balenaEtcher: Create a bootable USB

 

To create a bootable USB.


You can easily create a bootable USB that works on most systems. You can use a cross-platform utility called balenaEtcher


Using balenaEtcher:
Plug in the USB stick you want to turn into a LiveUSB. 


Step 1, Select the image you want to record. IMG, ISO, ZIP, DISK, GZ, RAW, and some other formats are supported.


Step 2, Select the USB drive or SD card to which you want to burn the image.


Step 3, click on the «Flash!» button to start the process. Once you click this button, Etcher will take the image you selected and burn it to the disk you selected. When this is done, it will check if everything went fine and safely remove the USB drive. It will then ask you if you want to flash the same image or a different one.


Note:Make sure the device that is identified in the bottom line is what you want to use and that there are no files on it that you do not want destroyed.




Click OK to create the files necessary (it will take some time) on the USB device.


Either click to restart the system, or exit to reboot manually on a different machine or at another time.


Boot from DVD/USB


BIOS (Basic Input Output Subsystem) is a programmable chip that controls how information is passed to various devices in the computer system.


Start the computer and press ESC, F1, F2, F8, F10 or F12 during the initial startup screen. Depending on the BIOS manufacturer, a menu may appear.


Choose to enter BIOS setup. The BIOS setup utility page appears.


Use the arrow keys to select the BOOT tab. System devices appear in order of priority.


To give a USB or DVD drive boot sequence priority over the hard drive, move it to the first position in the list.

30 years of the Linux Distribution.

There are currently hundreds of active Linux distros, but only a few of them can be described as the mothers and fathers of everything else we know these days as Linux. According to "DistroWatch", 99% of all Linux distributions which exist today are at some point a derivative of one of these five.

Slackware Linux

Debian

Red Hat Linux

Arch Linux

Opensuse 

Those five distributions couldn't be any more different. However they do share all the same core: a "Linux kernel", "GNU" as well as various "desktops". 

Why are there so many money distributions today?

Well the number one reason is it's all free. “Free” does not refer to cost in this case. It is because anyone has the freedom to make and redistribute a peice of software that people can download for free. Software companies like Mac or Windows, don't provide free software. They provide service and support of their software and people use it as it is delivered by them. But in the free software world the Linux kernel, The core of the linux distro is not patented. So everybody owns the software not just the individual. Thus anyone is free to modify and build as own. Different people have different ideas and needs. For a skilled person it’s relatively easy to create their own, perfect distro. As stated before 99% of all distros in development today come from Slackware Linux, Debian, Red Hat Linux,Arch Linux, or Opensuse. That’s why there are so many distros. 

How to choose a distro

Choosing a Linux distribution is a personal thing. It greatly depends on what you want to do with it.

Mx Linux: Suitable for – Beginner to Advanced

Mx is currently the most popular of the Linux Distributions. MX Linux is a collaborative effort between the AntiX Linux distribution team and the MX Linux distribution team. It is built on the Debian core, but has a more regular release cycle. Debian takes a strict stance on free software. Therefore, you won’t find any proprietary software in a default Debian installation. By contrast MX Linux includes a very handy tool, named MX Tools. These can Install codecs and Nvidia drivers for example.

Pop!_OS: Suitable for – Beginner to Advanced

System76, a Linux computer retailer, develops Pop!_OS. This Debian and Ubuntu-based distro is perfect for beginners because of its easy interface and easy installation method. As a distro that comes with all the features necessary for a solid gaming experience, one edition of Pop!_OS is designed specifically for NVIDIA dedicated graphics cards. 

Linux Mint: Suitable for – Beginner to Advanced

Just like Pop!_OS, Linux Mint has the best from Debian and Ubuntu and can provide a people-friendly experience for beginners. If you are an avid Windows fan, then you will love the cinnamon desktop from Linux Mint. Cinnamon replicates Windows's look and feel, however keep in mind it is not windows. 

The Nobara Project Suitable for – Beginner to Advanced.

Nobara is a brand new distribution from Glorious Eggroll, also known as, Thomas Crider. Nobara describes itself as a Linux Desktop Gaming OS for content creators. It is a Redhat and Fedora based-based distro that is perfect for beginners because out of the box it includes essential graphics drivers, multimedia codecs and Steam. It also has additional software especially for streamers and content creators. 

openSUSE Leap and GeckoLinux Static Suitable for – Intermediate to Advance

openSUSE Leap is a easy system to set up for a non-technical friend or family member. openSUSE Leap is a Linux distribution is based on SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop (SLED). It is stable and highly tested. The software available is not the latest and greatest, but the most stable. Because a new revision is only released every 3 years. Codecs needed to play audio and video. They have to downloaded separately from a community site. GeckoLinux Static is a Linux distribution based on openSUSE Leap. Unlike Leap, GeckoLinux Static proprietary media codecs and other necessities are pre-installed by default. Neither distro is really good for people new to Gnu-Linux.

Slackware Suitable for – Advanced 

Slackware is oldest linux distribution. But it's not for regular people. It really is for geeks. It's very hard to install. It also uses .tar.gz packages rather than more popular .deb or .rpm systems. Is for people with advanced computer understanding and for those who like to tweak or for the server market looking to get every little ounce of server performance.

Arch Linux Suitable for – Advanced 

Arch Linux is what they call a DIY (Do It Yourself) operating system. You decide which desktop environment to use, which components and services to install. This granular control gives you a minimal operating system to build upon with elements of your choice. So like slackware it's not for regular people. 

Chrome OS Flex Suitable for – Beginner

Chrome OS Flex, is based on Gentoo Linux and CloudReady. No matter your experience level, you can sit down with a Chrome a Flex and immediately put it to use. Chrome OS Flex offers largely the same functionality as Chrome OS. This is Google's proprietary code, not to be confused with the Gnu open-source project, Chromium OS. What you lose in terms of open-source safety, you potentially make up for in ease of use. Also at this time, Flex doesn’t include native support for Android apps.

Final thoughts

If you're a professional or amateur content creator. The Linux desktop may not be for you. If you have to use proprietary hardware along with its companion software the Linux desktop may not be for you. When you go to the store to buy a laptop or desktop, the shelves will be filled with Windows based PCs The fact is industry-standard software like Adobe Photoshop, CorelDRAW, Microsoft Excel, and many more apps are simply not developed for the Linux desktop. There are software alternative available in Linux, but they lack many of the features found in Windows software.

While Microsoft will support Windows 10 until 2025, what happens to people who want to hang on to their machines? I remember what happened with the end of of Windows XP and Windows 7 support. Installing Linux on older hardware that is no longer supported by from Apple and Microsoft will help keep them and other obsolete electronics out of landfills, where hazardous chemicals can leach into the soil, air, and water. So in other words it's good for the environment. Most of us are not professional multimedia content creators or use proprietary hardware for work. For those who are interested in a Linux distro for an older system. There are distributions that catered for a different set of needs. So, you can choose to install any of the available Linux distros according to your requirements.

Nobara:Unofficial Fedora Linux 36 Spin focused on Gaming

Gaming and content creating on Linux doesn't stop with open source. In fact some of the most popular proprietary software and applications usually have open-source alternatives. 

Firefox-web-browser

Chromium-web browser.

LibreOffice- basic office suite.

kdenlive-video editing program

OBS-Software for video recording and live streaming. 

Handbrake-transcoder for digital video files.

Gimp-image editor

Blender- 3D computer graphics

Audacity-multi-track audio editor and recorder

As you can see, it’s not hard to find alternatives to popular software and applications. Open source programs offers more flexibility to the user. Proprietary software programs tend to be less flexible and often comes with restrictions. 

Gaming on a Linux distro 

Valve software several years back came out with a Linux native steam client. They thought it would convince many software makers to write code native to Gnu+Linux systems. Some did, but Valve didn't do a very good job of pushing Linux as a platform. Valve did come out with their own homegrown Linux gaming centric distro called steam OS but it hasn't been updated on the desktop in years. 

Thomas Crider (aka “Glorious Eggroll), a Software Maintenance Engineer at Red Hat, has created a very nice alternative to Steam OS called Nobara. My first impression, It is a distro powered by Fedora and targeted squarely at gamers and content creators. 

Here's a sample of list of packages, and software on the Nobara Project’s ISOs

NVIDIA drivers

OBS Studio

Wine dependencies (winetricks, gstreamer, etc.)

third-party codecs

Steam

Lutris

gamescope

xone (kernel module for wireless Xbox controllers)

goverlay

mangohud

vkbasalt

LibreOffice

printer drivers

kdenlive

Blender

ProtonUp-Qt

flathub

I'm sure many will argue that anybody can install all of those packages on any vanilla Linux distro themselves. However for new users that takes a little research to know what packages or needed for content creation and gaming. Mr. Crider goal seems to be to make a gamer’s life with Linux more simple. Everything is set up after first install so the user can get started on whatever task they are trying to do right away.

Is it a modified version of Fedora 36?

I don't think it's really fair to say that Nobara is just a modified version of Fedora Linux with user-friendly fixes added to it. People used to say that Linux mint was just a modified version of Ubuntu with proprietary packages absent from a pure the Ubuntu install. No I disagree. I feel that Thomas Crider (aka “Glorious Eggroll) is creating something special just like Clement Lefebvre and Vincent Vermeulen did with the creation of Linux Mint back in the day.

There’s 3 ISO that you can download:

Official – Nobara with a modified version of Gnome desktop.

GNOME – Nobara with the default GNOME desktop.

KDE – Nobara with the default KDE desktop.

My system configuration built in 2020 (Your mileage may vary)

CPU: Ryzen™ 7 2700 

GPU: Powercolor Red Dragon RX 5700

RAM: 16GB (2 x 8GB) (PC4 19200)

MOTHERBOARD: ASRock AB350M Pro4 (BIOS 5.90 2019/7/5)

STORAGE: Intel 545s Series 2.5" 256GB +WB Blue 1TB 7200 RPM 

HORI Fighting Commander for Xbox One wired USB controller.

Microsoft Xbox One wired USB controller.

Black Web wireless keyboard.

Zelotes T-90 USB wired Gaming Mouse

My impressions.

I installed the KDE version. The highlight of nobara Linux is its based on Fedora 36. Fedora is well known for having amazing hardware support. Plasma 5.24 looks stunning. The first boot presents a clean colorful desktop. There’s a kde logo in the bottom left that gives you access to an application menu, a system tray in the bottom-right corner, and no top bar. The layout is intuitive and simple. It’s set up nice by default, but you are free to customize the desktop.

Next I noticed the the RPM Fusion repositories are enabled out of the box. RPM Fusion provides software that the Fedora Project or Red Hat can't ship due to legal reasons. Flatpak flathub repository was also enabled by default. There are people out there that need proprietary programs like Discord, Microsoft Teams, Skype, Zoom, and Microsoft Edge browser. Flatpak flathub repository got you covered.

Watching streaming services.

Nobara Linux has a set of multimedia and graphics apps ready to use. Video and audio to play without any issues because of gstreamer. So play any movie you want to watch and listen to any song you want no matter format. Everything is just baked in. I was able to watch Amazon Freevee, Paramount Plus, Pluto TV, and Filmrise streaming services without a problem.

Playing games on Nobara project.

The Steam and Lutris gaming platforms or pre-reinstalled and ready to use. Of course, Wine is also included by default in Nobara Linux.

For my steam test, I selected ‘Stary' and 'Warframe’. Steam downloaded Proton 7.0-3 running with my system set for 1080p resolution. And, the Custom MESA-ACO drivers for my Rx5700 worked out of the box without any tweaks needed. I wanted to also test out OverWatch, but it's not available on steam. For that I had to use lutris to install and run it. The Lutris Overwatch install script is actively maintained and kept updated. I didn't have to make any modifications. 

Conclusion...

To be clear...the Nobara distro is not a ‘Fedora Spin’. As far as I can tell it's a completely completely independent project from Fedora. They do use fedora packages, code and repositories. Fedora Linux is a community-built distro sponsored by Red Hat, which was the most profitable open-source company in the world before its acquisition by IBM. However, Red Hat does not develop Fedora Linux directly, though some of the company’s employees are members of the Fedora community. While no distribution is a perfect fit for everyone, Thomas Crider (aka “Glorious Eggroll) primary goal is to give the most simple point-and-click user experience to new Gnu-linux users. His Nobara Project adds many necessary packages, and fixes issues by default that will make make Fedora Linux for new users. All my hardware was supported, I liked the default collection of applications and the distribution was very easy to set up. 

The distribution is available for download from the project website in three versions.

 Nobara Linux Changelog

Are there any useful native Linux programs?

Yes there are many great Linux native programs. It is true that when does users have native support for premium proprietary applications like Adobe Photoshop, Microsoft Office, and more. However Linux has many open source programs. It is true they are not as well-known to the public, but they get the work done. Proprietary applications are more popular, especially because they have been in the market for many years. Open source programs tend to be free or reasonably priced. There is no vendor lock-in due to the associated cost.

Open source software is arguably more secure since many people with the know-how can take a look at the source code for the program. The idea of making source code freely available actually started in 1983  by Richard Stallman, a programmer at MIT. Stallman believed that software should be accessible to programmers so they could modify it as they wished, with the goal of understanding it, learning about it, and improving it. 

Q: Can you use open source programs on Microsoft Windows operating system? 

A: Absolutely.

In fact there are many open source programs written for the windows operating system. For the average user top free and open source software that can replace those pricey applications quite effectively, without the need for license fees.

15 Best Open-Source Alternatives For Expensive Applications (As of 2022)

 Gimp (Adobe Photoshop)

 Inkscape (Adobe Illustrator)

 Scribus (Adobe InDesign)

 OpenShot (Adobe Premiere)

 Synfig (Adobe Animate)

 Darktable (Adobe Lightroom)

 Ardour (Adobe Audition)

 Okular (Adobe Acrobat)

 LibreOffice (MS Office)

 OnlyOffice (MS Office)

 GnuCash (Quicken)

 Chromium (Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge)

 Evolution (Outlook)

 VideoLAN Client (Windows Media Player)

 XSplit (OBS)

The Grass Roots OS

"Linux is a cancer that attaches itself in an intellectual property sense to everything it touches"-Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer interview with the Chicago Sun-Times on June 1, 2001.

Linux Distros has become the largest collaborative development project in the history of computing. My first ever experience with Linux was probably around the year 2000, Epic Games he developer of Unreal Tournament, had a deal with Loki Software to maintain and support the Linux version of Unreal Tournament. I tried to install Slackware's Linux Distro that same year but honestly just couldn't figure it out. Despite my original negative experiences, the positives about the Linux operating system made me keep an eye on it. When I looked on the internet to know more I learned there were hundreds of Linux distributions. I also found out the reason why developers keep creating and distributing  different and unique Linux-based OSes is everything is free. The Linux kernel is free. The apps are free. The resources to create a whole operating system on top of the kernel are free. Gnu is free. Everything is free. 

The year was 2003, I remember like it was yesterday it was very first time I booted into the Linux desktop. The distribution in question was Lindows (later renamed Linspire) 4.0 live CD. I was blown away by the concept of the live CD.

For those who don't know, a live CD (also live DVD, ) is a complete bootable operating system which runs directly from a CD-ROM into a computer's DDR RAM, rather than loading from a disk drive. 

 

With the live CD, I was able to take a look at Lindows 4.0 without installing it.. with no commitment. There was no doubt that Lindows was designed for the novice Linux user. The user interface was very recognizable to Windows users. Over the next few years I did keep my eye on the progress of Linux the desk until Slax Linux and Linspire 5.0 appeared on the scene. Both distros convinced me that an open source operating system could replace Windows XP on my personal computer.

As of 2022 hundreds of Linux distributions are available. Distros, or distributions, are simply different “flavours” of Linux that have different contents in a specific part of the operating system. Technically, Linux just refers to the kernel, when used strictly. The actual term for the operating system is GNU/Linux, where GNU refers to the operating system and Linux part refers to just the kernel. Most distributions come ready to use, and includes a package management system, or packet manager, which is used to install, uninstall and manage software packages. People have different criteria to decide what is good in a distribution. For most people it's stability and ease of use.

Recommended distributions for new users.

These distributions include a software repository, which allows you to browse for software you want or need, click on, and have it install. 

Pop!_OS distribution is developed by System76. It is primarily built to be bundled with the computers built by System76, but can also be downloaded and installed on most computers. System 76 provides two ISO images for download: one with AMD video drivers and another with Nvidia drivers.

Linux Mint was created to provide an out-of-the-box experience to the newbies. Cinnamon desktop is very similar to Microsoft Windows as they both have the start menu on the bottom left.

Nobara Project is a modified version of Fedora Linux with user-friendly fixes added to it. It has 3rd party codec packages such as those for gstreamer, 3rd party drivers such as NVIDIA drivers.

MX Linux is a Linux distribution based on Debian stable and using core antiX components. With the welcome MX Tools screen, you can launch any one of the apps to make configuring and using your system even easier.

Final thoughts....

Gnu+Linux is truly a grassroots operating system. It is a great alternative to Windows for home users. Some think the Linux Desktop is too hard to learn- it’s not. Others say Linux Desktop doesn't have any useful programs-it has many. Most Linux Distros are open source and free to download. They don't have paid promotions. Those developers don't actually have much much money. They are running their community with the good people donating money for their work.  Windows and OSX are backed by the world's two of the top three biggest tech companies. That's why you see them everywhere. 

Officially Windows 11 support ends with Intel 7th Generation and AMD Zen 1 processors. In other words CPUs from 2017 will not be supported by the latest and greatest Windows version.

 The latest and greatest Linux Distros can easily be installed on PCs that have CPUs from 2008. Don't throw away your old PCs, switch to a Linux Distro today.