Switching to Ubuntu

[newby_investor]

Update:

Thanks to Newby_Investor for pointing out that the file system is different between Windows and Linux.

Anytime, mate... that's a bit of a place where you can be caught out if you're not careful, though for most end-users it won't really make much difference. I doubt my wife knows what a file system is, and she uses my Mint laptop without hassles.

I am happily enjoying Mint at the moment. After getting used to the OS for almost a month, I am going to back up my data and install a more complete Debian package.

If you're happy with Mint, there's no real reason (other than just for a learning curve) to install Debian. I've done all the more DIY-style distros back in the day, ones like Mint have matured to the point where you can just install it and do your work (or leisure or whatever you're going to do).

I will not be using a Windows system at home again and the learning experience is actually fun.

Edit: when did Firefox get so good?

A few months ago, forget how long exactly, they did a complete re-design. It got a lot faster overnight. Still hogs a lot of memory, but I guess I just open too many tabs...

 

[Johnatan56]

Anytime, mate... that's a bit of a place where you can be caught out if you're not careful, though for most end-users it won't really make much difference. I doubt my wife knows what a file system is, and she uses my Mint laptop without hassles.



If you're happy with Mint, there's no real reason (other than just for a learning curve) to install Debian. I've done all the more DIY-style distros back in the day, ones like Mint have matured to the point where you can just install it and do your work (or leisure or whatever you're going to do).

I will not be using a Windows system at home again and the learning experience is actually fun.


A few months ago, forget how long exactly, they did a complete re-design. It got a lot faster overnight. Still hogs a lot of memory, but I guess I just open too many tabs...

Since the quantum update last year around November.
Still can't multi select tabs properly...
But yeah, improved substantially. There was also a new update changing the web render, should be enabled by default next release, should also improve.

Firefox seems to deal with many tabs better than Chrome does for me, have never crashed due to too many tabs on FF.

 

[CT_Biker]

Anytime, mate... that's a bit of a place where you can be caught out if you're not careful, though for most end-users it won't really make much difference. I doubt my wife knows what a file system is, and she uses my Mint laptop without hassles.

I had a look at the file system windows uses, and it is seriously messy. It explains why the OS is so inefficient.

 

[CT_Biker]

Since the quantum update last year around November.
Still can't multi select tabs properly...
But yeah, improved substantially. There was also a new update changing the web render, should be enabled by default next release, should also improve.

Firefox seems to deal with many tabs better than Chrome does for me, have never crashed due to too many tabs on FF.

I wanted to mention that it is way more stable when I have a few tabs open and the console as well. It does not lose it's snappiness the way chrome does.

 

[Johnatan56]

I had a look at the file system windows uses, and it is seriously messy. It explains why the OS is so inefficient.

They could update the file system, but for a majority of things it doesn't really matter and won't really impact home users.

There is a different FS, but you need enterprise to partition it I think, has better support for SSD and drive errors I think, but not really something to write home about for most users. They removed the ability to create it on Pro one or two major updates ago, not sure Why, probably segmentation.

 

[CT_Biker]

They could update the file system, but for a majority of things it doesn't really matter and won't really impact home users.

There is a different FS, but you need enterprise to partition it I think, has better support for SSD and drive errors I think, but not really something to write home about for most users. They removed the ability to create it on Pro one or two major updates ago, not sure Why, probably segmentation.

Well with hardware being as cheap as it is, a memory swap system would clean up and speed things up a lot, I think. Then again I do not design OS'

Well, at least I get the chance to have a look at that soon as Linux is Open Source.

 

[CT_Biker]

I've decided to keep Mint and start digging into Terminal, it is a great Distro.

Debian is slightly slower to be honest.

 

[gamer16]

I've decided to keep Mint and start digging into Terminal, it is a great Distro.

Debian is slightly slower to be honest.

Having fun so far I see, what are you using your PC for?

 

[CT_Biker]

Having fun so far I see, what are you using your PC for?

Mainly hobbyist programming. Teaching myself in my spare time with the goal of becoming a Developer.

 

[gamer16]

Mainly hobbyist programming. Teaching myself in my spare time with the goal of becoming a Developer.

I hear Linux is good for this, keep at it.

 

[CT_Biker]

I hear Linux is good for this, keep at it.

It is. The terminal is a little different to Windows. Way more powerful, and useful.

 

[sicelo.m]

I've decided to keep Mint and start digging into Terminal, it is a great Distro.

Debian is slightly slower to be honest.

What does "slow" mean in this context?

 

[ghoti]

If you got speed issues, and are like me, have a SATA drive and limited RAM (4GB), then I would recommend trying Manjaro for speed. Ubuntu is too slow on my laptop cause it keeps touching the drive. Every time the drives spin up there is a 30 second "freeze" on the system as the drives spin up and data is moved around. This was caused by snapd on my ubuntu system. I moved to Manjaro because of speed issues and there is a remarkable difference between Ubuntu and Manjaro.

 

[CT_Biker]

What does "slow" mean in this context?

Responsiveness from the OS. Open and closing programs. Running code and compile times.

Its Mint is fair bit faster at Run time as it takes 0.068 seconds on average to run a file in a full IDE(Pycharm)
Debian takes a little longer I averaged 0.95 - 0.1 second to run in the same IDE

I no longer use PyCharm, and have migrated to VSCode(Lord why did I do this?)

The GUI for mint is also more to my liking.

 

[CT_Biker]

If you got speed issues, and are like me, have a SATA drive and limited RAM (4GB), then I would recommend trying Manjaro for speed. Ubuntu is too slow on my laptop cause it keeps touching the drive. Every time the drives spin up there is a 30 second "freeze" on the system as the drives spin up and data is moved around. This was caused by snapd on my ubuntu system. I moved to Manjaro because of speed issues and there is a remarkable difference between Ubuntu and Manjaro.

I have a SATA drive and 8GB of ram.

Have you configured your Memory Swap Partition? It makes a difference. Especially when you are running a lot programs and while under heavy use it helps keep the OS efficient.

I know that Memory Swapping comes in handy for scaling, but it also comes in handy for home use. I experience very little lag or hesitation from my laptop, where as with Windows I was forced to wait.

 

[gamer16]

Responsiveness from the OS. Open and closing programs. Running code and compile times.

Its Mint is fair bit faster at Run time as it takes 0.068 seconds on average to run a file in a full IDE(Pycharm)
Debian takes a little longer I averaged 0.95 - 0.1 second to run in the same IDE

I no longer use PyCharm, and have migrated to VSCode(Lord why did I do this?)

The GUI for mint is also more to my liking.

Have you tried disabling the swap? Forcing the OS to use the memory only.

 

[CT_Biker]

Have you tried disabling the swap? Forcing the OS to use the memory only.

Would that not make the OS less responsive as it would need to keep more applications in the RAM for longer? thus leaving less RAM available for system use?

I'll give it a go. It's only a 2GB Swap partition - I am guessing this is similar to Windows and its file paging memory allocation, or related to it.

What I did notice that if the Swap partition is too big, it will slow Linux down.

 

[gamer16]

Would that not make the OS less responsive as it would need to keep more applications in the RAM for longer? thus leaving less RAM available for system use?

If you have a small amount of memory yes as it would only be able to keep a part of what you need in the memory, if its more than 8Gb you'll have a good time as what you are currently working on will be stored in the fastest storage medium available, apart from cache that is. It made a huge difference for me, until you have too many tabs open in your browser but you can work around that.

 

[CT_Biker]

If you have a small amount of memory yes as it would only be able to keep a part of what you need in the memory, if its more than 8Gb you'll have a good time as what you are currently working on will be stored in the fastest storage medium available, apart from cache that is. It made a huge difference for me, until you have too many tabs open in your browser but you can work around that.

My swap space file is about 2GB currently. I did try it with my second DIMM disabled and it still ran great with a 4GB Swap Space. I would not say that it ran as if it had 8GB of ram, but it did not feel like it had 8GB of RAM, but it was still pleasant and quite quick.

I should maybe keep System manager open to see if I am even using the Space.

Even with a lot of RAM browsers still consume quite a bit of resources. Websites these days run a lot of code client side.

 

[ghoti]

My swap space file is about 2GB currently. I did try it with my second DIMM disabled and it still ran great with a 4GB Swap Space. I would not say that it ran as if it had 8GB of ram, but it did not feel like it had 8GB of RAM, but it was still pleasant and quite quick.

I should maybe keep System manager open to see if I am even using the Space.

Even with a lot of RAM browsers still consume quite a bit of resources. Websites these days run a lot of code client side.

Your swap should be double your RAM. Swap file is ON the SATA drive. Anything that touches SATA will be your bottleneck.

If you have a SATA drive, perhaps you have the same problem I have.