im not a linux evangelist but people post on here weekly like "i miss when computers were more like the early 2000s and had basic software and i didn't have to pay attention to all the flashiness and complexity and updates" girl what you desire is running stable debian on a spare thinkpad

February 17, 2026 - 05:41 UTC

38
20
1607
Debian stable on my desktop and my laptop and a console for gaming and I have zero regrets.
0
0
7
i3 gaps go zoom 🏎️
0
0
1
Back when I could use Linux for work (15 years ago) I very quickly came to this exact conclusion. I still use Debian for my home server and gaming PC. Work forces me to choose between Windows and MacOS because we’re Microsoft everything. MacOS has steeply declined in recent years.
0
0
7
KDE and rice it to your heart's content!
0
0
0
I love my linux spare laptop, it feels so nice and clean and focused.
0
0
0
its only occuring to me tonight that people dont know this and im losing my god damn mind
0
0
131
i recently got fedora kinoite which is one of their immutable desktop distros. genuinely amazing, its so fast and convenient. the limitations are real but if you draw, write, or just use browser + filesystem its perfect.

only short point is music prod with a DAW. fl was too expensive not to use..
0
0
0
many are saying it
0
0
0
Sometimes I'm considering it, sometimes I see my friends have to deal with Vulkan shaders and I just don't think I have the patience

Win 11 also runs my patience dry because it's such a piece of shit, I'm just trying to do everything to stay on Win 10 at this point
2
0
1
tbh dealing with vulkan shaders is clicking the "skip" button on the precompile window and the game working completely normally 95% of the time
1
0
4
Yeah it was 11 that finally drove me to Linux.
0
0
0
Yeah but my thinkpad lasts maybe fifteen seconds off the charging cable….
0
0
1
It’d be cool if there were laptops that came with Linux out of the box because 99% of people will never install a different operating system from the OEM.
4
0
20
i tried doing it once, but linux didnt like my lack of commitment and banished me from trying on this computer ever again.
0
0
2
It might depend on where you live, but some Thinkpads can be bought with Linux. They knock off a few bucks for the Windows license, too. I bought one when I was living overseas that came with nothing at all on it.
0
0
7
good news there are! there's a number of brands, such as Alienware and System 76
3
0
27
My thinkpad came with linux, it's great!
0
0
3
The problem is I have to use MS products at work and switching back and forth is tiring. I'm only willing to do it because I have an at home Linux engineer for tech support.
0
0
0
Please no, though I agree with you.

β€œStable debian on a spare thinkpad” is ultra galaxy brain solution here
0
0
1
I don't know if Debian is the thing I would recommend to people. I consider it more of an intermediate difficulty, not for big reasons just little pain points. The big one being obviously new hardware support.
0
0
1
It's always a Thinkpad
0
0
2
ill do it
eventually
probably
0
0
2
[I'm about to put linux on a hand-me-down T430 (because obvs) and I'm a debian stable lifer on the server but have been wondering if there's a distro that's a little fancier in terms of GUI while having solid hardware support and also Is Debian.]
0
0
0
The fun part about remembering this if you were hacking in the early 2000s is that when you come back to it a lot of the annoying problems have been fixed. If stable doesn't have what you need you can always add support for testing and use specific packages from there.
0
0
0
But I also want it to run all my games.
2
0
0
Unless you play some specific games with anticheat there is a good chance all your games works ootb
If you play mostly indie games like Disco Elysium there are native ports

Some popular games like fortnite don't work, others like Warframe are officialy supported
areweanticheatyet.com/
0
0
6
Then switch out of windows.

www.windowscentral.com/microsoft/windows-11/nvidia-points-finger-at-windows-update-microsoft-patch-blamed-for-pc-gaming-issues
0
0
0
YES! YES! OH MY GOD
0
0
0
fuckin around with my hyprland dots takes me back to tinkering with Litestep in the WinXP days and man, I didn't realize how much I missed that
0
0
4
I found spiral Linux & have been very satisfied on a hand me down ThinkPad from my late grandma. It's true this is very possible & enjoyable
1
0
2
itsfoss.com/spirallinux-review/
In case anyone is interested in the simplicity of Spiral Linux :D
0
0
0
I’ve got fedora running on my laptop and it works like a charm, you can barely tell the difference between having Windows or Fedora. There’s very little constraints nowadays. Besides, a little terminal knowledge never hurt anyone
1
0
2
If you're a Windows power user you practically need terminal knowledge anyway to keep the damn thing stable for long periods of time... so many weird bugs, tweaks and quality of life features that are best run in a command window or powershell
0
0
4
T.T I just need Clip Studio to make a Linux version of their software and I will finally jump ship from Win10

So far all the Wine or bottle attempts at making CSP work just, have one or more things that just don't work for me.
0
0
9
Oh my God this is exactly what I need thank you for this information
0
0
3
I've been maining linux on my main desktop and two laptops. Two with Fedora and one with Ubuntu. I sadly cannot recommend it to the average user yet. There are still usability issues and imo if you ever need a terminal then it's not ready. My main issue is networking drops on all three.
1
0
0
I think we're 80% to 90% there, though. Steam mostly just works with all my games. You can even get heroic to run games from other hubs like Epic. It's incresible how well games work out of the box these days. But maintaining linux on modern hardware takes knowledge and imo the "rtfm" bros kill it.
0
0
1
i love my old thinkpad running Debian stable. it's such a piece of shit: battery lasts 20 minutes, disk is constantly at 99% capacity, hasn't had a software update in six months, etc

yet I still end up using it regularly, because it Just Works
0
0
7
πŸ’Ž
0
0
0
you're not gonna believe what I am doing right now
0
0
2
Okay but unironically I do want like a t440 or whatever and one of the spinny disk caddies that goes in the cd drive slot
1
0
19
Bring back clitmouse
1
0
22
I think a lot of people have a very different image of linux than reality which end up making them think that's not what they want
2
0
54
If you end up explaining it to them just tell them Android is linux and that they already use it.
0
0
6
Which is kind of funny because Steam Deck is very popular and the desktop mode it ships with is very very similar to any distro shipping Plasma. The modern Linux desktop is already at their fingertips and they can see what it's like.
1
0
49
debian user for 25 years now, can confirm
0
0
0
Only thing at this point stopping me from switching is the 2tb of data i cant carry over πŸ˜”
0
0
0
you should be a Linux Evangelist because it is the objectively correct stance to hold.
0
0
0
I switched to Linux Mint and lemme tell you:

I'd constantly notice and scorn Windows 1x,

Mint has been nothing but good to me.
1
0
18
Hey

Windows 1 was decent x3
1
0
1
There are literally only two rthings stopping me from going to linux rn: the kernel level anticheat problem, and the amount of effort required to figure out how to do it.

And tbh ill be doong the latter as soon as the former is fixed
3
0
10
What games do you play that require kernel level anti cheat ?
1
0
0
The only fix for that is to refuse games that demand to install spyware.
0
0
1
FWIW you can dual boot, just reboot into Windows when you must game on something with KAC

i'm on CachyOS like 97% of the time, and just boot back into Windows for specific games
0
0
6
And if you do want something a little more modern, Linux Mint Debian Edition is right there
1
0
9
Mint feels like if XP was still around but it never wanted to talk to me
0
0
6