nothing helped. Just this weird and very quiet electrical static noise whenever I tried piping audio to it. Eventually it worked again by some downgrading, plus random hotplugging and testing it on a Windows machine for a sanity check and it started somewhat working again. My Microphone was another issue, at the same time it decided to be ridiculously quiet for no apparent reason I could see so there were wider problems. I had enough, I had work to do and after hours of hair-pulling — hello from Fedora.

Fedora's KDE Spin

Thankfully, with the likes of Flathub / Flatpak packages and how far along apps like Discover have come along for installing packages and setting things up, there's not a whole lot to learn. It's been a very long time since I used Fedora, and it was one of my first Linux distributions I tried sticking with back when it was "Fedora Core" and wow — it's always surprising to see how far we've come as a platform for doing anything.

Fedora does come with some of its own issues, like NVIDIA drivers being a nuisance to install, which they definitely should improve. If other distributions can do one-click or one-line installs, I'm sure they could do it too. However, it's just another point towards me swapping to AMD when prices settle, or perhaps Intel when Arc properly launches for desktop. I also need to figure out why Dropbox won't load on startup, some little things like that.

Anyway, are you really a Linux nerd if you don't distro-hop at least once a year? Jokes aside, I look forward to seeing why people keep recommending Fedora nowadays as a stable distribution, let's see how long it takes me to break it.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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About the author -
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I am the owner of GamingOnLinux. After discovering Linux back in the days of Mandrake in 2003, I constantly came back to check on the progress of Linux until Ubuntu appeared on the scene and it helped me to really love it. You can reach me easily by emailing GamingOnLinux directly. Find me on Mastodon.
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165 comments
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ShabbyX Apr 8, 2022
So I visit my parents every now and then and advocating Linux obviously every time. They always had an Ubuntu installation they never booted to. A month ago I visited them and thought, hey let's experience with Manjaro on their PC (instead of mine), they won't use it after I leave anyway.

Long story short, they are used to it now, and have been on Manjaro for a month. Now, I should be happy right? Except it's bound to break sooner or later and who the hell is going to fix that?

14 Apr 8, 2022
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Fedora as a stable alternative to Arch? Well, you know what they say: have it your way.
STiAT Apr 9, 2022
Quoting: MaluraqAs a long time Fedora user, I don't see it getting nearly the love it deserves. It's stable and reliable and has a LOT of spin options to get the look and feel you want. I run it with XFCE4 myself. Enjoy!

Using fedora for 4 month now, breaking my system once I'm not sure if that's true. Though, was played by Nvidia drivers, but for me it was not a stable experience.

I still use it though, it's still the best option for me.

Fedora is not stable, considering 80 % of the GPUs in the laptop space probably are Nvidia.

I do understand their stance towards that. Just, that won't be good for any average user.
STiAT Apr 9, 2022
Quoting: 14Fedora as a stable alternative to Arch? Well, you know what they say: have it your way.

On that part it's probably really more stable. They usually don't break on fundamental stuff in a stable release cycle.

But to be fair, distributions are just that. They maintain upstream packages.

The difference with Arch and Fedora is, Fedora undergoes a quality gate. Which Arch never did, never does, and probably never will do.
I tried to give Fedora a shot last year when my laptop's NIC died, but I couldn't figure out how to get the Wi-Fi driver compiled. I messed around with DNF, Yum, and probably yet another package manager but never ended up getting an internet connection after a few hours. On Arch, it took me about 2 hours to follow a pretty simple guide to getting my Wi-Fi drivers compiled.

I don't think I'll ever be able to use another distribution; Arch is the only one I've been able to figure out.
DrDickGind Apr 9, 2022
timeshift or some other recovery tool is a great idea when using arch. Im really happy with it. Sorry to hear you jumping of the: I use arch btw train :D


Last edited by DrDickGind on 9 April 2022 at 2:53 am UTC
BigJ Apr 9, 2022
Friendship ended with Arch, now Fedora is my best friend
Phlebiac Apr 9, 2022
Quoting: Liam DaweSomewhere I followed a wrong command, didn't pay enough attention, stuff got removed that shouldn't and it all died. It was a learning experience

You have to watch out for those embedded 'sudo rm -rf /' suggestions. ;-P
slaapliedje Apr 9, 2022
Quoting: jensCool, I hope Fedora works for you, I’m more than happy with it since several years. Fedora shines with its Gnome integration (which I use), but don’t know how well the KDE integration is set up.
I was amused when I watched a video that was trying to push the idea of not suggesting different distributions, and instead to suggest people use something based on the desktop environment. I sort of agree. If trying to convert someone over, we should ask what the person is looking for. Based on these questions, you suggest the 'best of breed' for the DE, and be sure to ask if they want stability or continuous new features.
For example; if someone wanted simple, out of your face system where you can just launch applications and get work done, I would suggest stock Gnome. If they wanted new features over stability, I would suggest Fedora over Debian.

If they want complete customization, I would probably suggest Suse over Fedora, with KDE. At least it used to be a great KDE distro. Not sure how great it is now.

I kind of miss Xandros, but that might be the Tequila talking...
anokasion Apr 9, 2022
Hello, we have chatted before on Twitter when your site was small, I doubt you'll remember me.
Anyway, because Arch *needs* to be bleeding edge, it always uses the latest packages, we all know that; now, I have a Geforce GT710 2GB VRAM, although I can run 95% of games of the 700 on my list, NVIDIA decided to drop support for my card and throw it to legacy drivers. And Arch didn't like that. Manjaro also didn't like that. So I said bye bye and just got a SSD, I would use my HDD to put games, builds, etc, and the OS on the 256GB Kingston SSD.
I decided to install MX Linux, which I never used, and sounds strange, but that is because it's the devs of Mepis and Artix joined and made this distro. It was on top on DistroWatch at that time, and was on top yesterday as well.
It's super stable, everything works, the default WM is XFCE, and the best thing is, it doesn't use systemd, uses a custom sysv on init. It's FAST, I know I never tried a SSD, but I can tell it's really fast.
So, I update packages every time is needed, and set to use the latest NVIDIA drivers that supported my card. I don't like Legacy.
All games work as before, and with this speed I don't see the value on using Arch, I prefer something more stable, I already got speed.
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