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First Debian, then Ubuntu because people said it was better, then back to Debian because it wasn't (snaps really suck and break things), then to Pop OS (bc new laptop preinstalled with it). I also got a SteamDeck semi-recently if that counts (still use the Pop OS laptop).
Ubuntu 10.04.
A walk down memory lane
I received a free CD of 10.04 with a computer magazine that I purchased every time I travelled.
The CD was neglected for the better part of that year, until I tried it out of curiosity. I remember setting up a dual boot configuration around two weeks in. I removed Windows around eve of 2011 and never looked back.
Since then I distro hopped every six months but kept coming back to Linux Mint as it nailed the balance between stability and UX, especially for the home machine that would be used by people from diverse age groups.
In those years, GNOMEβs UX regressed so terribly with its 3.0 release, that Canonicalβs Unity and Mintβs Cinnamon & MATE popped up as a response. One of those didnβt make it by the end of that decade. In those same years, Canonical started alienating its users with questionable decisions. Fedora and Manjaro became stable enough to be recommended for actual daily use. The 2010s was a wild ride.
Though by the start of 2020s, I entered Appleβs walled gardens as I no longer had time to troubleshoot my devices and tools, and expected those to work reliably.
I still use Linux on the home machine as well as the homelab. But I patiently wait for the day Linux is stable for daily use on phones. :-)
Same.
fedora π
I'm not sure if Yggdrasil or Slackware, which we tried out at the old university computers. But quickly Debian became so much more flexible.
Elementary OS 6 Years ago
redacted
@Waffelson First effort was Corel Linux back in 1999. The experience was so bad that I didn't try linux again until 2008, and it finally stuck 6 years ago. Now i'm all in.
Ubuntu on an orangepi 5 when it released, now Linux Mint dual-booted to windows (haven't booted into windows for ages now) on my main rig. I'll figure out making VR work at some point I hope, it's all I really use windows for now.
SuSE linux 4.2 about 1994-6 ish? Fond memories of having to roll my own modelines to get crt monitors working. Used the various versions until the sell out to Novell and the controversy with Microsoft. Then a really big gap with some macs and now Iβve just started using Mint on a mini itx machine Iβve put together just for that use.
Slackware circa 1996
Ubuntu 12 or 14 on a hdd
My first linux distro was i dunno how many years ago. Ubuntu I gave a old dell inspirion with an althlon to one of our church members at the time, no idea what happened to that laptop.
Currently I'm using linux mint due to recommendations for being easy, just recently switched from windows 11 actually.
I attempted to boot Mandrake/Mandrivia on an old laptop once and failed, then I mucked around in Slackware's live CD for an afternoon. The first thing I actually installed and used daily was Ubuntu 10.04.
Ubuntu 5.04 back in like 2004-2005. Although I did pick up RedHat 5 back in the late 90s but never managed to get it installed... Because I was like 11 or 12 lol
Ubuntu. Still going strong 5 years laterβ€οΈ.
Red Hat 6 in college.
Mandrake Linux 7 at home.
In 2000
MkLinux around 1997, but mostly NetBSD back then.
Ubuntu, opensuse, or freebsd. I can't remember what I installed first, since it was around 2006-2007. There was a piece about Linux in some PC magazine and I had to check it out.
I saw some Red Hat first around 2000, then tried Mandrake on my machine around 2005.
Tried Redhat in the late 90s, but I really started using Linux with Mandrake, a few years later.
RHEL desktop 4 when it was still free and I was in middle school
Zorin :D
Ubuntu in 2010 (with compiz' burning screen of course!). Got a new laptop a the time with decent to good specs and was shocked how bad it performed with the stock Win7 and bloated with bloatware (it was a Sony).
I'm not sure what the first distro I installed was but I used to have a Linux VM running 24/7 on my Windows machine back in '06. I ran folding@home on my athlon 64 and for some reason the client at the time ran faster in a Linux VM on windows than it did in native windows. Pretty sure I was running Ubuntu but I can't be certain.
Fedora,
I will never repeat that mistake again, it was more like Dementor.
I eventually switched to fedora after using linux for a while and I love it
Explain
it's simple,
on each linux upgrade it broke(on boot after screen would show yellow, red, orange, ... squares) so I had to clean reinstall, gave up after maybe fourth upgrade
It sucked all the interest
Fedora Core 2 :)
First must've been Caldera Linux in 1996 or 1997. Absolutely wild to compare with contemporaries at the time.
Slackware, circa 1995. Kernel 1.2.8
First one I tried was suse. Had it installed at an installfest (ah those heady days). But when I got it home it wouldn't work with my monitor.
Second I bought Mandrake, but couldn't get that to work either because I had lost my monitor manual and couldn't give it the vsync value for it.
First one I got to work was called LibraNet. That worked great for a couple of years until they stopped supporting it because it was run by a father and son team and the father passed away.
So then I chose suse again, hoping a bigger org wouldn't suffer the same problem. But then later there was some controversy I can't remember anymore (was it with microsoft?), so I switched to Kubuntu which I have been using forever, but am going to switch to opensuse very soon for various reasons.
Fun trivia: used KDE on every one of them.
DLD with some 2.0 kernel.
Ubuntu 6.04. It was really simple to get it up and running even back then.
ubuntu, manjaro was my first real foray into linux. I hopped to arch about a week later.
It's been like 5 years now. Please help.
Ubuntu studio π€£π€£π€£
Ubuntu 8.10. My XP install had gotten corrupted and I didnβt own a disc copy of Windows. One of the tech support ladies at my school gave me a copy. Once I discovered the desktop cube and GTK themes I was hooked.
SuSE Linux 6.0 I believe. Its been a while and I was very young then...
Linux Mint 20 (MATE).
Almost Arch or Gentoo due to trolls.
I'd also like to mention that was when I got my first computer and I first had to figure out what's an OS.
I got it used, and it already had ~~Windows~~ free DVD burner pre-installed. I didn't have any flash drive, why would I anyway? I just managed to dig out one single DVD-RW.
Suse Linux before it was opensuse
*ubuntu (Xubuntu -> Ubuntu 10.04 -> Kubuntu 12.04) -> Debian 8 (KDE). Debian since then.