Hej lemmings! (Hoping this is relevant enough for the selfhosted commjnity)
Quick question for you all: do you stick with the same distro across your PC, laptop, and server, or do you pick different ones based on the device and what you’re doing?
For me, I’ve been mixing and matching depending on the use case, but I’m starting to think it’d be nice to just have one distro (or at least one family like Fedora or Debian) running everywhere. That way I wouldn’t get confused about default settings or constantly have to look up flags for different package managers.
Right now my setup is:
- Gaming rig: CachyOS
- Laptop: AuroraOS
- NAS: Unraid
- Various project servers: DietPi, Debian, Alpine etc…
I feel like NixOS might be the only distro that could realistically handle all these use cases, but I’m a bit scared of the learning curve and the maintenance work it’d take to migrate everything over.
Am I the only one who feels like having “one distro to rule them all” would be nice? How do you guys handle your setups? All ears! 😊
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I run OpenSuse Tumbleweed on my Daily Driver Desktop, Bazzite on my Laptop, Debian on my Game Server
I use Fedora on my personal laptop and DietPi on my RaspberryPi 4 where I selfhost a bunch of stuff.
I use Arch (btw) on my desktops and laptops.
On my servers I’m halfway through replacing Debian with openSUSE.
My desktop and servers have different use cases and I interact with them in different ways, so there’s little confusion for me.
I feel the same way. I use fedora on my laptops and desktops and debian on my servers. Generally my servers do not have or need a gui so debian makes it easy to install without. I tried fedora server once and i just was not happy with it.
I used to have Ubuntu everywhere, then changed to Debian for servers. Now that I’m using bazzite for my gaming rig, I really liked the idea and went to fedora silver blue on my work laptop. I’m the near future I want to re do my home lab, bit not sure yet what, unfortunately to many open questions concerning storage left.
I use ArchLinux more or less on all Device where it is possible It runs on my workstations, on my NAS, on my servers
Reason for that is: I am lazy and this way I don’t have to learn how to administrate different Distributions.
Yep. Arch on my personal multi-use laptop, Arch on my work Java-development laptop, Arch on my gaming PC, Arch on my home Forgejo / DNS / NAS server. Just easier to not have to remember how to do things in different ways, plus my home server can efficiently act as a repo cache.
Did have ALARM installed on the home server back when I used a raspberry pi, and while that’s an amazing project, a pi is just a bit underpowered for some uses. Got a mini PC extremely cheap since it wouldn’t support Win11, but it runs Linux like a champ.
For my Gaming PC I ended up with cashyOS. Justs works and still gives me enough flexibility for customization. Server is Proxmox with mostly Debian LXCs but I started to add in some alpine containers. Probably going to throw alpine on my old laptop as well, just for fun. Ah and then there is my MacBook with macOS, which for now I plan to keep…
I typically use EndeavorOS because I enjoy how well documented and organized the arch wiki is.
I tried switching to fedora on my laptop recently but actually had some issues with software that was apparently only distributed through the AUR or AppImage (which I could have used, I know).
When I also had issues setting up my VPN to my home network again, I caved and restored the disk to a backup I took before attempting the switch. The VPN thing almost definitely wasn’t Fedoras fault since I remember running into the same issue on EndeavorOS but after my fix from last time didn’t work I was out of patience.
My servers runs either on debian or Ubuntu LTS though.
I do - more or less. Since I am the IT guy for my entire family and don’t feel like doing tech support on 10 different distros.
I’ve thought about it, but I like having Bazzite for my gaming PC and Debian for my laptop, so I’ll probably keep using multiple distros. For me it’s:
- Gaming PC: Bazzite (it’s plugged into my TV, like a console, and goes straight to Steam’s big picture mode)
- Laptop: Debian with KDE Plasma
- Home Server: Debian (a little single board computer, no desktop environment)
Due to bazzite,I checked out fedora silver blue for my work laptop. So far I’m happy.
Work notebook runs Linux Mint
My private desktop PC runs Cachy OS with Wayland/KDE but Wayland crashes all the time, so my private notebook bot Cachy OS with Gnome. Love it. Now I need to reinstall my desktop to also install Gnome. Dont want the hazzle to install it Next to wayland
Basically, I do. Kubuntu everywhere. Only exception are the servers that run a UI less version of Ubuntu.
I normally install Linux based upon what I am doing. Gaming wise is usually popos. (I have eyed up CachyOS). I use Endeavor for a lot of old mac stuff. etc.
I was HEAVILY into the apple ecosystem, so I have a lot of macs. I have a macbook, running MacOS, and i have a desktop computer that i was using for my server, but instead bought a ras pi, and now use my desktop AS a desktop (partly because i want to dump apple because of all the bootlicking that Tim Apple is doing towards drumpf), which runs linux mint. My ras pi runs ubuntu server. Aside from that, that’s the extent of my home computing. I have an iphone too. But my mac mini goes unused now, and thinking of selling it, but not sure. /rambling
I usually stick with ubuntu/debian based distros, because it was the first distro system i used when i first used linux. so I stick with what i know. Though I did support a RH server once when i worked in IT.
Debian home server, macOS desktop, newer laptops run Arch and Fedora, and the two old MacBooks both run Mint DE. Oh, and OpenWrt on the router.
For me, I am running EndeavourOS on my laptop (for its rolling release updates and its customisability) and Debian on my homeserver (for its stability). I have also set up a secondary laptop with Linux Mint that is now being used by somebody else for its ease of use :)
