Installing Linux on Dell Optiplex 7010 Plus Micro

The machine comes with Windows11 whether you like it or not (well, it depends on the country you buy it).

Officially it is a hardware supported by Ubuntu.

I tested booting with Lubuntu and SparkyLinux. Bluetooth, Wifi, Network works fine.

• Testing Linux distributions:

You can use different tools to put the iso(s) on a usb stick and boot from them.

Personally I found Rufus the best as it:

- Gives you full control of the settings

- Allows you to do md5sum within the tool (always check the iso right after downloading it)

https://rufus.ie/en/

• Important note about the BIOS settings as it comes from Dell with Windows11.

Windows11 was installed using this configuration (RAID On). I found that in order to work with Linux, I had to change it to AHCI/NVMe. Remember to change it back to "RAID On" every time you want to boot Windows11.

When booting up:

F2: BIOS setup

F12: One time boot order setup (from here you can also access the BIOS setup)

Disabling "Secure Boot" did not cause any problems to Windows11.

The BIOS has many more settings, but I believe those were the main ones that affected windows / linux bootings.

• Installing multiple OS in parallel easily.

Either you create or reuse the /boot/efi partition that is already created (with size 350MB  [fat32]).

It is critically important that for each Linux that you install, you mark that partition as "/boot/efi" mountpoint and set the "boot" flag on it (in blue on the photo). The distro will know what to do with it and will install itself alongside the other "distros" there. However, the GRUB menu that you will see will be the one of the "last" OS that you install. All the options/distros will be there, but the look & feel will be the last one.

I say this because I found that I didn't like the Lubuntu's GRUB nor the Sparky7.0, so I stayed with Sparky6.7.

See here how they all share the /boot/efi

Here I was installing Lubuntu.

Testing it all before the final installation.

You can use VirtualBox and create one VM with "EFI Bios". That will give you a similar setup that the distros will find on the real hardware.

One by one, install the distros you want on the same VM and verify they all share the /boot/efi and appear on the GRUB menu.

Take notes of how much space you will need/want for them for "/" and for "/boot/efi"

For example, Lubuntu used 4MB of /boot/efi and Sparky used 16MB. However Lubuntu recommends 300MB (for future updates/kernels I guess).

Comparison Windows11 vs Linux.

It is soooo different.

Windows11 was already using ~160GB of the hard drive, the CPU was busy when I was doing nothing and the RAM usage (right after booting up) was ~7GB. I know you can improve that, but ... didn't want to waste my time.

Linux. Some of those distros used 3.5 - 6.5 GB of disk,  RAM ~ 260MB , and the CPU utilization (already browsing the web and several apps open) was 0.03 %  The chassis is as cold as it can be, while on Windows it was quite hot. I always say "I want the machine for me, not for the OS".

I hope it helps you.

Final Notes:

- Read about EFI/UEFI if you didn't know it.

- Don't be afraid of touching the BIOS too much. You can revert all the changes. Just keep track of what you change and the effects.

- If a usb-stick doesn't boot up no matter what you set on the BIOS, try to boot from it on another machine or on a VM, maybe it wasn't well written.

- Secure boot ... if you don't need it, don't use it.

- Test and test with VirtualBox / Vmware or whatever you want to use.