BombOmOm

Seconding Framework, they make great laptops.

Highly recommend getting one with an AMD processor, as AMD drivers are built into the Linux kernel updates. Driver updates will just work without you having to think about them.

Yeah, going along these lines. There is probably a USB header on the motherboard. These have pretty darn good speeds. You can get an adapter that lets you turn those into a USB-C port and then use a standard USB-C to Ethernet adapter. Something like this or this. No guarantee on either of those specific adapters being good though. Looks like slim pickings for such things and both of those are garbage brands.

If you have a USB-C port on the back of your motherboard, you can get an adapter for that directly.

Also, motherboards generally come with 2.5Gb/s ports now too. Some even have two. Something to consider.

Am I correct in understanding that the card will run at PCIe gen 3 X1 if I do this?

Correct. The situation you described in the original post would result in Gen 3 x1 speeds.

The interface will always default to the fastest standard that both sides can support. If one is gen 2 and the other is gen 4, gen 2 is the highest that can be supported. If one side is x8 and the other is x4, x4 is the highest that can be supported.

What can I do if the card is PCIe gen 2 x8?

If you put a Gen 2 x8 card in a Gen 4 x1 slot, you will get a Gen 2 x1 link.

File a small slit in the end of the slot so the card fits into it, but runs past the back. The card will run at Gen 3 x1 speed, but otherwise work properly.

Many motherboards even come with the end of the PCIe slots open for this exact purpose.

Honestly, Mint works well for games too. Been running it for the last year. :)

Depending on what VPN software you use, they may already have a linux version. All of the big-name ones do, as well as a good chunk of the smaller ones.

For anti-virus, you don’t need one in Linux. Even for Windows I would recommend using the built-in AV, rather than Norton.

Yep! In steam, Add Game > Add Non-Steam Game > Select the Game. Then in the game’s properties, go to the compatibility section and choose “Force the use of a specific Steam Play compatibility tool”, which will then run the game under Proton.

That said, I actually run a number of games under Wine. The Heroic Launcher covers GOG, Epic, and Prime games, and will install them with Wine enabled for them by default.

Things to try:

• Update your BIOS, this will likely solve the issue since things are working fine with your prior CPU.
• If you are running an XMP/EXPO profile, turn it off, as it might be making your system unstable.
• Memtest. Run it for at least a full cycle (which takes about an hour). If you see more than a single error, then there is something wrong with your RAM.

What errors do you get on boot? Also, are Windows and Linux on the same drive, or separate?

For running an OS off a USB drive, I would recommend getting a USB to M.2 enclosure and putting an M.2 drive in it. This will give you better performance than any flash drive out there. The memory they put into normal flash drives is just slow slow slow for the use case of an OS.

M.2 Enclosure

M.2 Drive to go in it

Now, the only negative there is that is kinda expensive. If you really want to stick to a normal USB drive, maybe try this one out. But I would really like to stress that running an OS off a normal USB drive is going to be slow.