A young reletive "borrowed" my second laptop when she went to university.

 After 3 years she complained that it was running slowly, (not surprisingly with all the junk files on it) so she gave it to an "expert" to clean up and he botched it. Originally the operating system was Windows 8 and when the oportunity arose I upgraded to Windows 10.

 Now it has reverted to Windows 8, and she, on acquiring a new laptop has given it back to me.

 I am not a fan of Win 8 nor Win 10 and would like to install a Linux operating system.

So, two questionds, Which Linux system is best for me? I use the laptop for news browsing, weaher updates, communicatins, general enquiries and occasional on-line shopping. I have no interest in Gaming.

The hardware is an HP Pavilion G6 series.

Secondly, how do I uninstall the old Win 8 OS without harming the Linux? I do not want it running away in the background, using up HD space and possibly interfering with the Linux.

Try Mint https://linuxmint.com/ or, even better, try Windows 7.

 

Format the hard disk during Linux installation and it will remove old Windows.

3 hours ago, fdsa said:

Try Mint https://linuxmint.com/ or, even better, try Windows 7.

 

Format the hard disk during Linux installation and it will remove old Windows.

Mint's good, user friendly, comes with sufficient useful software. Doesn't require much fooling around, as Linux tends to do (trust me), and also has an active helpful support forum. I use it on a laptop and like it a lot. Yeah, go with Mint. Choose one of three flavors of desktop environment:

 

https://linuxmint-installation-guide.readthedocs.io/en/latest/choose.html

 

Not sure what your problem is w/ Win 8. The interface is universally detested, however. You might upgrade to 8.1. I could live with that.

 

 

And then replace the crappy start menu with a Win 7 clone:

 

https://github.com/Open-Shell/Open-Shell-Menu

 

which civilizes it and makes it easily useful.

I started my Linux journey about six months ago, after my old Mac Book Pro was getting too slow after all the updates. I must have tried a dozen different distro’s, some good, some not so good.

For someone new to linux I would suggest either, Ubuntu or Linux Mint. Both are stable and easy to install / configure (Linux mint slightly easier). The distro I use is Feren OS. Feren is highly configurable. It has 8 different layouts you can choose from (from mac to Windows and everything in between), but takes a little bit longer to setup.

 

As for installation, all three are easy and straight forward. Download the os to your hard drive, then flash it to a USB stick (I use BalenaEtcher to flash to the stick). Reboot into your USB stick (not sure how to do this on Windows, easy on MacOS). You can run the linux os from the USB stick to get a feel for it and see if you like it. If you want to install it to the hard drive just hit install and follow the instructions. Note: running linux from the USB stick may be a bit slow and not all the functions may work properly. It is only to get a feel for it.

 

As for removing Windows, when installing Linux you will be given a choice of installing along side Windows (dual boot) or clean install (wipes the hard disk clean, including Windows).

Youtube is a great source on how to install, dual boot, configure etc.

 

Linux Mint download          https://www.linuxmint.com/download.php

Ubuntu download               https://ubuntu.com/download/desktop

Feren OS download            https://ferenos.weebly.com

BalenaEtcher Download      https://www.balena.io/etcher/

 

 

 

 

I used to be an Ubuntu users, but switched to Linux Mint when Ubuntu started to dumb down the user interface, making it more like something designed for a tablet or mobile 'phone.

 

Linux mint comes in various editions.  However, the "standard" edition is probably going to be the best fit.  Note you also have a choice of user interfaces, Cinnamon and Mate.

 

Finally, don't forget to try and run from a thumb drive before you install to check out whether everything works OK (mouse/keyboard/audio/CD drive).  Getting printing to work will need to be addressed after an install.

31 minutes ago, Oxx said:

Getting printing to work will need to be addressed after an install.

Most printers automatically get installed when installing Linux Mint. Just connect the printer to the computer before installing.

22 minutes ago, farang51 said:

Most printers automatically get installed when installing Linux Mint. Just connect the printer to the computer before installing.

Not my experience, both with HP and with Brother printers.  Took a lot of fiddling around to sort things out.  CUPS is not the easiest of things to work with.

Most of the Linux distributions out there can be run live from a USB stick, so you can check them out before installing.

I like Mint, but if you want to keep it small and simple have a look at Puppy Linux.

 

 

+1 for Mint

 

 

6 hours ago, Oxx said:

Not my experience, both with HP and with Brother printers.  Took a lot of fiddling around to sort things out.  CUPS is not the easiest of things to work with.

I haven't have to fiddle to install printers in Linux for more than 10 years and never had problems in Linux Mint (HP printers).  You must have been very unlucky.

Thanks to all who have replied so far, Please continue with your advice.

The printer is no problem, I still have the installation disc which has on it the choice of windows, Linux and Mac operating systems.

Off-topic post reported and removed.