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Comment by JeremyMorgan | Hacker News Reader

Pop is my new favorite. I started using it at the urging of friends, and love it. I've written a couple reviews of it on my blog, as it's been my "daily driver" for my laptop for nearly a year.

I've been a Linux user since 1995/96, and a die hard Arch user for about 10 years. So why would I want a Linux distro that's super hands-off and easy to use?

It's incredibly stable. "Set it and forget it". If I want a bleeding edge version of software I can add it. It's performant, easy, and all my hardware works. It really just "stays out of my way" so I can get work done instead of tinkering. It's nice.

I still keep an Arch install around, but when I want to fire up a laptop and get to work without a single problem, Pop has been fantastic for it. I recommend it to new users, as well as old neckbeards like me.

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Nothing wrong with PopOS, but I'd pick plain Debian over Ubuntu. Just make sure to install from the "unofficial non-free media" if you're on modern hardware. Also the 'testing' channel of Debian makes for a great semi-rolling distribution.

I think for many some of the appeal of Ubuntu is in Ubuntu LTS, which gets more attention than the Debian alternative.

Have a look at the Ubuntu LTS page: https://ubuntu.com/download/desktop

And then look at the Debian equivalent: https://www.debian.org/lts/

(though the differences are perhaps because the latter is comparatively more unofficial)

But hey, many people prefer more stable distros with somewhat long life times, so that's a valid preference nonetheless.

Disclaimer: mostly a Debian user, i dread having to migrate from 10 to 11, but hey, at least i can use Ansible for all of my servers this time around.

Better marketing doesn't make it better. If you compare the actual releases I think you will find Debian to be more stable overall.

I would prefer to use Debian if it was more stable. It worked fine on my workstation but if I try to use it on my laptop it would not ever resume from suspend making it unusable.

I think Ubuntu has the benefit of the large user base making it more likely that your problem is solved.

My laptop is also a 5 year old thinkpad x1 gen 4 so it should be supported, and Debian is the only linux that gave me this problem.

While unlikely, it could've been that the kernel version was too old or you were missing non-free drivers for something? On my experience, if it worked in Ubuntu, it would work on Debian, and if it didn't, using the latest backported kernel would solve it.

Odd, I own this exact laptop, and haven't experienced any suspend/resume issues on either debian 10, nor 11.

Ahh, but the difference here is not in the stability of Debian vs Ubuntu, but rather the fact that Debian's LTS offering is just a community effort, as opposed to Ubuntu having an official LTS release.

Many aren't even aware that Debian has LTS releases in the first place.

My choice too, but with Pop Shell added. Coming from i3, then sway, the transition to Pop Shell was seamless. The natural integration with Gnome, which is always a pain with i3/sway, is a great selling point.

I second the recommendation for using Debian as a rolling distro, under testing or unstable.

Reminds me of the first rule of Arch Linux.

Always tell other people you use Arch Linux.

I use Arch (again) since 4 month...but just because of archinstall ;)

I tried that too yesterday! I wanted to try Gnome 41 so I used the gnome template in archinstall, but then afterwards I got in a big mess with NetworkManager vs. systemd-networkd and the docs said NetworkManager was included with the gnome group but then it wasn't and I wasn't sure what to disable/enable and couldn't install it until I set up wifi with systemd. Ended up installing Fedora 35 beta, so far I'm happy. The previous time I tried to install arch manually but I found out late in the process that I made a small mistake settings up something related to btrfs and luks and I didn't want to restart all over again. That part went great with archinstall.

Obligatory: https://github.com/overmighty/i-use-arch-btw

And don't forget to get an email address from https://iusear.ch/iusearch-mailbox.html

so if you're an Arch user, and a Vegan who does crossfit which one would you mention first?

>I've written a couple reviews

Isn't it just Ubuntu with slightly (basically introduces tiling) different shell? What is there to review?

There are some desktop and environment changes, but Pop also have a really good power management module that no other distro has, and good compatibility aroung different GPUs combination, and that is a big deal in laptops.

I had some problem in the past with a laptop with Intel GPU + AMD GPU interchangeable graphics in other distros while with Pop is ready to use after installing. AFAIK, those who had Nvidia Optimus and similar Nvidia technologies had a lot more of troubles outside Pop.

I haven't used Ubuntu in ages, so I don't know how those things are actually managed. Probably they aren't far behind.

Anecdotal evidence, I know... But there were several things that just didn't work right for me on vanilla Ubuntu that Pop made right when I switched 3 years ago. Mostly graphics related in my case.

I think it's important to remember that System 76 has been "making Linux work on hardware" for over a decade now, which is a totally different mindset to building a distro than most maintainers have.

Also, complete anecdata on my part, but I've found developers who've gotten used to working on Macs find Pop OS to be a smooth transition. At least, in my circle of friends/coworkers.

I second that. Running PopOS even on a System76 laptop which replicates the Macbook-macOS tandem experience.

Any good reasons to select Pop over Ubuntu?

Nvidia out of the box.

Ubuntu has had the proprietary nvidia driver on the iso and selected out of the box for a few releases now.

NVIDIA Optimus support - out of the box with a UI to switch graphics cards. The only other bistro I have seen to support it is Ubuntu MATE. All other distros require installation outside of the default package managers.

"bistro" and "MATE" make for an interesting typo.

> The only other bistro I have seen to support it is Ubuntu MATE.

Rarely have I come across an eatery that serves IT.

Here's a few:

- Great initial repo list

- Togglable tiling manager

- Excellent shortcuts for everything that improve my workflow

Sure, I could get all of this stuff and more working on any other distro, but this stuff works out of the box, and is stable.

Is there any way to use Pop without the gnome backend? Gnome and Pop both ship with Nautilus, and apparently don't work well without it, but Nautilus doesn't have type-ahead navigation. This is when you are in a directory and start typing the first few letters of the file you want to get to. In Windows Explorer, that will just lead to the cursor skipping ahead, whereas in Gnome, this starts a search for the file. It's absolutely appalling behaviour, and the developers are obstinate to a fault at changing this, despite outcry.

Yes. I use Pop!_OS with Plasma, it's great. The documentation includes details on switching to 8 different desktops.

https://support.system76.com/articles/desktop-environment/

I had the same issue and resolved it on Pop! OS with this patched nautilus from a PPA.

https://launchpad.net/~lubomir-brindza/+archive/ubuntu/nauti...

Works great for me!

Oh hell yes. Thank you! I think it's time to give Pop a chance again then!

Thanks a lot for the list. "Luckily" not deal-breakers that would warrant a shift for me. I have been using Ubuntu without any complaints as daily driver for a year or so. But as I plan to get a new laptop in the future I contemplated whether I should try a new distro as well.

There are other reasons but for one Pop doesn't push Snap. Flatpak is available and well integrated, but isn't forced down your throat (as Snap is in Ubuntu).

I generally prefer flatpak but I feel snap is a bit ahead and for one simple reason: marketing.

Canonical has been pushing very hard for snaps and it shows when I get get official builds of things like Zoom, Visual Studio Code, JetBrains and Spotify but the flatpak versions are just community provided. Some of them tend to work better than flatpak as well because of “classic” confinement. Using VS Code in flatpak and not having full access to the system in my integrated terminal kinda sucks. It might not be better from a security perspective but it’s much better from a user experience perspective and that matters more to me personally.

The said I still use flatpak as well, and prefer to use flatpak if there isn’t a material difference in functionality between the snap and flatpak.

ive been wondering. if a new user is switching from windows, don't you think something like kde neon would have "less friction" UX wise ? i somewhat understand the appeal of pop os but gnome is wildly different from windows and i have seen people turn off.

KDE is certainly closer to Windows than GNOME is, but in my opinion only enough that longtime Windows users would likely find it sitting an uncanny valley of Windows-ness, at least with all the default configurations (which most new users would be using) I've seen.

In practice I've found that Cinnamon, XFCE, and MATE configured similarly to how they are by default on Linux Mint to operate more like Windows than KDE does.

Long time KDE fan here.

IIRC last time I tried Pop OS it seemed very usable and the only thing that stopped me from using it was some hardware issues on my rig (a faulty drive, not the fault of Pop OS).

I especially liked that they try to clean up keyboard shortcuts in a smart way.

(For reference my issues with Gnome 3 that they built (built?) on is the we-know-best attitude combined with what I perceive as agressive copying of certain Mac OS features and also not trusting its users.)

From my experience, people who want to try linux is yearning for somewhat different UI, but not too different from familiar win/macos UI. Pop OS hits the sweet spot imo, refreshing but comfortable enough while usability is still there.

gnome is literally macOS with a few changes though

That is the point I tried to make, sorry for the confusion.

Neon may be a bit too bleeding edge for a new convert from Windows.

Kubuntu is probably just right.

Just install dash-to-panel and desktop icons extension. Now you've a very fine traditional interface.

Yes https://imgshare.io/image/poposwindows.pgDfc7

I keep seeing this advice for windows users switching to Linux - that they "need" a DE that is incredibly similar to Windows in order to feel comfortable. However, I think that's really the wrong approach. You'll just end up making them go into that headspace where they expect/want linux to work exactly like windows. If they really wanted something that's just like windows, why would they even leave windows to begin with?

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