I’m looking to turn an old laptop into a home server. What distros make sense to use for that? Use a server dedicated distro like Ubuntu Server or is a regular desktop environment like Mint fine too?
Edit: TL;DR use Debian
I’m looking to turn an old laptop into a home server. What distros make sense to use for that? Use a server dedicated distro like Ubuntu Server or is a regular desktop environment like Mint fine too?
Edit: TL;DR use Debian
Don’t use frigging debian. It’s 2026. Use something atomic and for containers like openSUSE MicroOS.
Debian still exists today because of the stability provided by older-but-perfectly-fucntional packages. Older ≠ bad
Not everyone needs an atomic OS. Not everyone wants to use containers for everything. Because while those have value, they also add a layer of complexity and an additional learning curve.
And debian isn’t the eternal answer to everything. It will require more maintenance. Most people are just stuck on what they have always done and don’t want to change.
Thank God I didn’t listen to all the people regurgitating that I should use debian.
You’re right–like I said, an atomic OS has its benefits, and containers are great. They’re just not a place I would point a beginner.
It’s easy for those of us with more experience to forget what the learning curve is like. Sure, there are a handful of people out there who would enjoy starting out with Alpine or Arch, but there’s good reason most people start with Fedora or Mint or Ubuntu.
Maybe I misread his experience.
When I started with Linux, I started with Ubuntu in 2005.
But when I started self hosting, which was just last year, I went straight to MicroOS and podman and never regretted it.
Well, that’s my recommendation at least. In the end, either will work.
And possibly more clock-cycles, leading to higher energy usage.
And maybe even more RAM.