So, pretty recently actually, I decided to join the cult of Gentoo Linux. Why? Not really sure. I think a lot of it had to do with me wanting to explore something new, a level deeper in the linux rabbit hole.
How I Got Started on Linux in the First Place
I've always kinda considered myself technically-minded, i.e. me and technology have always kinda been on good terms. That being said, I hate windows. Windows 7 was probably the last good windows update. Windows 8 tried too hard to have the same UI as the crappy Windows phones/tablets at the time. Windows 10, while being functionally sound and good for gamers like me, I began to really despise the amount of spyware and bloat.
At the time, I was becoming more conscious of my digital footprint and wanted to be even better with computers. This was when I discovered SomeOrdinaryGamers. Ol' Mutahar preached the linux experience, and I was all about it. I followed a tutorial and dual booted Windows with Pop!_OS because I really liked their desktop environment. This was during the 2020 COVID pandemic.
It worked pretty flawlessly. Minor learning curves and fixing issues myself. Pretty much every game I played work out the box thanks to Steam's Proton.
About 3 months later, I switched to Manjaro linux to get a taste of that sweet Arch BTW (which I later had embroidered on my wedding suit). I began to grow deeper of a level of an understanding of linux, and I eventually fully committed and removed Windows completely off my system.
After about 6 months of fully committing to the linux OS on a daily, I decided to go one level deeper and install Arch. This is where I found my home for the next few years.
So, Why Did I Switch to Gentoo?
Good question. I saw a lot of people in the linux community talking about how gentoo gives you even more control over your system. I also liked the idea of being able to fine tune my PC to it's exact use case. I could specify exactly what drivers I do and don't need support for. I also wanted to grow my knowledge of linux further and grow my skillset with the system.
I did have some experience with Gentoo in the past in a virtual machine, so I was already familiar with how the installation and general day-to-day was gonna go.
After a few hours of installation and minor fixes to kernel modules I forgot to add, the system was fully installed.
How Does It Compare to Arch?
I think my gentoo install is a lot more lightweight than my arch install. I feel like certain things work better than on my arch install, my mic quality on Discord and recordings are a lot better. USE flags and Portage are still taking some getting used to, but overall it's been great.
Some apps like discord (because it won't even let you use the app until you've updated) will require an update before the gentoo team puts out a release, which isn't a big deal. I just install the tar.gz file, extract it, and then add the desktop entry to my .local/share/applications directory and work from there.
Overall, I think I'll keep using it. Maybe a year from now I'll be running a full LFS build muahahaha