Remember to make it dual boot and I bet you will use Windows more than Linux later. At least I do not need to solve issues in the middle of the clear sky night.  

Tom

I bought a really nice miniPC with NVMe SSD and 16 GB of RAM so I can do lunar as well as deep sky. Set it up dual boot and spent hours getting Windows software installed.

I've had it two months now and haven't booted Windows since the initial setup.

Maybe some day?

You can compile from source. It's a labor of love!

But all the ubuntu flavors work great.

@Scott
so do you run the mini PC headless, with Ubuntu, is it easy to set up to run this way…??

Do you have experience with linux? Sounds like you do coming from debian.

What are you starting with? A brand-new miniPC? If it already has Windows you probably want to set up for dual boot as Tom says. This is a bit more complicated. You would first need to:
1) Shrink the Windows partition to make space for your linux install
2) Make a USB stick with the ubuntu installer of your choice
3) Install ubuntu on the free space you created in Step 1

From there on it's pretty easy, yes. I used primarily unix and linux at work for 30 years and use a mac laptop, so Windows is like a foreign language to me. But if you have only ever used Windows then you'll have a learning curve to climb.

PM me if you want help.

@scott
been using Stellarmate for a few years, so very familiar with that
the mini PC will have empty hard drive, so will just install Ubuntu, and then RealVNC server, will it work headless without a false HDMI dongle fitted, or will I need one..?

I have read that others have figured out how to do headless without the "dummy HDMI" plug, but it's kind of complicated. It depends on the exact video card and drivers, and there's NO equivalent of /boot/config.txt like on a Pi.

My experience is that it's easy-peasy to just buy the dummy plug and stick it in there:
$6 on Amazon with free next-day delivery

@scott
hmmmmm, I do have one of those, but do you know if they will work with a resolution set above HD as I currently use 2k on my PI 2560 x1440, will this work..? I did use 4k but too sluggish over VNC so had to drop it down, but don’t really want to go down to HD as it’s looks awful on my 28” 4k monitor….

The dummy plug doesn't actually do anything except provide passive resistors where the video card expects them too be. It "pretends" to be a monitor.

You can buy plugs that pretend to be higher resolution than HD. I think this one pretends to be 4K. Regardless, there's no "there" there. It's just a dumb plug that doesn't do anything.

For just remote controlling a computer that has no monitor, I don't see the point in trying to get beautiful graphics. What you want is to do your capture on there and then display your processed image on a machine indoors. That's where the resolution will matter, not on your VNC session to run mount and camera control.

The easiest way to install dual boot is to install windows OS in the first place, then only install Linux alongside Windows. The Linux installation process will guide you through it. No need to worry much.

If you need a lightweight Linux system, Lubuntu or Xubuntu are good choices. Both also can support kstars.

I choose Kubuntu is because according to Jasem Kstars is develop on this Linux distro.

Tom

I am using tightvnc for my headless imaging PC. It doesn't need any dummy HDMI plug and it can be setup to run any resolution that you desire. It can be really tricky to to configure.

I can’t find VNC that will install on the mini PC, I have Ubuntu all loaded and working, but for the life of me I can’t get a VNC to work, tried downloading RealVNC and the file will not install it says incompatible….so anybody any ideas and or instructions…..??