L I R O N I C S

There are many different Linux variants. I am not to discus about the best/difference, read https://distrowatch.com/ to get more info. My favorite -as I said- is Debian. You can download a small network variant, mini.iso. It's really small sized. After, you will have to write it to a USB stick to make it bootable. There are many sites which explain how to do this in Windows. For me, I use Linux command like DD. So in a terminal type, # sudo dd if=location mini.iso of=/dev/USB stick.

You have to boot your device to USB stick. This can be setup in BIOS. Once booted from USB stick, you can start installation of Debian. When to partition, I use a partition for boot/efi about 512MB, 20/30 GB for / and rest is /home.

At some point at the end of the installation, you can choose for software. I deselect all options and install a minimal Debian setup! This means you only get a command line interface = CLI which is enough to install more apps.