[Sh1tHappens]

If your are looking for good alternative to kali linux, you can try Parrot OS (https://www.parrotsec.org/). It contains more tools than kali and works very well for me.

[Johnngnky]

I switched to Manjaro LInux from Ubuntu yesterday.

That's a rather wierd switch, most people use Ubuntu or Linux mint at the start, and work on from there. Rarely do people switch to them.

I believe you misread. I started with Ubuntu and switched to Manjaro.

Ah terribly sorry for that

English isn't my first language, and in Cantonese(my mother tongue) we can only say "switch from something to something", not the opposite way

I haven't used manjaro, but have heard that it's good.
Weirdly enough, altough I started with Ubuntu, I switched to deepin in 1 day, but switched back(again) due to privacy scandals of deepin.

Currently tho, my main OS is windows, but also hackintosh and various Linux distro in my VM.

[q0xd]

That's a rather wierd switch, most people use Ubuntu or Linux mint at the start, and work on from there. Rarely do people switch to them.

I believe you misread. I started with Ubuntu and switched to Manjaro.

Ah terribly sorry for that  

English isn't my first language, and in Cantonese(my mother tongue) we can only say "switch from something to something", not the opposite way

I haven't used manjaro, but have heard that it's good.
Weirdly enough, altough I started with Ubuntu, I switched to deepin in 1 day, but switched back(again) due to privacy scandals of deepin.

Currently tho, my main OS is windows, but also hackintosh and various Linux distro in my VM.

Hahah, all good buddy. I'm not a native speaker either :p

Yeah, Manjaro is definitely a good distro. I like it so far.

[Kludge]

I believe you misread. I started with Ubuntu and switched to Manjaro.

Ah terribly sorry for that  

English isn't my first language, and in Cantonese(my mother tongue) we can only say "switch from something to something", not the opposite way

I haven't used manjaro, but have heard that it's good.
Weirdly enough, altough I started with Ubuntu, I switched to deepin in 1 day, but switched back(again) due to privacy scandals of deepin.

Currently tho, my main OS is windows, but also hackintosh and various Linux distro in my VM.

Hahah, all good buddy. I'm not a native speaker either :p

Yeah, Manjaro is definitely a good distro. I like it so far.

What are the big differences between Manjaro and Ubuntu? I understand they're both very newb-friendly distros that aren't too far off of how any version of Windows operates, but what makes either one worth using if, say, you're already navigating via terminal most of the time? Is the user-friendly GUI good enough to make neckbeard network warriors like me install either distro on the PC of a customer/client I don't want on Windows anymore, but they just wouldn't understand a "higher-tier" distro?

[skeeba]

What are the big differences between Manjaro and Ubuntu?

Great question. Manjaro and Ubuntu are both very popular Linux distributions (distros), AKA _flavors_ of Linux.

In a nut shell, Ubuntu is a distro based on the _Debian_ distribution, while Manjaro is based on _Arch Linux_. So the understand the differences, you have to understand the differences between Debian and Arch, then understand the differences between the parent and child distributions.

Without getting too deep into details, Manjaro uses a rolling release model with the *pacman* package manager, where Ubuntu uses a stable release model with the *apt* package manager.

The release models differ like this: Manjaro favours having the latest version of software as soon as it is released. An example: the programming language Ruby version 2.6.3 was released last Christmas (2018); not long after, Manjaro users were able to use pacman to install Ruby 2.6.3 directly.

Ubuntu follows a stable release model, with predetermined binary updates slating for a stable user environment (imagine Manjaro as the wild west, where packages of software are updated independent of each other without much consideration to the interoperability between them... Although Manjaro attempts to stabilize this a bit, that's for a different conversation). Using apt, I believe the version of Ruby that can be downloaded is 2.6.1 (don't quote me... I only use Ubuntu for servers, and I don't use Ruby anymore for production).

In short, this means that the most stark difference will be _not_ what software packages you can install, but which versions you'll be able to install. Also, using a rolling release model, stability between packages will break from time-to-time, although Manjaro does a great job of preventing this. Still, it may happen, but the remedy is pretty simple with some DuckDuckGo-fu. Ask yourself this: Do I want stability with slightly aged software packages, or do I want the latest binaries with the potential to have some manual work to maintain your system from time-to-time.

I don't think you asked for it, but my preferred distro here is Manjaro. I am actually an Antergos user (another distro based on Arch, although the project was recently canceled.... Sad   ), which is also a rolling release-based distribution. For personal computing, I prefer the rolling release philosophy. It keeps my system consistently up-to-date with software, with the latest features and bug fixes, with an emphasis on the bug fixes.

Manjaro, as you said, is also newbie friendly. For that reason I'd go for Manjaro. But now you'll need to determine which desktop environment you'll want. But that's beyond the scope of my reply.

Best of luck.

Links:
Desktop environments
https://itsfoss.com/best-linux-desktop-environments/

[Drako]

I used to use Fedora, but it stopped running on my computer for some odd reason I could never figure out, so I just used Windows. I might get a second system or dual boot Kali on my main computer since I really want to start using it again. While I was using it though, Fedora worked really well. I wasn't into computer games at the time since I had a console, so I only used it for school work.

[Kludge]

What are the big differences between Manjaro and Ubuntu?

Great question. Manjaro and Ubuntu are both very popular Linux distributions (distros), AKA _flavors_ of Linux.

In a nut shell, Ubuntu is a distro based on the _Debian_ distribution, while Manjaro is based on _Arch Linux_. So the understand the differences, you have to understand the differences between Debian and Arch, then understand the differences between the parent and child distributions.

Without getting too deep into details, Manjaro uses a rolling release model with the *pacman* package manager, where Ubuntu uses a stable release model with the *apt* package manager.

The release models differ like this: Manjaro favours having the latest version of software as soon as it is released. An example: the programming language Ruby version 2.6.3 was released last Christmas (2018); not long after, Manjaro users were able to use pacman to install Ruby 2.6.3 directly.

Ubuntu follows a stable release model, with predetermined binary updates slating for a stable user environment (imagine Manjaro as the wild west, where packages of software are updated independent of each other without much consideration to the interoperability between them... Although Manjaro attempts to stabilize this a bit, that's for a different conversation). Using apt, I believe the version of Ruby that can be downloaded is 2.6.1 (don't quote me... I only use Ubuntu for servers, and I don't use Ruby anymore for production).

In short, this means that the most stark difference will be _not_ what software packages you can install, but which versions you'll be able to install. Also, using a rolling release model, stability between packages will break from time-to-time, although Manjaro does a great job of preventing this. Still, it may happen, but the remedy is pretty simple with some DuckDuckGo-fu. Ask yourself this: Do I want stability with slightly aged software packages, or do I want the latest binaries with the potential to have some manual work to maintain your system from time-to-time.

I don't think you asked for it, but my preferred distro here is Manjaro. I am actually an Antergos user (another distro based on Arch, although the project was recently canceled.... Sad   ), which is also a rolling release-based distribution. For personal computing, I prefer the rolling release philosophy. It keeps my system consistently up-to-date with software, with the latest features and bug fixes, with an emphasis on the bug fixes.

Manjaro, as you said, is also newbie friendly. For that reason I'd go for Manjaro. But now you'll need to determine which desktop environment you'll want. But that's beyond the scope of my reply.

Best of luck.

Links:
Desktop environments
https://itsfoss.com/best-linux-desktop-environments/

Good to know. I've never used Manjaro personally, just installed it when asked, always secondary to Windows, as most of my customers aren't ready to take the plunge.
Normally I just use CB++ because it works so damn well and is so damn slim.
Thanks for the gigantor explanation. All I really needed to know was one is stable release and uses Debian, the other, rolling updates based in Pacman.

[Nyx]

Currently on Linux Mint and I'm finding it's a great first Distro. Mint makes everything very intuitive for a new user transitioning from Windows.

[skeeba]

Currently on Linux Mint and I'm finding it's a great first Distro. Mint makes everything very intuitive for a new user transitioning from Windows.

In case you haven't followed the debacle: http://www.uhoditv.org/linux-mint-must-die/

[Sartux]

Currently on Linux Mint and I'm finding it's a great first Distro. Mint makes everything very intuitive for a new user transitioning from Windows.

Yeah Mint is a really good first distro - it does have some issues but not ones that should effect the normal user. It's light enough not to slow everything down (and seems way faster for most users than windows) and it also runs most packages/software fine. Plus one of the big things is that it has loads of documentation/forums for if you get stuck.

For any cracking/hacking I use Kali - there are other pentesting distros but it's the most mature in my opinion.
For a really small install/boot distro I use SliTaz as it seems to always work without problems.

Loads of other distros and there are loads of good ones, but I do get a bit annoyed when the distro is basically just a slight reskin/package change from others.