I think he means if you’ve set up your partitions where only the core OS is on root, it’s easier to distro hop and point your new os to your home folder. There are partition strategies that make distro hopping easy.

I’ve tried most distros over the years. I liked arch with gnome, but maintaining it was a bit of work. And then I realized that when I was done setting it up the way I liked it, I was essentially just building fedora workstation. So I switched a few versions ago and I haven’t looked back.

Fedora is boring, like sometimes too boring. But then I remember that’s what an os is supposed to be. I now run it on all my PCs and it’s what I install on family members PCs. (Yup it’s even done well with windows converts who don’t know anything about linux - their transition has been easy)

Issues I have encountered:

1. Rpmfusion is a must, otherwise the distro doesn’t handle much. It’s also the best way to nvidia.
2. i still run into the odd codec thing even with rpm fusion-I just use VLC and it works fine
3. it took me a while to figure out that the fedora based flatpaks are not always the same as the flathub versions. For example, back to point 2, the fedora flatpak of VLC is missing codecs while the flathub version works with everything.
4. i don’t like how flatpaks update automatically. I’m sure I can stop that behavior but I haven’t bothered to look into it yet. It manifests itself with steam. The flatpak updates but the main system has not. Steam then has driver differences which leads to processing more shaders and sometimes outright conflicts and my games default to the integrated gpu. This is always fixed by simply updating the system, it’s never a real issue. But sometimes I don’t want to update, I just want to game.
5. it’s got some funny ways of doing things. Always worth googling before you do something. For example, the way you update grub, there’s a special fedora way to do that. They push Podman instead of docker and despite what they say, it doesn’t always build cleanly - just use docker. That kind of stuff.

What I like about fedora

1. It’s boring and “just works” not even mint “just worked” as good for me
2. the upgrades between versions are boring and non events. It works if you go into detail cleaning up old things from the command line, it works if you just click the “upgrade” button in the gui.
3. its not bleeding edge but still pretty new. I’ve thrown some brand new hardware at it and it was supported, whereas all other distros failed except arch
4. It’s cake to maintain. Updates don’t require the attention arch does, and honestly I’ve had more issues with Ubuntu updates. It sets up btrfs by default - some may see that as a detriment - but it sets you up nice for snapshots and whatnot right out of the box.

I say give workstation a shot and give it a little time to get used to things. Definitely do rpmfusion. It’s the one time I’d recommend just jamming commands into the terminal exactly like the website says without thinking. (You still have to read the website for the right commands). Good luck!

Full screensaver functionality is tough on Wayland, if not impossible right now. They apparently don’t know how to have fun over there.

That said, it’s worth noting that you can install dosbox, fire up win3.11 on it, and then run your nostalgic screensavers full screen from there. Afterdark and whatnot. Dosbox keeps the computer alive so the screen saver runs forever and the computer doesn’t lock - so it’s not really full functionality. But if you’re just looking for some fun - that works great. (I do love my flying toasters)

Remember when the internet didn’t suck? Pepperidge Farms remembers.

I think I’m in. It’s expensive but I want an htpc/gaming machine in my Mancave. I don’t know how anyone could have expected $600 price tags in this crap ai fueled market.

I’m not sure all devices are getting a bios update for this. Didn’t Dell confirm this some time ago? If I’m understanding things correctly, Microsoft is forcing you to: 1) get the update by installing win11 legit with no bypasses 2) get the bios update from your hardware manufacturer 3) essentially turn off secure boot.

I think there are plenty of fully functional PCs out there, capable of running win11, but not supported because of something like tpm2.0, whose bios won’t be updated by the manufacturer, and therefore have no path to receive this update. Which means the pc will probably eventually be forced to run without secure boot.

Which I think means if you’re a windows only user - forced obsolescence-buy a new pc. If you’re a linux user - you’re fine.

I think? I could be completely wrong here - but that’s my understanding of it all.

New iPhones bought from Apple that are unlocked “connect to any carrier later” work on all the networks in the us. Once upon a time, there was an “unlocked” phone - meaning you could change the sim and the phone wasn’t locked to a contract. But you still had to match the phone to the major carrier. For example, an att phone could be unlocked, and then used on straighttalk (becasue straighttalk resold att network). But it wouldn’t work on Verizon or T-Mobile because they were different networks.

That’s not a thing anymore with iPhones and hasn’t been for a long time. An unlocked iPhone can be used with any carrier that supports esims.

If your old phone is still on a contract - you may not be able to transfer the phone number, or have to request an unlock, or any other shenanigans. But the new iPhone will still work on whatever network you take it to.

Ideally, your contract is done, you buy new unlocked iPhone, you take it to your existing or a new carrier, you say “I bought a new unlocked phone, I want to set it up new, and I want you to transfer my number” a prime time carrier will just make this happen for you. A reseller can be a little more of a pain in the arse.

Personally I’ve been happy with the prepaid plans from straight talk - despite their setup process sucking. If you call them and get a person to help it goes pretty smooth. And the service is indistinguishable for a much cheaper price once it’s setup. I’m pretty sure this goes for most resellers.

Good luck - you’ll be fine!