Can my PC run Linux?
If your PC runs Windows 10, it’ll run Linux. That covers nearly everyone who lands on this page, so what follows is how to confirm it and the short list of things that can still catch you out.
Windows 11 turned your computer away over a checklist. It wants a processor from an approved list, as though your CPU had been refused entry to a nightclub, plus a security chip called a TPM and a particular startup system with Secure Boot switched on. Microsoft’s specifications page sets it all out. Linux asks for none of it.
Two minutes to check what you have
In Windows, open Settings, then System, then About, and find the line called System type. You’re hoping for “64-bit operating system, x64-based processor”. Mint has been 64-bit only since version 20, and its own guide reckons a computer made after 2007 probably qualifies, which is a generous window. If the line says ARM-based processor, as it does on some recent thin laptops, stop here. Mint isn’t built for those chips. If the computer is a Mac, the Mac guide covers it instead.
Installed RAM is your memory. Mint’s minimum is 2 GB and it recommends 4 GB. With only 2 GB, skip Mint and go to Lubuntu, which is made for exactly this.
For disk space, open File Explorer and click This PC. Mint needs 20 GB and recommends 100 GB. If Windows is staying, that space has to be free space, left over after everything Windows is already using.
What the numbers can’t tell you
Memory and disk rarely stop anyone. Trouble comes from smaller, duller components, and the wifi chip is the usual suspect. No spec sheet will tell you whether yours works with Linux. Most do, straight away. A few need a driver, which is a small piece of software that teaches the system to talk to one particular part.
Graphics cards made by NVIDIA are the other one to know about. They work, and they’re at their best with NVIDIA’s own driver, which isn’t switched on by default. Mint has a tool for this called Driver Manager, under Administration in the menu, and its guide says checking it is one of the first things to do after installing. It lists what your PC needs and installs it with a click.
A PC can also be too new. If yours came out in the last few months and Mint won’t start on it, there’s a separate download called the Edge edition, built for recent hardware.
The test that settles it
Run Linux from a USB stick before you install anything. Step 4 of the switching guide walks through it, and it leaves Windows and your files alone.
Once the desktop is up, be thorough. Connect to wifi, then play a video and listen for sound. Try the webcam, the brightness keys and the volume keys, then close the lid, wait a minute, and open it to see whether the laptop wakes up properly. Plug in your printer and a second screen if you own them. Anything that works from the stick will work once Mint is installed, and anything that doesn’t is now a specific thing you can search for by name.
Mint’s guide makes a promise about this test. If your processor can’t run it, nothing bad happens. You get an error message and carry on with your day.
Two things to find in Windows first
Many Windows laptops encrypt their disk without ever mentioning it, using a feature called BitLocker or device encryption. It’s a good feature. It comes with a 48-digit recovery key, and Windows can demand that key at startup after what it considers a hardware or security change. Installing a second operating system is the sort of event that can set it off. Microsoft says plainly that its support staff cannot retrieve or recreate a lost key, so go and find yours now, while Windows still starts, and write it on paper.
The other is Secure Boot, a startup check that Windows 11 insists on. Leave it on. Mint installs happily with it enabled. If you ever see the words Secure Boot Violation after installing, Mint’s guide offers two fixes, which are to reinstall without ticking the box for extra media software, or to switch Secure Boot off in the PC’s startup settings.
With the recovery key on paper, the next job is making the USB stick.