Hi! I’m getting a new laptop any day now and I plan on going back to Linux after maybe a decade on Windows. What works best for gaming nowadays? Is manjaro good for that? I prefer a distro with a nice name but of course that’s not the central thing. I’ll also do some book keeping, writing et cetera but I don’t think it’s much to worry about. I also hope to use my Valve Index on it.
The usual suspects are Bazzite, Garuda, Nobara. But you can game on every distro. To give proper advice, some info on your hardware would be needed.
Thank you! It’s this one, I have a good local sale on it https://www.acer.com/se-sv/predator/laptops/helios/helios-neo-16/pdp/NH.QLVED.009
One important part for gaming is the graphics card - I cannot comment on that particular one, but I would recommend searching it like “nvidia rtx 4070 + linux” so you can find advice and recommendations. You could also hop over to https://www.protondb.com/, select that card and see what most people are running. Or there is this https://linux-hardware.org/ page, where you find lots of info about whats being recommended.
Nvidia used to be problematic with Linux, but I also have an older Nvidia card and haven’t run into any problems (yet). Also there’s lots of new development in that area, I’m sure it’s gonna be ok. Also some distros offer preinstalled Nvidia drivers that you simply select in a driver manager - that for example is the case for Linux Mint.
Keep at it, you got this and there’s so many people and resources online to help. Best of luck!