Does your laptop have 2 GPU’s?
NVIDIA Optimus sucks for Linux, I would suggest looking into EnvyControl and forcing your xorg & xrandr to use your NVIDIA GPU primarily and not the iGPU.
this post was submitted on 06 May 2025
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My choice is Arch Linux purely because it's bleeding edge
I've no idea if Arch actually has newer drivers than Debian / Fedora, but if they are you'll (usually) get better support from the developers of whatever application / package - or in your case - drivers that you're facing.
It's more involved than "just" installing Debian, etc... but reading through the Arch Linux wiki as you install will (should) ensure you've got the correct drivers setup and you'll know why they're working.
So... it'll be more effort, but you might get "better" results.
nvidia stutters on linux for me too and there was nothing i could do to fix. its better on x11.
ive also seen plenty of weird issues on nvidia laptops with switchable graphics.
please tell me if you ever find a solution.
I second disabling Nouveau via blacklist, and I'm unsure if there is similar software for Lenovo, but I use asusctl to force the use of the Nvidia card over the integrated Vega graphics. This could very well be an issue with graphics card switching, so it's worth looking into.
As for distro recs, while most would probably recommended Linux Mint for beginners, I prefer to recommend Bazzite. It's Fedora-based, but comes with Nvidia drivers and lots of gaming optimization baked-in.
Bazzite
Seconding this, Especially for the atomic stability and built in nvidia support
Check the lenovo legión discord server, there is a linux channel and they can help you better than here probably
Interesting, thanks! Do you happen to have a link to it?
Try Ubuntu, it has a user friendly GUI for installing Nvidia and other 3 parts drivers.
This could be an issue where the AMD GPU is only being used. I, like some of the others would suggest Linux Mint.
Did you make sure that Nouveau was not loading? If both drivers are on the system, Nouveau usually ends up taking precedence unless it's been blacklisted. Also, if this is a laptop type with a hybrid graphics setup, you may need additional software to manage the handoff between GPUs (optimus, bumblebee, etc.)
I've done some more digging and indeed, the AMD integrated GPU is being used. Optimus seems like a good option, but then apparently I'd have to use x11 as the desktop renderer because Wayland doesn't play nice with nvidia.
As far as I can see, x11 will be deprecated not too long from now?
Mark my words, X11 will still be around as an option 10 years from now.
Linux Mint, probably the most popular distro, doesn't even support Wayland in its default configuration, yet.
Wayland's nvidia support is improving over time, but although it's becoming less popular, X11 isn't likely to be completely deprecated anytime soon—I'd expect any mainstream distro to still at least have it as an option a couple of years from now, to handle corner cases Wayland still doesn't support.
The last X11 stable version bump on my distro was about a month ago, to 21.1.16, so it isn't like it's abandonware or anything.
Oh, that's good to know. So I can just install x11 on my Fedora no problem whatsoever?
Provided Fedora has the appropriate packages (and I expect they do), I can't see why not. But see if there's any distro-specific documentation on switching first.
My spouse has a laptop from Asus with VERY similar Specs (but an RTX 3050ti instead of a 3060) and so far Linux Mint has been a pretty trouble -free experience with ONE condition:
I set it to use the dedicated nvidia gpu 24/7 as opposed to the integrated AMD gpu. I forgot what exactly was happening but if memory serves it was disrupting something, I think recovering from closing the lid?
After doing that we’ve never had an issue again. They mostly use at their desk plugged in, sp the power usage isn’t much a concern.
Hope this helps!
Was it hard to set it to always use the dedicated gpu?
I don’t remember it being particularly difficult, I’m a bit of a linux newb myself, but I’d be lying if I said I remember which steps I took off the top of my head.
That's odd, I remember using Debian 12 without this issue when it was released, I later switched to an Arch based distro (Endeavour OS) to experiment with how it would run games (they ran better, I think some games were freezing on Debian 12 stable).
I can't say anything about Fedora, never used it.
Do you have more information about the specific driver you installed on Debian 12 and Fedora 42? Like the version number? Maybe the neofetch result of your computer specs too.
Sorry for not being able to give more details.
Thanks for your answer! I had 535 installed on Debian 12 and 570 on Fedora 42. This is the result of fastfetch (neofetch is EOL). Let me know if you need any more info or if you think you have something that might help. Thanks!
System Details:
-
OS: Fedora Linux 42 (Workstation Edition)
-
Host: Lenovo Legion 5 Pro 16ACH (82JQ)
-
Kernel: Linux 6.14.5-300.fc42.x86_64
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Uptime: 30 mins
-
Locale: en_GB.UTF-8
Hardware:
-
CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5800H (16) @ 4.46 GHz
-
GPU 1: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Mobile
-
GPU 2: AMD Radeon Vega Series
-
Memory: 4.30 GiB / 27.25 GiB (16%)
-
Swap: 0 B / 8.00 GiB (0%)
-
Disk (/): 23.09 GiB / 243.14 GiB (9%)
-
Display: 2560x1600 @ 60 Hz
-
Battery: 60% [AC Connected]
Software Environment:
-
DE: GNOME 48.1
-
WM: Mutter (Wayland)
-
Theme: Adwaita
-
Packages: 2490 (rpm), 12 (flatpak)
-
Shell: bash 5.2.37
-
Terminal: Ptyxis 48.1
-
Network: 192.168.2.14/24 (wlp4s0)
Okay, I had the same problem with a 3060 laptop. The easy answer is : your next distro should be Nobara.
These errors happen because your computer does not use your Nvidia GPU but the AMD one. There is no hardware acceleration.
In Nobara, everything comes preinstalled and preconfigured. I didn't have those problems anymore.
(If you fancy masochism, you can also go the Arch or NixOS way)
Thanks! I'm downloading nobara now, any tips to get it to work as expected?
None ! That's the greatest thing. Take the time to read the welcome message (you know that window that come when you first boot any distro) and follow any instruction. It should work out of the box.
Only shame is that they don't recommend dual hooting with windows, which is a requirement for me
You should be able to do it. I dual booted nobara / arch / windows in the beginning
try installing btop and having a look at the gpu utilisation when you're running stuff
I have a desktop which has / had a similar problem.
Originally I built it with a g-series Ryzen which has integrated Radeon Vega graphics. Upgraded to a 3060 and wanted to run Linux for gaming instead of windows.
I couldn’t get a distro to reliably use my graphics card without the issues you describe. Stuttering, crashing, generally unusable.
Garuda was the answer (to be fair I’d try Bazzite too but I just didn’t get there as Garuda worked). In fact, it worked out of the box for me and I enjoyed it so much I made it my work OS.
I like the GUI utilities they’ve made for front-ending a bunch of Arch CLI utilities and I’ve been saved by BTRFS snapshots more than once.
Give Linux Mint a spin, I seriously doubt there's a friendlier distribution for newcomers from Windows.
But would it fix the core issues that OP is having?
Not directly, I'm just giving OP the answer they wanted:
The quick and dirty questions is: Which distro should I try next?
But wouldn't mint have the same issues as Debian 12?
Why?