Picking a Distro

[Carsomyr]

Over the years I have tinkered briefly with various distros, but I never really used any of them for an extended period of time. I very quickly get fed up with compiling, recompiling, and dependency issues, or having to upgrade every 6 months to continue having recent software. I also always had trouble trying to use more recent kernels/gpu drivers. But here I am again, going to test pcsx2 on the linux side of things, and so again i need to pick a distro... I generally like ubuntu-based distros, fedora and the YUM based stuff is kinda meh. I liked Zorin OS, but it's generally ready several months after each ubuntu release, and it has some quirks... ATM I'm eyeballing either the latest Kubuntu 16.04.1 or Linux Mint 18 Cinnamon... Thoughts/Opinions/Advice/Suggestions??

EDIT: Well due to a lack of responses I think I am picking Kubuntu.. I tried mint 17, it was one of the ones that didn't take to me using a newer kernel and all, not that it matters now since both of these are based off ubuntu 16.04 and thus kernel 4.4 but I have seen what the cinnamon DE offers, and KDE looks appealing Soooo sometime today I'll have a linux partition on my SSD

EDIT2: I have Kubuntu installed, nvidia driver 361 (thank god because the basic driver artifacts like crazy), the unstable ppa installed, copied over some of my files from my windows partition, and I am up and running!

[Maxxus]

Not a suggestion for a distro, but it annoyed me too having to upgrade every 6 months or so to get the most recent updates, and then I realized I didn't actually need to do that. If the packages you have installed fill your needs then why are you upgrading all the time. I'm currently running ubuntu's minimal 14.04 LTS release and aside from the automatic security updates they push down, I only update packages as needed.

[Carsomyr]

At the time It wasn't fullfilling my needs, Windows 10 runs like lgihtning and all the distros i was using then were sluggish as hell, and I couldn't get a recent kernel or GPU driver to work under them without creating some real stability issues... I must say now though with the nvidia 361 package in the latest kubuntu this OS runs like butter also

[grob]

Seems like you already figured stuff out. Distro doesn't matter much. Just pick something, stick with it and figure out the issues you come across. Default looks can always be changed.

Have fun

As for the six month upgrade cycle, that is how the Ubuntu ecosystem works. You can also stick with LTS releases so you don't have to worry about upgrades as frequently, at the cost of having older base software. That's not something you can get around though, except in rolling release distros (Tumbleweed, Arch, ...).

[Carsomyr]

I'm not really worried about it anymore, aside from PCSX2 I have no real use for linux... I mean I'm sure there are free alternatives to software that might be as good but as far as gaming goes linux doesn't get the love windows does and honestly anything else I might do is just as good on one or the other

[scythefwd]

then why move to linux over windows if the only reason is pcsx2? I also see plex down there.. that a client or the server?

[Carsomyr]

Well for right now testing PCSX2 on the linux end, but also I am pursuing a career in the field so knowing some linux is a good idea :specially server side linux is more popular than windows... In fact a lot of windows clients use linux servers (whether they are aware of it or not). And eventually when I start coding on a semi serious basis it will be nice to be able to compare the 2, and it should help me with making code cross platform

[scythefwd]

Well, I think you'll find a lot of infrastructure is still windows. In mixed environs, it'll be web servers, db servers, DNS, and maybe a trivial role like DHCP...