Getting ready to officially switch from windows to fedora security for the first time and would like some help

hi im getting ready to switch from windows to fedora security as my main os and am wondering a few things is this a good idea to do even though im not very experienced with linux will my pc hardware run fedora security well to use it for gaming and hacking and would it be a better idea to just use fedora workstation instead of security and will the security version make any big diffrences to my computers ability to run games well especially when the hardware i have is not very good will i run into any problems and obviously i plan on running a few vms on this

as you can tell just from the way im asking my questions im not very experienced at all when it comes to understanding linux but i thought if im really gonna learn linux and hacking as a beginner no bettter way to try it hands on and put myself in a situation where i have to just keep working with it and have no other choice

my pc specs are here:
GPU:
Radeon™ RX 460 Graphics
Primary/Discrete
CPU:
AMD Athlon™ X4 845 Quad Core Processor
2 Cores
RAM:
8 GB
VRAM
2048 MB
GDDR5 1750 MHz

If you don’t have experience using Linux I would not recommend using The Fedora Security Lab spin. I do not think it will work well for your use case.

Try the KDE spin. It is very feature-rich, and you should be able to pick it up easily enough coming from Windows.

Also, you don’t have to limit yourself to just one flavor of Linux. You can dual boot and keep Windows too … for just in case.

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On top of what others said, be aware that spins are just that… a “twist” on the main offering – most of the time if not every single time you can “convert” one version of a given distribution into another with varying amounts of effort.

For instance, the security spins of any distro (or GNU+Linux flavors, as I fondly like to refer to them) are just the baseline version of your GNU+Linux distribution plus the security-focused tools.

Security spins are created because if you need something like that, it is most likely you won’t be doing any audio/video processing… or playing games… or doing traditional office work… or some expensive computational operations – you’re interested in something in particular hence you strip everything that’s not necessary for that purpose out of it. That’s why it is highly unlikely (not impossible tho) that you’ll find a good chunk of security-focused tools in a spin dedicated to multimedia edition.

Other than that, all those spins are generally the very same thing. The only noticeable difference I can tell about Fedora spins is the Core OS and Silverblue spins, which ships dramatic differences regarding how the base system is put together, as they are not only very focused on doing just one thing and doing it well (i.e. Core OS spin), but also a testbed to evolve the whole distribution to a new level (like Silverblue is).

I’d suggest you pay a visit to places like Distrowatch.com, LWN.net, fsf.org, or Phoronix, and start learning about the different kinds of distros that exists, like binary vs source-based, fixed-release vs rolling-release, to learn how a GNU+Linux distribution is put together, what is a “package manager” and what are the commonly known ones, what are Flatpak and Snap (this way you’ll realize how insanely cool is Silverblue approach), what are the most common file systems and which one would best suit your needs… and of course, you can just cross the street and learn about the BSD, Minix and other Unix-like, Unix-inspired and also not-Unix-like or Unix-inspired operating systems out there. There’s also this other cool OS called Emacs, that a lot of people use mostly as a text editor of all sorts.

I just started learning guitar. It is the same thing, almost: which one should I take? Which strings should I use? What kind of amplifier will suit me best? What pick should I try? What music method should I devote my time studying?

You just build your rig and begin your journey.

It’s impossible to see the end of the rabbit hole from where we stand, don’t overthink it. Keep your mind open to learning new stuff and you’ll do great :slight_smile:

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I just would like to distinguish a lab from a spin.

When we do talk about a spin we are talking about a flavor of desktop. For instance if you like the xfce desktop, as the security lab uses, you just can check the live iso here: https://spins.fedoraproject.org/xfce

When we do talk about a lab, we do want to have a set of programs to solve a task. So the Security lab as you mentioned, would be a good choice if you want to solve network tasks with more than just the basic tools you get with all of the spins.

Because of the feature-richness I would not recommend to start with the KDE desktop. Nothing against KDE, just if you come from Windows and like to do things “the way you are used to do” xfce has more the structure as you might be used with windows. The mate-desktop is also a good choice if you like a solid structure.

Anyway, the decision is yours. Easiest way to discover all the desktops is when you install virtualbox and start the iso’s from there, without installing them. So you can compare with windows and see what fits you best.

When was the last time you used Windows? 2000? :joy:

I like XFCE as much as the next guy, but I have to double-down on KDE being an easier transition from Windows if you are used to a modern version of it like Windows 10.

Either way, I think we are all in agreement that the lab spin is not the way to go. Keep in mind, the lab does not contain any “exclusive” tools or anything like that. If you want to install a pen testing tool and check it out, learn how to use it or whatever you can absolutely do that on a “normal” distro.

Another option would be just set up the USB version of the security spin and fire up a thumb drive whenever you want to tinker with the tools, but keep a more “normal” distro on the metal for when you just need to browse the web or play games and stuff.

I started with DOS 3, I’m the voice of “grayed hair” Linux fans :roll_eyes:

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Roger that