OpenSUSE Tumbleweed

Why I switched to OpenSUSE

First of all, it really is pronounced OPEN SUSAH. It’s German, don’t shoot me. OpenSUSE Tumbleweed is a rolling Linux release based on the Suse Linux Enterprise commercial Linux, a major competitor of RedHat.

I ran a Internet Service Provider using Suse Linux years ago, and at the time it was my favorite distro. I also ran several other major projects using Suse.

I ended up switching to CentOS for servers, and Mint for a desktop for a long time. Then I discovered my love for new stuff and found Arch, which led me to Garuda, an Arch based distro with a LOT of really tasty features installed by default. I really do like Garuda to play with, however…

Some distros have small teams of maintainers and conflicts in the community can kill a distro. On my production machine, the desktop I use for real work, I need stability and longevity. (Yeah its a rolling release… I know.)
OpenSuse is backed by Suse Linux, as Fedora is by RedHat. This means that personal issues, lack of interest, real world issues, none of these are going to have much, if any effect, on the longevity of a Distro.

I found Tumbleweed to be stable enough for daily use, and I like it better than Fedora, which is NOT a rolling release.

On another note, OpenSuse games REALLY well. WIne, Lutris, and Steam with Proton all work. The games that I have tried all have worked, and Stellaris even performs better in Linux.

You have a choice of KDE or Gnome on install, currently I’m running the newish KDE Plasma 5.2.4. I like Gnome, too, but I’m just most comfortable with the feel and workflow of Plasma.