My time with Linux has been equal parts amazing and absolutely infuriating. Linux Mint is NOT usable out of the box. Here have been my issues:
Nvidia GPU - Trying to figure out how to get the drivers working was a nightmare with ten million different people giving different advice on how to get it to work. Eventually I was able to get them signed and it seems to work
Bluetooth - Another nightmare. Bluetooth is terrible on Linux. It took hours to get it even remotely working ok, but I still don’t think it’s perfect.
Compatibility - Some things just straight up don’t work for seemingly no reason. None of my controllers work with Steam, no matter how many countless hours I’ve spent troubleshooting.
And that is where I am disappointed. Troubleshooting Linux issues sucks. There are so many people giving their opinions and all of them are different and most don’t work.
When Linux is working right it is amazing, and I love it. But right now, it just isn’t as good as Windows and extremely infuriating more often than not. Guess I am going to switch back and give Bill Gates all of my info again. Really fucking disappointing
Update: Controllers seem to work after forcing compatibility mode in Steam. No idea why that was off or why Steam was essentially hijacking my controller, but it seems to work now. For everyone that helped thank you.
Looks like you used hardware that was designed for windows and are blaming it now on Linux.
I am not understanding the issue you have that requires signing of drivers.
Yes some Bluetooth devices lack the support from the manufacturer’s for Linux, the Controllers i have used work great, at least for my needs.
Controllers have better support Linux for ages. Not understanding the issue here either.
Troubleshooting on Windows sucks at least to the same degree. The same non specific error message gets you 50 possible solutions.
No need to announce your departure.
I’m venting because I don’t understand how the experience is so vastly different for people. And what do you mean hardware designed for windows? Literally the only thing is the NVIDIA gpu
Not the guy your responding to and I 100% get your frustration, but I want to provide a little anecdote.
Back in November, I built a new desktop to replace my 7 year old one and put OpenSUSE on it. No matter what I tried, I could not get either Bluetooth or WiFi working. I tried updating drivers, restarting controllers, reinstalling the OS, replacing the OS with Mint. Nothing worked.
I did a lot of searching over the next few days, and it turned out that my motherboard was so new that it’s built in WiFi chip did not have Linux drivers yet. Like at all.
Most products aren’t created with Linux in mind, so compatibility isn’t a concern. It’s up to the community to create patches & drivers to make things work, and it can take a bit to get things working.
I’m genuinely sorry you had the experience you did, but I hope that if you do return to Windows that you’ll give Linux another try in the future. Search your products to see if others have had issues, along with potential solutions, before you dive in.
Thanks for the thoughtful response, and not chastising me like half the other people in this thread. Yes it’s been very frustrating because I want to switch full time. I don’t understand how I am having these issues on a reinstall of Linux, when my first install had none of these issues.
Basically everything you stated, Bluetooth, Controller and GPU is hardware.
Your experience is probably different since you still think and act like you use windows. This is normal. When you are used to something and then switch to something that works differently you will run into problems.
I did a first install of mint months ago and daily drove it. I have gotten pretty used to Linux.
months ago
How long have you been using Windows for?
My whole life up until last September when I first installed mint
Do you see the paradox here? You expect to be as proficient as you might be with something you’ve used your entire life with something you’ve only used on and off for a couple of months…
I’m venting because I don’t understand how the experience is so vastly different for people.
It’s always going to be a driver issue. It takes time and money to develop drivers for *nix, so most manufacturers don’t bother. It’s the most significant issue *nix has to deal with and if it wasn’t an issue, no one would deal with Windows.
Nvidia isn’t supported well on Linux*. A touch of Google fu would have told you that.
So all of this can be traced back to using a NVIDIA gpu and having to use secure boot?
Why do you need SecureBoot?
Dual boot with Windows. Dumb windows requires it
You might be better off with bare-metal linux and shoving windows inside a VM where it belongs.
I tried installing a VM but man it was really laggy. I used the open source one on linix, not virtualbox. I probably fucked something up, though.
Sorry to hear that Linux Mint is not working well for you. Unfortunately, things can sometimes still be rough when it comes to hardware support. I have personally also had issues with Nvidia GPUs and Bluetooth. Often this is because the manufacturers only provide drivers for Windows and Linux drivers need to be created by the community.
Regarding Nvidia and secure boot. I’ve had the same issue (on both Mint and other distros). After some frustrations (including a BIOS update) I finally gave up and disabled secure boot. Since then, I haven’t had any issues with my dual boot with Win 10 (but I probably won’t buy another Nvidia GPU). What makes you say that Windows requires Secure Boot?
No I didn’t. When I installed Linux mint the first time I was able to fix everything. I needed to reinstall it and that is where this controller issue started
This seems quite weird. Are you perhaps missing a package (e.g. steam-devices)?
I have steam-devices and same issues. No luck at all. Thanks for the response.
Windows does not require secure boot.
Windows 11 absolutely does require secure boot
Nvidia isn’t responsible for the other issues you have… Did you do any research about your hardware and Linux compatibility?
Bluetooth will be whatever wireless chipset you’re using likely.
No I didn’t. When I installed Linux mint the first time I was able to fix everything. I needed to reinstall it and that is where this controller issue started
And you’re missing the point: do your own research
And Bluetooth devices count as hardware. You bitched about that too.
Thanks for the response
Linux Mint is NOT usable out of the box.
I set Mint up for my 65 year old mother about 4 years ago, and she hasn’t had a single issue since. I think it’s less about Mint being usable out of the box and more about Mint not doing what you want out of the box…
I can see everyone down voting you to oblivion… And that’s sort of fair. But that’s beside the point.
I was having trouble with NVIDIA while using mint early on and decided to switch to Fedora. Maybe try that once. Fedora has better defaults for nvidia.
Use the KDE Plasma spin btw. See if it works.
Thanks, I might try that if a new install doesn’t work
I’m sorry to hear you’ve had so much trouble with Linux. I understand the frustration that comes with Unix based OSes especially after being a heavy Windows user for years.
I did a bit of searching on your profile and saw you’re dual-booting with Windows on the same hard drive. I personally had issues with trying to set that up myself (Windows is a finicky, jealous b****). My own solution was installing my distro of choice onto a separate hard drive - if you can eventually do that I recommend it.
I know you’re getting a lot of flak for your post but it’s good to see honest opinions from people who genuinely want to try Linux but aren’t necessarily the same level of hyper-nerd as the typical demographic here.
Having information from a wider opinion pool will help in understanding how to get Linux to more of the population - but that’s a side tangent.
It’s encouraging to see that you are still open to trying in the future and taking a break from it can help you clear your head and come back with fresher eyes.
Unfortunately I don’t have much experience with NVIDIA drivers, and probably a similar amount of troubleshooting as Mint but I’ve found EndeavourOS to be friendlier to a middle-upper tech/gamer use case. Mint, for me, seemed cold and “office”-y and didn’t work well for me as I don’t only use my browser and word processor.
That said, distros are an almost ridiculously personal choice and part of that is trial and error. If you haven’t gotten the chance I recommend test driving a couple other distros in an Oracle VM (for user-friendliness) so you can decide what you like the feel of before committing to an install again, if and when you feel ready.
Good luck and godspeed until then.
Thanks for the reply. My next build will not have windows on it at all, If I can help it. Honestly mint is great and was working amazing until I had to reinstall it.
If you come with expectations that you’ll just be fully catered no matter what your setup is and expect things to just work without ever trying to understand problems, you sure can be disappointed. Believe or not, most of the time those issues are out of control for Linux or the distros, as your hardware vendor made it to work on Windows and Windows only. Community is here to help you, but with your attitude it gets difficult no matter how much others try to help.
fucking hate bluetooth ngl, it’s a horrendous standard that doesn’t do what I want it to do and even when it can it fails horribly and is unbearably unreliable
how did you install the nvidia drivers btw? I thought in mint there was a “driver manager” thingy that installed it for you with one click
Bluetooth works great in Android for me though… once the devices have been paired, they connect the moment they are available and it just works.
However, for some reason on PC it’s often quirky (Windows or Linux). My PC bluetooth works through a dongle so I wonder if an integrated card would do better.
Also, most devices will not keep more than 1 pairing, so it will be annoying if you plan to be jumping around between computers. But that’s not the fault of the protocol, in theory remembering multiple pairings can be supported if the devices wanted to implement that.
i have one laptop with one of the new internal Intel wifi cards and it works pretty well, but all of my other devices don’t work that good. I just hate that you can’t use the microphone and headphones at the same time with most Bluetooth devices without getting horrendous quality, if that was improved I might use it a bit more
It was that easy this time around, because I’m dumb. The last time I never said I needed to sign them in the installer so I had to do it manually
oh are you using secure boot? my condolences
I’ve been on and off with Linux for about 15 years and just want to counter some of the people trying to troubleshoot or criticize to say: it can be really tough.
We need our computers to work and we expect things to function correctly.
I’ve used dozens of distros over the years. I was a super early Arch adopter, mained Gentoo for about three years, ran my own BSD server for programming projects, and still maintain several small home Linux servers. And even I sometimes want to pull my hair out trying to get semi-new hardware working right in my distro of choice. I spent three hours today fighting Nvidia and sound drivers and eventually just had to give up on that machine after being told that what I want just flat out isn’t supported in Linux on the hardware I have.
Take a breath, set it aside until you’re ready to take another crack at it, and know that it’s a journey. You’ll get there or the software will catch up and meet you halfway. No shame in being frustrated :)
Thanks so much! I appreciate it. Already giving it another go with Pop OS
Maybe Linux isn’t the solution you are looking for in this case? I use Linux whenever I can, especially at home because I have far fewer problems than with windows. But it’s not a panacea, and if it’s easier to use windows then use windows.
That’s the thing, I’ve loved Linux when it’s worked right. I want to use it full time. My first install, after fixing everything, was going great. I had to reinstall because I messed something up, and now I can’t fix any of this.
About NVIDIA: yeah, Nvidia on Linux is a big, big mess. Things are improving but it’s still a pain in the ass sometimes. Maybe some of your issues could be solved by changing to another Desktop Enviroment.
About Bluetooth: I don’t know how recent your hardware is, but maybe changing to a newer kernel (preferably a more up to date Distro, like Fedora) would solve it.
About Compatibility: I don’t know what controllers you are using. I personally had issues with Xbox Wireless Controller drivers, and after some searching I easily fixed it with xpadneo, maybe that could help.
Mint is usually a great distro for beginners, BUT it sometimes sacrifices shiny new updates for stability (which is a good feature of Mint), that’s why I recommend you to try Fedora. Good luck with your Linux adventure 😃
Thanks for the response I appreciate it
Normally I don’t suggest distro-hopping for newbies but sometimes it’s a good idea to try a couple distro before settling in. Since there are tons of different hardware, some distros offer a better out of the box solution for some hardware.
Try openSUSE Leap for instance.
Also someone suggested trying KDE Plasma on Mint, so try that first. It might alone solve your problems.By the way, if your need for Windows can be covered on a virtual machine, go that way instead of dual boot. Windows really can mess with your bootloader.
As a daily OpenSUSE user on both my work and personal machine I’m not sure if I would recommend for a first timer, I feel like it makes a lot of assumptions as how much the user knows
They just need to learn how YaST works and it’s done mostly. They won’t even need terminal for anything. I installed openSUSE Leap on my sister’s PC and she’s using it without any problems for quite some time (Though gotta admit installing Xbox controller driver was a hassle, maybe it’s not like that for Tumbleweed). She previously used Manjaro, Pop!_OS, and Mint and she had problems with all. Leap is pretty much perfect. (Let me put nazar amulet here 🧿)
I’ve been using Linux Mint for 2 weeks now. Everything worked out of the box. No nVidia driver problem, controller works fine, can’t speak for Bluetooth since I don’t use it. I only scratched my head on the Joplin synchronization with my phone using Syncthing, which was fixed after maybe 10min of tinkering. Haven’t rebooted to my backup windows install since. 10/10 would recommend.
I’m having this issue, I don’t want to switch OFF of mint since it’s so familiar now, but I would like better nvidia support. Tried arch a few times but really struggled
Just commit some time into learning on how to enable/install (proper) nvidia support on arch (even if you don’t understand nothing at all and/or feel very uncomfortable doing so) and it’ll be a smooth ride after that.
Bluetooth - Another nightmare. Bluetooth is terrible on Linux.
Shitty dongles is shittier in Linux, that’s true. Never ever had a problem with Bluetooth on laptops.
None of my controllers work with Steam, no matter how many countless hours I’ve spent troubleshooting.
They work with games outside of Steam? If true is a Steam problem, not a Linux one. “But it works with Steam on Windows”, well Valve can fuck up and introduce a bug on the Linux version.
Mint isn’t the platform for gaming on Linux. It’s way behind on a lot of things like display drivers. Try something like Bazzite or Nobara that have a ton of tweaks for both Nvidia and steam. Honestly, I’m really shying away from recommending Mint to new users, it’s getting really stale.
Bazzite has been great for me. Bluetooth, Nvidia GPU, controllers, Bluetooth controllers all worked out of the box, and it’s based on Fedora so you get all of those perks, and the rollback feature, which comes by default, works (to an end user) rather like timeshift (I think - it lets you return to the previous working configuration if an update has a problem, which admittedly did happen to me recently, I just rolled back and waited for the devs to fix the problem the next day, lol).
It doesn’t have a live boot option so it just has to be installed to try it, which is disappointing.
But I totally get if OP wants to take a break and maybe come back to Linux in a few years, because Linux will keep getting better and Windows will keep getting worse.
Bruh. You been on here for two days complaining about something where you’ve been told exactly what the issue is, and it’s not your Mint install, Linux, or anything else about the same system or with the community you’re asking for help in.
You’re not doing the work to find the issue, or help the people trying to debug with you. You’re actually seemingly going out of your way to not be helpful and just complain, and that’s a YOU problem. Have fun on Windows 👋
Are you fucking serious? I’ve followed all the god damn advice I was given and have spent over 10 hours troubleshooting this ONE issue and nothing has worked.
Yes, and then you come back here raging that “Mint is not ready out of the box”, which isn’t true. The problem is with Steam and steam-input. You’ve been told this half a dozen times now. It has nothing to do with Linux (where you’re posting in), or Mint specifically. It’s your setup with Steam.
I don’t see how. I have done everything you suggested with steam. I’ve tried every possible configuration, and nothing works.
Read what you just wrote, then tell me how Mint is the problem, and why you’re posting in this sub.
Dude, I have the exact same steam configuration in Windows, and my controller works. Tell me that’s not a Linux issue
Again, it’s a driver issue. Has nothing to do with *nix. The manufacturer of the controller doesn’t ensure that *nix distros have access to the driver. So how can it work?
Specifically which controller is it? Have you looked for *nix drivers specifically for that device? From the manufacturer?
Thats the thing. I’ve tried both xbox and ps5 controllers, and none are working. I test with jstest-gtk and whats weird is the right joystick shows it only moves up and down. Not sure if that’s related, but it’s weird
Kid, if you want proof, DM me an invite to a call somewhere you can screencast and I’ll show you exactly what the issue is and fix it quickly. I’m that positive.
That’s what atomic distros are for. Detecting problems at the development level, not the user level. Might give one of them a try. And get rid of the dual boot, that’s just pain in the ass
