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Comment by echoangle | Hacker News Reader

It’s just not ready for a non-technical user. Try to explain to your mother how to properly get NVIDIA graphics cards running. I couldn’t even do it myself. When I installed Debian, the included open source drive was unusable (lagging even when just moving the mouse) so I wanted to get the driver by NVIDIA. You need to mess around with secure boot and even then, I couldn’t log in using Wayland and would just loop back to the login screen because Wayland didn’t start properly. That’s not acceptable for noobs.

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For a "mother proof" / "noob" system, I'd recommend:

1. Install Ubuntu 2. Select closed source Nvidia driver during install 3. Done

I don't recall having to mess with secure boot -- is that some dual boot thing?

My mother taught me to program, and ran my first programs (FORTRAN) on paper with me. Please don't casually use "mother" or "grandmother" to mean technically incompetent.

>Try to explain to your mother how to properly get NVIDIA graphics cards running

why would she need that? 1. on almost all big distros thats included by default 2. 99% of user do not use a GPU they just browse the web.

For 1., I was citing Debian as an example which doesn’t include it, and that’s certainly a big distro. Other might be better and this isn’t needed for them. For 2., as i said, the default driver was absolutely unusable for me.

no mom is gonna install debian lol besides are we gonna act like there are no drivers needed on windows? People will get the information how to install the drivers like on windows. By using a search engine.

Two problems here:

1. Debian has ideological reasons for not including nvidia. If you're not a proponent of FOSS software, you wouldn't even look to Debian. It's popular because it's a good distro, but it's a very particular kind of distro.

2. Debian Stable does now include nvidia drivers. Yes, they relented, specifically because of situations like yours. Personally, I think it's a good thing they relented.

My mom gives a f** about Nvidia.

Well does she give a f** about a usable computer? Because you have to care about Nvidia to get Linux working if you have a nvidia graphics card.

My mom doesn't have nvidia gpu. She doesn't need it, so it was not purchased for her. She uses Intel integrated graphics, that's all what she needs. It is perfectly usable computer.

Thus, a side effect is no need to install any third-party drivers at all.

So the response to "Linux isn't ready for mass adoption due to suboptimal driver availability" is "Well it works on one machine I care about"? Good for you, but how does that contradict my point? Is the solution to not just switch everyone over to Linux but also get new graphics cards for everyone who has a nvidia GPU (which is probably the majority)?

No, the point is, that when you are switching someone to linux, especially when it is a "normie", that would not be capable of installing windows either (nevermind dealing with windows update overwriting their oem driver), you do that for them.

Edit: No, most users do not have Nvidia GPU. Most Steam gamers do. But gamers are not entire computer market; it is just a small slice of the market. Meanwhile, Intel iGPU is the majority.

Yeah, the ideal Linux desktop for non-technical people is a Chromebook. Roast me if you want, but that's what my mom uses. I did have her using a Ubuntu install awhile ago but the amount of times I had to provide technical support or her to do very normal stuff just made it impractical.

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