Exactly how can Windows break my computer. My wife has a computer still running Windows XP and it still works. She never connects it to the internet, think that’s the way.

Will I be able to run my steam and Epic games with this? What about another PC games I own? And my hundreds of mp3 books and thousands of music files. I have them on internal harddrives. If I upgrade my main hard drive to this will I be able to access the files and docs on the two another drives?

Will I be able to run my steam and Epic games with this? What about another PC games I own?

Possibly yes, and incressingly possible over time. Check out ProtonDB. Proton is built into Steam. I don’t know anything about Epic.

And my hundreds of mp3 books and thousands of music files.

Absolutely yes.

I have them on internal harddrives. If I upgrade my main hard drive to this will I be able to access the files and docs on the two another drives?

Yep, there’s support for multiple hard drives, and Linux can read NTFS-formatted drives. But what’s more, Linux installers have long supported “guided partitioning,” which helps you install the OS alongside an existing one like Windows, and then choose between the two when you boot. Of course, when you’re installing any new OS, even Windows, you should make sure you have backups of all your stuff, just in case.

I still recommend getting a new SSD to install Linux on if you want to keep the ability to run your old Windows on that same machine. It is cheap, safe for both your Windows and Linux installs, usually allows you to take advantage of advancements in SSD speeds, lets you have access to your old files so you can transfer them over and makes the whole process far less terrifying.

At some point you’ll realize you haven’t used your Windows drive in a year and it will be a lot easier to make the decision to finally erase it all and repurpose the drive for something else.

At some point you’ll realize you haven’t used your Windows drive in a year and it will be a lot easier to make the decision to finally erase it all and repurpose the drive for something else.

It hasn’t been a year yet but so far it’s been the other way around for me (except for the VM I run my piracy stuff on and my media server, that’s going great). I have been running into constant issues and annoyances trying to use Linux as my daily driver. Maybe if all I cared about was streaming content and gaming it would be fine but I couldn’t even get through my taxes without having to switch back.