UPDATE: After months I decided to give Qubes OS a try again AND I finally got Qubes R4.3.0 running on my Acer Nitro!
First the installation went good, I didnt encounter problems for installing, only thing since i used rufus I couldnt use the option to TEST and then install as written here Trouble installing QubesOS from USB - #3 by apparatus
I wanted to share exactly how I solved the boot issues on this hardware (Ryzen 7 8845HS / RTX 4060):
- Kernel choice: I am using Kernel 6.12.59-1. I tried updating to latest (6.17) specifically to see if it would help with external monitor support, but it resulted in a black screen and wouldn’t boot at all, so I’m sticking with 6.12.
- The USB-C Hub / Boot Loop Issue: Since this laptop only has 2 standard USB ports, I have to use a multiport USB-C adapter for my mouse and Focusrite Scarlett audio interface.
- The Problem: If I started the PC with the USB-C hub plugged in, it would crash and reboot immediately after entering the disk encryption password (boot loop). If I detached the hub before starting, it booted fine.
- The Fix: I solved this by disabling “autostart” for
sys-usb. Now I can leave the hub plugged in at boot; I just log in to the desktop first and then startsys-usbmanually. This prevents the crash, and everything (audio interface, mouse, etc.) works perfectly.
- External Monitor & BIOS: I tried switching the BIOS to “NVIDIA-GPU only” mode to get the HDMI port working (since it’s wired to the Nvidia card). However, the BIOS gave a warning that USB-C functionality would be limited/disabled in that mode, and it didn’t help with the boot stability, anyways anything I tried didn’t work so I went back to Optimus mode.
- Current Status: The only remaining limitation is the external monitor, which I’m not using for now.