Hey folks. I’ve had an on-again, off-again relationship with Linux for over 20 years. Usually, my attempts to use it are either thwarted by issues installing, issues booting, or general problems while using it… leading to “catastrophic failure” that I can’t fix without digging into hours of research and terminal commands.
Windows 11 (even 10) are rock solid for me, even as a very heavy multitasker. No crashes. No needing to reboot, unless I’m forced to with an update, and really no issues with any hardware or software I was running.
But with Linux, I just can’t believe how unstable it is, even when I do the absolute basic things.
I’m trying to learn why this is, and how I can prevent these issues from coming up. As I said, I’m committed to using Linux now (I’m done with American software), so I’m open to suggestions.
For context, I’m using a Framework laptop, which is fully (and officially) supports Fedora and Ubuntu. Since Fedora has American ties, I’ve settled with Ubuntu.
All things work as they should: fingerprint scanner, wifi, bluetooth, screen dimming, wake up from suspend, external drives, NAS shared folders, etc. I’ve even got VirtualBox running Windows 11 for the few paid software that I need to load up from time to time.
But I’m noticing issues that seemingly pop out of nowhere on the software/os end of things.
For example, after having no issues updating software, I get this an error: “something went wrong, but we’re not sure what it is.”
Then sometimes I’ll be using Firefox, I’ll open a new tab to type in a search term or URL, and the typing will “lag”, then the address bar will flicker like it’s reloading, and it doesn’t respond well to my mouse clicks. I have to close it out, then start over for it to resolve.
Then I’ll open a different app, sometimes it might open, sometimes it won’t.
Or an app will freeze for no obvious reason, and I’ll get a popup asking to wait or quit.
Another time I left my computer while I went out for a walk, came back, and it was like I just rebooted… all my work was gone, and it was starting fresh from the login screen.
I’m trying not to overload things, and I’m doing maybe 1/5th of what I’d normally be doing when running windows. But I don’t understand why it’s so unstable.
Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
FWIW, I’m not keen to switch away from Ubuntu, because I do still want official support if there’s ever a problem with getting hardware to work.
UPDATE: Wow, I did not expect to get so many responses! Amazing!
Per suggestions, I ran a memtest86 for over 3 hours and it was clean.
I installed Fedora 41 and am now setting it up. Seems good so far, and elevated permissions can be authorized with biometrics! This was not something I had to. Ubuntu, so awesome there!
Any specific tips for Fedora that I should know? Obviously, no more Snap packages now! 😂
UPDATE 2: Ok, Fedora seems waaaay more stable than Ubuntu (and Mint). No strangeness like before… but not everything works as easily. For example, getting a bridged network adapter to work in virtualbox was one-click easy on Ubuntu… not so much on Fedora (still trying to get it working). And Virtualbox didn’t even run my VM without more terminal hackery.
But the OS seems usable, and I’m still setting things up.
One thing I have noticed, however. When I search for how to fix or do something, nearly all websites and forums reference Debian/Ubuntu commands, so the fragmentation there is a little annoying
I’ve been running Linux for 20+ years as well (on-amd-off for most of that, but mostly on). Stability has almost never been an issue, only when I was fucking around and finding out lol. My biggest problem in recent years was Ubuntu never having what I wanted, and Arch always having what I needed… So I just moved to Arch and things have never been better.
This. If you’re going to fuck around with your root, be prepared to find out. Most other problems is a quick search, “oh I don’t have x dependency”, and done.
Nowadays you just need to learn how to use Timeshift and make a save point before messing with stuff. System unstable after tinkering? Time to roll back. Linux is easier and more stable than ever before.
Just stay home, literally in your system, and you’ll be fine 99% of the time.
Where did you get this laptop from? Did you buy it new or used?
The reason why I ask is because it sounds like you have hardware issues.
Yep, the Firefox thing is weird. I’d run a memory test . Does this laptop do the same thing with Windows?
Also op mentions 20 years, were your other experiences like this?
Using only non american oss is literally impossible.
I see your edits and I had the same experience with Ubuntu. For whatever reason on my ThinkPad I had bugs and just weird issues that no one else would run into every single time. And I would try Ubuntu after every major update and it would still be some weird bugs never the same ones.
I’ve now been using Fedora for almost 4 years it’s solid. I always recommend enabling RPM fusion to get those proprietary codecs and I like to change my zram config to what is recommended on the arch wiki.
You need to stop worrying about “official support.” You aren’t a business so it doesn’t matter for you. There is more support out there online for free than you realize. There’s nothing magical framework does for you that doesn’t get ported out everywhere else eventually anyway. Stop limiting yourself like that.
That being said, Ubuntu is built in Debian. Debian is an incredibly solid and stable distro. Ubuntu does do a few questionable things with it but it’s still very reliable. If you have problems with stability, it’s very unlikely Ubuntu is the problem unless you did something so incredibly stupid to it support wouldn’t help you anyway.
I have a theory. Windows can dance around memory corruption issues in ways Linux just refuses to do. Windows will misbehave in strange ways trying to make things work until it just can’t anymore. Linux is more of a binary thing. It works or it doesn’t. It’s not going to play pretend for you. It refuses. Linus has an obscene hand gesture for your hardware.
I want you to get a copy of memtest86+ and boot it off a flash drive. Then just let it beat the shit out of your CPU and ram for a couple hours.
Framework laptops are generally Intel. Intel hasn’t been making the best stuff over the past few years. It’s possible your cpu might be affected by a flaw Intel tried to cover up for a while. If it has it, nothing in earth will ever make that chip reliable. It’s not fixable. It will only get worse with time no matter what OS you use.
Yeah, this was my first thought: test your hardware.
Frameworks have all AMD options too, just a heads up. I have one and it runs great!
They do indeed! And if I had a framework that’s exactly what I would buy unless they had an ARM offering.
Somewhat obvious tips to get a more stable experience:
- Use a distribution that favour stability over being on the bleeding edge. Like Debian stable, or another distribution that maintain LTS releases,
- Install software from the distribution’s official package repositories. Avoid third party packages and repos as much as possible. If you really need a third party repo, verify it’s compatible with your specific distro and has reputation for being well maintained,
- When you do see a problem, take time to troubleshoot and if necessary make a bug report with necessary information for developers to identify the problem, so there’s a better chance to see it fixed.
- If you use Linux in a professional settings, there is paid support available out there, in some cases this get you priority for bug fixes.
Good advice, also Fedora’s “atomic” distros are both bleeding edge and extremely stable!
Atomic distro sounds like an interesting way to avoid breakage due to admin/user mistakes, so it’s a good suggestion. But it doesn’t help much with bugs in new software releases.
So the best choice depends on what exactly caused instability in OP’s case.
I was told Ubuntu was a good beginner distro and used it for like a year and then towards the end of that year things got weird. So since then I’ve moved to arch, because it rolls so much and I don’t keep up, it’s even more unstable. I got some other laptops running bazzite (fedora based) and they seem ok.
So yeah, like your edited comment, I would recommend fedora or even vanilla Debian.
You need to start with Linux mint. The errors you are mentioning are common in ubuntu, crashes happen and popup all the time on my ubuntu installations too. But never on Mint. Mint is based on the stable version of ubuntu, that it has long term support and it’s regularly getting updates to make it even more stable and secure. So please start with Mint, or Debian 12 (although Mint is better for new users).
this! and whilst i don’t know the hardware support for new framework models on mint, i recon it’s pretty good.
Surprised to hear stability questioned. We have RHEL systems at work that have been running 24/7 for over a year.
From the look of it, I may just have really bad luck with Ubuntu and related distros.
I’ve been on Fedora for the last 24h, and it’s been incredibly stable. Even heavy multitasking with Boxes running two VMs in the background! haha
I started using Linux more or less full-time in 2014. I find it to be just as “stable” as Windows or OS-X, which is to say: it’s stable until you do something that makes it not stable.
If you’re staying in the mainstream, using a “stable release” from a big distro (Ubuntu, Debian, there are others…) and waiting at least 6 months after the release of that stable release before using it, I have found Ubuntu to be just as stable as Windows or OS-X. You might want to use an unstable app, that can be a problem in any OS, but granted: there aren’t as many “stable” apps to choose from in Linux as Windows.
OS-X and their apps have burned me hard, repeatedly, for things that Windows and Linux had under control 10 years earlier.
The major difference in my WIndows vs Linux experiences has been: when you want something to work and it just doesn’t, in Windows you have to shrug your shoulders and explain to your customers: It just doesn’t work, there’s nothing we can do. In Linux, you have the option to do the heavy lifting and make it work. It will frequently not be worth the effort, but if you’re really determined you can fix just about anything in Linux.
If you’re using Ubuntu make sure you’re using the most recent LTS release instead of the latest one. Stability issues shouldn’t be a problem on those.
Could this be a snaps thing?
I despise snaps and left Ubuntu for that reason. I don’t remember the specifics but I think even after installing firefox with apt it somehow get’s magically switched to a snap.
I daily drive debian on a t490s and it’s rock solid. There’s just no way anyone could consider this set up unstable.
In recent years I’ve found most of my problems come from the fancy new packages. In order of reliability I find that it goes apt > .dev > AppImage > flatpak > snap
One thing I have noticed, however. When I search for how to fix or do something, nearly all websites and forums reference Debian/Ubuntu commands, so the fragmentation there is a little annoying
I’m using Nobara, which is based on Fedora, so I hear you, but the only thing you really need to do is learn enough about DNF to translate “apt” commands in your head.
And maybe set up a few aliases you’re used to.
People shouldn’t HAVE to do that if they won’t want to. You should just be able to use your OS, not learn a new language to use it “okayish”
A new language? It’s one app.
And if you learn it, you are back to the same level of usage, not “okayish”.
But yeah, no one HAS to move from Ubuntu/Debian to another flavor. (Which is what OP is talking about).
No one has to move off Win 11, either, if that pain doesn’t make it worth it to them.
I shouldn’t have to learn where setting is in the windows UI every few years but that’s just the shit we live in. I find Linux easier because I just have to change one word. In windows I got to go through three different setting panels. Same but different
I just search for what I need in windows. Haven’t browsed through menus in years.
… You know there are menus with search in Linux just like Windows, right?
We’re only talking about the people who want to use the command line.
It’s less than the difference between windows CLI and poweshell. And if you’re like “I don’t use those”, guess what? You don’t need to in Linux either. You can run the update app.
Usually with Linux, once you start out you’re gonna get a ton of issues and you’ll have to troubleshoot them one by one. However, afterwards it should just be a smooth sailing.
Also as a word of warning from my personal experience, official support isn’t something you should be that concerned about. When it comes to software, when some corporation makes some official version for a specific distribution (like Ubuntu), it usually is made by some B-team and doesn’t work that great. If the program is good, it should be available on most major distros rather than just “an official version for just one” if that makes sense.
Also good call - if one distro is causing a fuck ton of issues, just give another one a try. The main difference for users between distros is what kind of software setup they are going with, and some setups are just prone to issues on some hardware or wasn’t tested properly. Still, I do hope Fedora treats you better.
This has not been my experience. I’m not on Ubuntu, but OpenSUSE and NixOS. Everything works and operates as expected everytime. The only issue once was nvidia driver updated versions before kernel did and I had to reboot to a previous snapshot and wait a few days till the kernel update was released to work with whatever happened to the driver. But 8 years of a dependable system otherwise
