I bought a laptop yesterday, it came pre-installed with Windows 11. I hate win 11 so I switched it down to Windows 10, but then started considering using Linux for total control over the laptop, but here’s the thing: I keep seeing memes about how complicated or fucky wucky Linux is to install and run. I love the idea of open source software and an operating system without any of the bullshit that comes with Windows, but most of the open source stuff I have is on my android and fairly easy to install. Installing and using Linux just feels like it’ll be a whole different beast that’ll eat up most of my time and I’m kind of intimidated by it.
TL;DR Linux scawy, how does a barely computer literate scrub like me who’s used nothing but windows since the dawn of their life get started with Linux?
You don’t have to install Linux if you are not ready for it. You can test it without installing by using Linux live distributions. With Ventoy you can have 10 or 20 different Linux distributions on one USB stick and test them to see how well your laptop works with it and which flavors you would prefer.
Note that what you will experience is just the Desktop, as the details of the distributions are more “which one has less errors over time and not outdated or unstable packages”?