 I've argued for years that if you want to use ARCH, the best way to do so is to use an ARCH-based distro instead of using vanilla ARCH, and there are many reasons for that argument. I think that ARCH-based distros are oftentimes easier to install, they're oftentimes easier to maintain, and they oftentimes have communities that are more welcoming to new users than vanilla ARCH tends to be. Those three reasons are, I think, important and good enough for most people to use an ARCH-based distro instead of vanilla ARCH. Now I'm saying this and I'm not deriding vanilla ARCH at all. I think vanilla ARCH is a great thing and I think that everybody who uses ARCH should try to install it at least one time because the process of doing so will help you learn a lot about Linux. I know a lot of the stuff that I learned about ARCH happened that first time I installed vanilla ARCH and it allowed me to broaden my Linux knowledge by quite a bit, but nowadays I hardly ever install vanilla ARCH simply because, I mean, for one thing I am lazy so the ease of install definitely appeals to me, but also because the communities are better and also it tends to be a lot less maintenance for me. I tend to just work on ARCH-based distros that take a lot of effort to get working on vanilla ARCH. For whatever reason, vanilla ARCH tends to take me like two or three weeks to actually get it set up because I use it for a while and then I realize well I forgot to install this one thing so I have to install that and I'm always trying to get the pieces together to make a cohesive distro and that's not something I have to do when I use an ARCH-based distro. So what I thought I'd do today is take you through my five favorite ARCH-based distros and if you've watched the channel for any amount of time you'll know that there's definitely going to be a couple of them on the list that are fairly obvious and I think they're actually all fairly obvious. I'm not going to recommend some off the beaten path distro for this list, but let's go ahead and jump in to number five. Okay, so number five on the list is Reborn OS. Now I've chosen this one because it has a ton of desktops, it is easy to install, but also it's not just a clone of Manjaro, right? It's actually much closer to Anteagos than any of the other distros on this list, which is weird considering that the next one on the list is going to be something that was supposedly, you know, taking over for Anteagos. But the reason why I say this is kind of an Anteagos successor is because it uses the same installer as Anteagos did. Now those of you who haven't been in the Linux community for very long don't know what I'm talking about and probably don't even know what word I'm saying, but Anteagos Linux was one of the first real successful ARCH-based distros. It's not around anymore, the developers decided to stop developing it, but it was very popular and it kind of went right along with Manjaro as one of the most popular ARCH-based distros. And RebornOS is kind of the successor. Now they're not actually related, but they do use the same installer. They have a ton of different distribution or desktop environments and window managers. So you can try out any of those you want. The live environment is a themed version of GNOME, similar to what Anteagos was. So it's very much kind of like that. So when you install this, you get a ton of different applications and such. That are installed, but it's not overly bloated. OK, and it's also one of the few distributions where you go through the installer and you don't get a ton of choices for what you get installed. Like there are some choices here and it's just basically a default list. There's things like browsers and gaming stuff like that. But you're not going to have the vast list of stuff that you'll see on some of the other choices that I'll show you today. So in a way, I think that that's better for new users because they're not going to be overwhelmed with choice. Like when you install ARCO for the first time, it asks you what kernel you want and what video drivers you need and stuff like that. So that stuff is very much pro level installation Linux user voodoo stuff. And this doesn't do that. This is much more, I believe, targeted towards new users. So that's RebornOS. So the next one on the list is EndeavorOS. And EndeavorOS is an interesting little distribution because it is a arch-based distribution that is very unapologetic in its theming. You'll notice that no matter what desktop you install, when you install EndeavorOS, they have gone through and actually spent a lot of time in making it look unique. Not so much unique, I should say, but different than everybody else. You're still going to notice similarities like this, you can tell. This you can tell is XFCE, but it's different. Most XFCE desktop environments look a little outdated. This doesn't look outdated. It also uses a different menu than what you would normally see. Or at least it's been themed, I should say. It kind of they're kind of going for the plasma menu that used to be used to be a thing. But anyways, they've gone through and themed all their desktops like this. And it's good. I will say that the installation can be slow if you choose the online installation. So I would recommend using the offline installation because it is much faster. I'm not sure if that's a mirror thing or what's going on. It seems like they shouldn't have mirror problems because really they're just downloading stuff from the arch mirrors. But I have noticed a few times that I've installed it that especially things like the BSPWM version, the install is a little slow. So if you look at the installer here, it does give you an option for quite a few things. You have XFCE, KDE, GNOME, I3, Mate, Cinnamon, Budgie, LXCute. And actually, I don't see the BSPWM version on here anymore, which is an interesting thing. But you can also go through and install things like printer support and stuff like that. Now, unlike other distributions that we'll see, this doesn't offer you a broad range of selection when it comes to what software is installed along the way. Whatever gets installed, it has been chosen by the developer, basically how it used to be or how it still is on a lot of Ubuntu based distributions. So you'd go through and choose whatever desktop environment you wanted and then you'd just proceed with the installation like you would normally. So Endeavor OS is a much more button down arch space distribution in that what you get is what you get. You didn't choose any of that stuff other than the desktop environment or the window manager. Everything else that is installed has been chosen for you by the developer. And that's an interesting way to do it. It's the way it used to be always done. So if that's something that appeals to you, Endeavor OS might be your choice. The next one on the list is probably the most interestingly designed distro. And this is Geruda OS and Geruda is touted as a gaming OS. Now, I don't want you to take that as the games you play on this are going to be run faster or better. That's not guaranteed at all. It's still Linux. You still have to put effort in the gaming no matter what distribution you use. The thing about Geruda that is great is that it uses the Zenkernel. So that's different than all the rest. It comes with the Zenkernel by default. It focuses and defaults to ButterFS, which is something that's also different than the rest. Now, the rest of them, you can choose ButterFS, but it's not default. Default is EXT4. Another thing about Geruda is that the way they do installation is actually much different than the rest of them. When you install this, if we hit the install button, you get a Calamari's installer. They've themed it obviously, but it's still the Calamari's installer. But that's all you get. You choose your location, your keyboard, your petitions, your user, and then you install it. That's all you do. You don't get to choose anything else. But unlike Endeavor, you do actually get to choose what's installed. You just do it after the distro has been installed. There's a wizard that pops up upon first boot and it will walk you through dozens of different programs and dozens of different categories of programs to decide what's actually installed in your distro. You can skip it if you want and have a minimal install. Or you can go through that and install just a ton of different applications from the the repositories through a GUI just as you go along. That includes things like fonts and browsers and office suites and gaming stuff and all that stuff. And there's not another distribution out there that I know of that does something in that way. Now, I used Geruda as my daily driver for about three weeks, just a couple, just about a month ago. And it was a fairly good experience. Pipewire ended up being the end of my experiment with Geruda simply because Pipewire hates me and hates my computer. But for the most part, Geruda was a really good experience. And I liked it. The one thing I will say is that the theming is not for everybody, theming really doesn't matter because it's so easy to change. But out of the box, this is what Geruda looks like. Now, they do have other desktop environments. And that's the one thing that is also different than Geruda is that if you want a specific desktop environment that they offer, you have to choose that specific ISO, whereas things like the ones that we looked at so far, both reborn and endeavor allow you to choose your desktop environment or your window manager during installation, Geruda forces you to choose the ISO that you want before you start installation. So that is Geruda. Personally, I'm not a fan of the theming. It's a little over the top for me, but I know a lot of people like it. And it was the first thing I changed. And I went to something different that was much more tame. Those candy icons or whatever they're called there at the bottom are just a little bit too bright for me. They don't match my personality. So anyways, moving on, number two is probably the most popular arch-based distribution out there, and that is Manjaro. Manjaro is similar to Geruda in that it forces you to choose your desktop environment and ISO before you start installation. So if you want the XFC version, if you want the KDE version, if you want the GNOME version or whatever, you have to choose to get that specific ISO. Like I said, Manjaro is probably the most popular arch-based distro out there. And for good reason, they do arch in a much different way. And the reason why I say that is because arch is a rolling base rolling distribution. That means you're always getting the latest software usually immediately. Whenever a developer releases it, it shows up on arch usually within a few hours. And that's the way a rolling release works. And it's a great thing, right? A lot of people like it that way. But sometimes things break because you're basically the guinea pigs being tested on all new software. And when things go wrong, when you find bugs, you're the first to experience them. Manjaro does things a little bit differently. They do pull from the arch repositories and they still have the AUR and all that stuff. But the standard arch stuff is delayed by a week or two. Maybe it's a few days. Like it really depends on what the software is. It's always delayed a little bit. And that way it allows the vanilla arch users and people using the stuff straight from the spigot, so to speak, to test that stuff and find the bugs that them be the guinea pigs. And then eventually it will filter into Manjaro so that things are a little bit more stable. And there aren't that many distributions on the arch side that do that kind of thing. And it's, I think it's really great because it allows people who they want more recent software, but they don't necessarily need it released the exact same day. They don't need it day one. So they use Manjaro and they can experience something of what you'd experience with a stable distro or a non-rolling release distro, but still have access to somewhat recent software. And that's a great way of doing things. Personally, I don't really care for Manjaro simply because I like to have a choice of more desktop environments. I personally like the community surrounding some of the other arch-based distros a little bit better. It doesn't mean that the community around Manjaro is bad by any means. It's actually quite large and fairly friendly. It's just that I've made friends and stuff like that in other arch-based district communities and really haven't spent much time with the Manjaro guys. So Manjaro's installation is done similar to basically all the rest, except for RebornOS. It uses the Calamari's installer. I believe it was the first distribution to use the Calamari's installer and they actually may be the maintainers of the Calamari's installer. I'm not sure about that. And when you go through and do the installation, you're just going to do the standard Linux installation. There's going to be no choice of software or any of that kind of stuff and Manjaro doesn't do anything post-installation for that either. Whatever is installed is installed by the developer and you kind of just have to live with it. Now I'm actually not sure that I think I might have misspoke just then. At one point or another, they did ask you to go through and select an offer suite. That doesn't seem to be the case anymore. They may do that post-installation. It's been a long time since I've actually installed Manjaro, but at one point or another, they were asking you to choose between Free Office and Libre Office. I believe those were the two choices, whether or not that's still the case somewhere along the line. I'm not sure, but if that does still happen, that's the only selection of software you actually make. For most people who are new to Arch Linux, I think Manjaro is probably the best choice. I know I didn't rank it number one on the list. I did that simply because I don't use Manjaro all that often, so I'm not as familiar with it also because it's just not my distro of choice. But I think for most new users, Manjaro, if you're going to use an ArchBase distro, Manjaro is the best option because of that staggered release that they have. It allows you to experience the Arch way of doing things without being shoved off the deep end into the most recent software, which can sometimes have problems simply because the new software tends to break more often than tested software. So that is Manjaro. So number one on the list is probably not a surprise to anyone who's watched the channel for any amount of time, and that is Arch Linux. And this is a very customized version of Arch. This is my version of Arch. And I'm going to show you the vanilla install here in a second. But I just wanted to show you this. This is the potential of what Arch could become. And this is how I've made my Arch go install. I just wanted to show you that because I'm quite proud of it. So one of the reasons why I like Arch Linux so much is simply because it offers you the most choice. I think it's the most Arch like ArchBase distro that you could possibly install because when you install vanilla Arch, you have the choice to install everything you want to install. It's up to you to build your operating system in the way you want to build it. That's really the purpose behind vanilla Arch. And it's all that's done through the command line and all this stuff. And it's varying levels of difficulty, depending on how familiar you are with the command line. But that's the point of vanilla Arch. With Arco, right out of the box, you get a ton of options before you ever even install it. So what I'm going to do is show you a couple things. So first, it offers two paths to installation. You can go through the beginner installation and it's going to give you some choices, but it's going to be pared down. It's going to be very much for a beginner. But if you want a ton of choice, you'd select the advanced installation and you'd go through this. And you can see here along the side, there's just a ton of things that you're going to have to go through. One by one by one, you're going to select the drivers, the kernel, the login manager, the display manager, the desktop environment or window manager that you're going to use, and which I'm going to get to that here in a second. I'm going to show you exactly that because that's one of the best parts about this. If once you get to this screen, you can't find the window manager or desktop environment that you want to install on this list, then it probably doesn't exist because they have like over 20 different desktop environments that you can choose from or window managers. And it would take a while to actually go through and read them all. And they've all been customized to be fairly similar to one another so that you can go through and install several of them. And I've done this. I've installed most of the window managers. And if you use them, you'll notice that the key bindings kind of translate through the entire ecosystem. And it's really cool because it allows you to experience those window managers without having to build your own configuration file. So that's cool. And this is one of the things that I just love about ARCO is because you go through each and one of these categories and you choose the software that you want to install right before you install it. And now it's similar to what Geruda does, but only it's done before installation instead of afterwards. But the Geruda install of all that software is very, it's kind of fragmented. And while it's not even really the word, it's kind of, it's like each category is its own app, the way they do it. And it's a little weird. It's good. But I think this is better simply because it allows you to, when you install ARCO and gone through all these categories and it goes through and installs, once you boot in for the first time, you have all your stuff. You're ready to go. And there's nothing else you have to do. So you can just start using your computer. With Geruda, there's that extra step you have to take after you install. And so that can be kind of a pain in the butt. I mean, it's the same, probably same amount of time both ways. But this always has felt, to me, at least a little bit easier. Now also, and I didn't really mention the communities surrounding the other distros simply because I'm less familiar with them. They all do have really good communities to varying sizes. Like Manjaro's is going to have the biggest community because it's the most used. Reborn's probably going to have the smallest because I think it's probably the least used. But they do have communities around them. But I'm most familiar with the ARCO next community. And one of the greatest things about ARCO is that the developers are very responsive to help. Now, they do require you to put some effort in before you start asking questions because the lead guy, Eric Dubois, has a YouTube channel where he's made like 3,000 videos on ARCO, mostly ARCO. And a lot of the problems you'll experience if you experience any are going to be solved on his YouTube channel. So they expect you to kind of sift through that stuff before you go through and ask questions. But if you can't find your question, your answer there, the forum, the telegram group, and the Discord are all great places to be. And there hasn't ever been a problem that I haven't been able to solve either through the YouTube channel or through the community. And that's not really something that I can ever have said about any other distro that I've ever really used. So that is ARCO. And that's number one on my list. It has remained number one on my list for top distro overall for the last year. It's the distro that I keep coming back to. So those are the top five arch-based distros. There are probably close to 50 arch-based distros out there, maybe even more than that. I counted 25 and then I decided to stop counting. So there are just a ton of them. And some of them are no longer being developed. Some of them are developed slowly. Some of them are just arch installers. Basically they just install arch. And those are good too. So I think the bottom line of this video is yes, these are the top five. And I've kind of given you my opinions on each one of them. But the best thing about Linux is experimentation and choice and learning stuff. So if you're a new user and you're considering an arch-based distro, try them all. There's no reason why you can't. And I think that if you go through and do the installation for each one of these, you'll see the differences between them. And also you'll kind of come to know the philosophy behind them. Cause each one of them do things just slightly different. Mandrao does the whole delayed thing. Garuda kind of focuses on gaming and all that stuff. Endeavor and Reborn are much more pared down arch-based distributions. And they don't come with a ton of software, pre-install and stuff like that. I mean, you can install stuff, but it's not all shoved at you right at the beginning of your installation process. And then you have ARCO, which does have that situation going on, but allows you to really, truly build up your distro in a way that is very much similar to what you would do if you were doing it all on the command line and building your vanilla arch-ups. So I think that the solution for you, if you're looking into switching to one of these distributions is to try them all because no one on the internet, no matter what they say, can tell you what the best distribution for you is. You have to go through and actually try them. And along the way, you're gonna learn stuff. That's the best part. So that is it for this video. If you have another arch-based distribution that you really like, leave those in the comment section below. You can like and subscribe. I really do appreciate everybody who has hit that red button. You can follow me on Twitter at Linuxcast. You can support me on Patreon at patreon.com slash Linuxcast. Before I go, I'd like to take a moment to thank my current patrons. Devon, Chris, East Coast Webgentu is fun too. Patrick L. Primus, Sid A. Marcus, Megalyn Jackson of Tools, Steve A. Mitchell, Art Center, Amityus, Merrick Camp, Joshua Lee, J-Dog, the BSDs Rock, and Peter A. Thanks everybody for watching. I'll see you next time.