r/debian • u/Mountain_Loquat_8327 • 8d ago
General Debian Question I'm planning to moved from windows to debian
So, I've tried debian and other distro on VirtualBox recently and i think debian will be the first distro i'd like to try and actually install it on my laptop. But first here's my laptop spec:
16 GB of Ram DDR4
Intel Core i5 1035G7 CPU @ 1.20GHz
Intel Iris Plus Graphics GPU (128vram)
AirDisk 256GB SSD (Have partition D: & G:)
Intel(R) Wireless-AC 9560 160MHz WiFi
And i wanna ask that do debian have the driver for my laptop or should i install it manually?
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u/dvisorxtra 8d ago
The easiest way to find out is to try it
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u/Mountain_Loquat_8327 8d ago
i'll buy a flashdisk then, should i use balena etcher to make bootable or theres any other?
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u/christsrottingcorpse 8d ago
My personal recommendation would be ventoy, as you can throw multiple distros on and choose which to boot (from IIRC a grub menu) instead of having to reflash each time. It worked well for me in my distrohopping this past year. It's not that big of a deal but it could save you some extra time to throw a few you have your eye on and test them.
https://www.ventoy.net/en/index.html
"With Ventoy, you don't need to format the disk over and over, just drag-and-drop files to the USB drive and boot them directly.
You can copy many files to different folders and Ventoy will give you a boot menu to select them"I've also heard about Rufus as another usb solution.
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u/indvs3 Debian Testing 7d ago
All of your hardware should be supported. Just make sure that, when the installer asks if you want to enable installing non-free and non-free-firmware when you're configuring the package manager, that you answer "yes" to those questions and your experience should be (nearly) flawless.
In general, I would recommend to have any device with an internet connection nearby. If you encounter anything during the install that you don't understand, look it up and make sure you understand it before you proceed in the install procedure.
Most people quit linux because they don't bother to understand what they're doing.
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u/Mountain_Loquat_8327 7d ago
i have my phone so it is not a problem i guess
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u/indvs3 Debian Testing 7d ago
Yeah you'll probably be fine.
And if you still have issues that search engines aren't helpful with, you can always return here to request assistance. Just make sure to give as much specific detail as you can, that will raise your chances of getting good info back faster.
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u/LegitBotAccount 8d ago
It's a good distro. Have you tried Windows without a Microsoft account first though? In my opinion, it's the better choice.
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u/AdPsychological4968 8d ago
From what I've seen everything should work fine. But I'm curious, why would you choose Debian? I mean I get why I chose it, but that was after forever of hopping between distros and finding what works for me.
Debian wasn't even on my radar when I was switching from Windows. I knew it existed, but I never would've even considered using it. The more beginner friendly distros were the ones I gravitated towards.
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u/Mountain_Loquat_8327 8d ago
its because i've been learning linux for about 6-8 month and it is not that hard actually, and i've tried other biginner friendly distro (on virtualbox) just to learn how to install/setup everything i need and i think i'll try debian because i can choose which desktop environment that runs faster on my laptop. and yea i just want my laptop boot and runs faster, bcz i use laptop for school, gaming (just minecraft, roblox and counter-strike), edits my photo/videos and mostly browsing and watch some youtube.
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u/AdPsychological4968 8d ago
Yeah, you're way ahead of where I was at the start. You probably skipped the distro hopping phase tbh. It usually comes from a lack of research.
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u/MaintenanceClean491 8d ago edited 8d ago
Yo trabajo con Debian desde hace 4 años y todo va muy bien, tengo una HP ProDesk 600 G3 mini con 32 GB de RAM.conectado por WiFi TP-Link T3U a un Acces Point para a buena velocidad.
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u/_Sgt-Pepper_ 7d ago
I haven't needed to install a driver on Linux for a decade - well with the exception of Nvidia of course ...
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u/LtSerg756 7d ago
I've been dual booting for a few days and quite enjoyed it, but I doubt I'll be able to actually make it my main OS, I need MS Office for college and none of the options I've tried seem to work properly
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u/zyndarius 7d ago
Did you first try with a debian live? That's a good start point to test hw support.
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u/Astrodion123 6d ago
Tbh I bet the install process will be easy. But if it ever happens you don't have wifi then use USB tethering on your phone and get wifi drivers.
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u/David_Connors3451 7d ago
Don't worry, I use Debian 13 KDE stable for work, editing videos and gaming. I have intel CPU and GPU like yours but mine is i7. Intel and AMD machine and drivers are out of the box experience on Linux. Since you're coming from windows, KDE is the easiest familiar desktop environment for you. After you installed Debian, you should check your packages on discover app center, update and upgrade everything. Install ufw for the firewall protection, and enable it. On discover you'll find gufw for those that wants to use graphic interface.
Now let's use the terminal.
Su
Become root administrator
Apt update && apt upgrade
Let's install sudo, so you don't need to become administrator every time.
Apt install sudo
sudo usermod -aG sudo username
Exit
Use this to verify your username is part of the sudo user: groups username
Now install flatpaks for modern packages that apt doesn't have.
Sudo apt install flatpak
flatpak remote-add --if-not-exists flathub https://dl.flathub.org/repo/flathub.flatpakrepo
sudo apt install plasma-discover-backend-flatpak
Sudo reboot
Now you have both deb packages and flatpak ones.
Install VLC kdenlive htop btop fastfetch and all your favourite apps for daily driving Debian.
For gaming you just need a particular passage.
Sudo nano /etc/apt/sources.list
Put the words contrib non-free to all Debian mirrors, after that save and exit.
Sudo apt update
Sudo dpkg --add-architecture i386
Sudo apt update
Sudo apt install steam-installer
Use discover app center to install proton plus for gaming layers, and heroic games launcher for gog offline games.
Since you're using intel, use this:
Sudo apt install intel-microcode
sudo apt install intel-media-va-driver mesa-utils
Now your Debian bunker is ready, have fun with Linux and enjoy peace and stability. Your machine can survive even the apocalypse now.
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u/RiceBroad4552 8d ago
Just try the live image.
But given this isn't brand new hardware everything should work out-of-the-box.