Linux Mint has a full install guide that goes into detail on every point with the click-through links. They are a real good source for people who haven’t done this before.
My suggestion to people is to install Linux on a computer you don’t use every day (old laptop, etc) and during installation have it be the only OS (ie, not dual boot with Windows). After awhile when you feel more comfortable, install it on your main machine. This lets you learn at whatever pace you desire.
And this is what I plan to do with my old gaming laptop. Do a trial run of Zorin OS, work out all the issues and then do install it on my new one and finally be rid of microslop
Heads up, my partner tried Zorin OS for gaming, at the suggestion of distrochooser.de, and did not have a good time. He switched to Fedora and everything was nearly seamless after that.
I’ve literally never installed an operating system. I can pretty confidently say that most of the people I know have never installed an operating system either.
I probably could follow all those steps because I’ve had experience navigating my computer’s BIOS, but most people don’t even know what a BIOS is. To ask them to navigate and make sense of it without detailed instructions is pretty unfair.
The fediverse is a very niche place, and the general tech savvyness that’s common here should not be taken as an actual measure of how tech savvy the general population is.
What’s crazy is you can actually learn how to do things by trying, it’s crazy! I didn’t know how to install Linux either when I was 12, but just searching for information I was able to learn how to do it.
I understand it. My original point was that most guides don’t explain it.
Also, the guide were responding to says ‘download iso’. If you google ‘ISO’ it does not come up with anything to do with Linux. Which proves my point that most guides are not helpful for beginners
It’s literally not even that complicated, I don’t know why the above commenter made it sound like that.
Boot from any live distro USB, and most of them have an installer on the desktop. You just follow the instructions. The most complex part is when it asks you if you want to dual-boot or wipe your drive and replace Windows with Linux completely. Just back up your drives before trying anything.
note on dual-booting:
If you want to dual boot, it’ll need to create a new partition, but it can do that automatically. The only issue is if you already have the maximum number of partitions allowed (I think 4 typically) then you need to do some manual stuff which can get more technical, but otherwise it should all happen automatically. The only decision you need to make is dual-boot or single boot (single boot wipes the existing drive, removing Windows entirely).
Everything else in that person’s comment basically just boils down to “create a live USB and then boot from it.”
If you have a friend who gives you one, you don’t need to make it yourself. Otherwise the process is “Download .iso file → install it on the USB (use Ventoy or BalenaEtcher or something similar)” (note: this will wipe and reformat the USB, so use one you don’t need for anything else; preferably one that’s blank, otherwise back up your files first).
As for booting from the live USB, they also made that sound too complicated. All you need to do usually is plug in the USB and the boot up or restart your computer. It should detect it automatically, and it’ll either boot from it or ask you whether to boot from it or your normal OS.
If it doesn’t do either of those things (which it usually will) then you need to figure out which key to press on boot up to take you to the screen where you can tell it to do so manually. That’s usually either Esc, F2, F6, or maybe Del. It depends on the computer manufacturer, just do a web search for “such-and-such computer safe mode boot key” or BIOS key or UEFI key or whatever. But the point is that probably won’t be necessary 9 times out of 10.
TL;DR, just boot from a live USB and follow the automated installer which probably has an icon on the desktop. It’s really not that complicated. There’s no owl.
This is literally my point.
I don’t know how to do a lot of these things and usually the guide doesn’t explain these points.
If it’s labeled ‘beginners guide’ it should explain how to do all these extra steps
Linux Mint has a full install guide that goes into detail on every point with the click-through links. They are a real good source for people who haven’t done this before.
My suggestion to people is to install Linux on a computer you don’t use every day (old laptop, etc) and during installation have it be the only OS (ie, not dual boot with Windows). After awhile when you feel more comfortable, install it on your main machine. This lets you learn at whatever pace you desire.
Thank you. I’ll take a look at this.
And this is what I plan to do with my old gaming laptop. Do a trial run of Zorin OS, work out all the issues and then do install it on my new one and finally be rid of microslop
Heads up, my partner tried Zorin OS for gaming, at the suggestion of distrochooser.de, and did not have a good time. He switched to Fedora and everything was nearly seamless after that.
Good to know. Thank you.
I’ll do more research and maybe go Fedora first if that’s a common problem
This is also how you install windows. Theres nothing special/difficult about Linux here.
Most people don’t install windows. It comes preinstalled
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I’ve literally never installed an operating system. I can pretty confidently say that most of the people I know have never installed an operating system either.
I probably could follow all those steps because I’ve had experience navigating my computer’s BIOS, but most people don’t even know what a BIOS is. To ask them to navigate and make sense of it without detailed instructions is pretty unfair.
The fediverse is a very niche place, and the general tech savvyness that’s common here should not be taken as an actual measure of how tech savvy the general population is.
What’s crazy is you can actually learn how to do things by trying, it’s crazy! I didn’t know how to install Linux either when I was 12, but just searching for information I was able to learn how to do it.
This is a much better explanation of what my point.
Everytime I’ve tried to do anything in my BIOS the guide has an option to do something that doesn’t exist for me
Which parts do you not understand? I can expand on those points if needed.
I understand it. My original point was that most guides don’t explain it.
Also, the guide were responding to says ‘download iso’. If you google ‘ISO’ it does not come up with anything to do with Linux. Which proves my point that most guides are not helpful for beginners
Most of that is the same for installing Windows lol
It’s literally not even that complicated, I don’t know why the above commenter made it sound like that.
Boot from any live distro USB, and most of them have an installer on the desktop. You just follow the instructions. The most complex part is when it asks you if you want to dual-boot or wipe your drive and replace Windows with Linux completely. Just back up your drives before trying anything.
note on dual-booting:
If you want to dual boot, it’ll need to create a new partition, but it can do that automatically. The only issue is if you already have the maximum number of partitions allowed (I think 4 typically) then you need to do some manual stuff which can get more technical, but otherwise it should all happen automatically. The only decision you need to make is dual-boot or single boot (single boot wipes the existing drive, removing Windows entirely).
Everything else in that person’s comment basically just boils down to “create a live USB and then boot from it.”
If you have a friend who gives you one, you don’t need to make it yourself. Otherwise the process is “Download .iso file → install it on the USB (use Ventoy or BalenaEtcher or something similar)” (note: this will wipe and reformat the USB, so use one you don’t need for anything else; preferably one that’s blank, otherwise back up your files first).
As for booting from the live USB, they also made that sound too complicated. All you need to do usually is plug in the USB and the boot up or restart your computer. It should detect it automatically, and it’ll either boot from it or ask you whether to boot from it or your normal OS.
If it doesn’t do either of those things (which it usually will) then you need to figure out which key to press on boot up to take you to the screen where you can tell it to do so manually. That’s usually either Esc, F2, F6, or maybe Del. It depends on the computer manufacturer, just do a web search for “such-and-such computer safe mode boot key” or BIOS key or UEFI key or whatever. But the point is that probably won’t be necessary 9 times out of 10.
TL;DR, just boot from a live USB and follow the automated installer which probably has an icon on the desktop. It’s really not that complicated. There’s no owl.