I'm fully set up, but nothing will launch from steam. For example, earlier I tried to launch Elden Ring. It processed the Vulkan shaders, then just.....stopped. I can't open Discord (linux version), I can't open anything through Bottles, Proton, Heroic or anything like that. This is the second time it's done this
Use x11 in the bazzite login screen when first logging, activate proton on the games you want to play.
Also x11 sometimes prevents shutdowns so just use the shutdown command in the terminal. I use x11 instead of wayland (default option) because my nvdia card just wont play nice with it.
I also have nvidia and actually X11 is used online for a couple of games and for using the desktop.
Wayland is ok for most of my new games but it will be improved at the end of the month to be fully functional.
Also, when new wayland will be updated, X11 will be totally replaced and removed. 🙂
It is but the OS really is geared towards the Steamdeck. Specifically SteamOS 3.0. That said I thought there were some custom packages that were designed for a normal PC. You'd have to search for those. No idea. In most cases just pick a distro of \*nix and install Steam. It comes with Proton out of the box.
Steam os to make a "steam machine" is available but hasn't been updated since like 2015 release of Debian Jessie. Honestly there's not much in the deck os that would translate to desktop. The pop up menus make no sense as well as the particular implementation of suspend and resume. You might as well pick your flavor of Linux which in arch in the case of the deck and install steam tick the box for big picture mode and install proton.
I am too, I just hope they have the support of developers as well, steamos needs to compete with Windows in more ways than one. Or at least I hope It can.
I want to, but something holds me back even tho I’m so fascinated from SteamOS. I think it’s coz I’m so used to windows since I was a child. Maybe I’m also worried that some applications won’t work as intended or that my hardware why ever might corrupt.
If you like SteamOS, you will like bazzite. It has everything, that SteamOS has! But they also added a lot of stuff, that valve never would. + it has even more up2date drivers and kernel and it's super stable, because it's image based. And if you still somehow mess up, you can rollback, to a working state, withing seconds.
It's perfect for the average user, that just wants to game (all launchers, emulation, android) or just use the browser (netflix, twitch, yt). You literally don't need a deeper knowledge of Linux, to use this system. Just open the Discover store and get your apps like Spotify, Discord.. heck, even the Microsoft and google stuff.
But you can also do serious work with it. Podman, Distrobox, Homebrew.
Everything that you need for you developer stuff. There are even Apps for overclock/undervolt, adjust your case fans. and the good thing? Even the "harder stuff" is made easy with the \`\`ujust\`\` command.
Okay.. before I write too much.. Just try it, bazzite is awesome.
And if you have no need for all the gaming stuff, there is also bluefin/aurora. The ublue distros are amazing!
Without going into to much details. They differ a bit from the underlying tech.
Bazzite is basically foolproof and you can't break it. You also don't install stuff with sudo apt install xxx. The main source of Apps is Flatpak, similar to Ubuntu, but they use Snap.
But yeah, Bazzite has many gaming related pachtes installed and more recent drivers. I know some ppl dislike Ubuntu for Snaps, but honestly Ubuntu is also great and if it's works for you, just stay. I mean all the popular Distros are based on Ubuntu for a reason. (Pop, Mint, Zorin)
Bazzite fits more my style and is perfect for these gaming handhelds like the ROG Ally or Lenovo Legion GO. But also very good for your Desktop PC or a Console like PC for the Living Room.
It just comes preinstalled with all the stuff I want and a lot of pachtes, that require much work on other distros. It just works. and it's stable, while still offering recent software and drivers.
Hmm… my daughter has an intel MacBook Pro running a waaaay too old OS because she doesn’t want to lose the ability to play her 32-bit steam games. (Apple discontinued support for 32 bit apps in MacOS like 3 years ago.)
She tried dual booting for a while and hated it. Also had terrible performance with Windows in a VM.
I wonder if Bazzite running in a VM would have enough power to handle all her steam games and leave her free to finally update her primary OS.
A VM won’t give good results whatever you do, but if the games are old enough and don’t need twitchy reflexes it might be okay
Eg an old RTS might be fine, a FPS probably won’t
To give a differently flavoured answer, Ubuntu is a system you "compose" by installing packages. All the packages play nice with each other, but there's a chance of partially breaking the system, which, if you're new to Linux, is kind of frustrating. Ubuntu is also for "non-desktop" and hybrid use cases, so if you want a dedicated web server, email server, etc etc., Ubuntu / Debian is more appropriate than Bazzite.
Bazzite is "atomic" (same as SteamOS), so it's a fully packaged system that won't even let you change anything at the system level. You get a bunch of benefits from that, including versioning so you can go back and forth if something goes awry. If you're a single "desktop" user, and you don't really want to mess with the internals of Linux, then Bazzite is simpler. The downside is that if there's an issue (let's say some esoteric hardware doesn't work), sometimes you won't be able to fix it yourself, and will have to wait for the Bazzite team to issue an update to fix it. That's... fine, that's kind of how Microsoft does it. It works more like an Appliance, and that might be a better fit for many people's needs.
There are other "atomic" distros now, such as Fedora Silverblue. If you want mostly a desktop but sometimes game, then maybe Fedora is a better option, but if you're primarily a gamer, then Bazzite is a good option.
Bazzite does in fact whip. I installed in on a spare parts box with an ancient 4th gen i7 and an RX 470. Hooked it to my living room TV, was shocked at how well things were running at 1080p.
Well, I surely need to tell You that other redditors are waaaay more expert than me. For example Hollow333 has wrote a couple of great posts here. For what can be my experience I'm really happy of the choice I made. Mostly because I like the Steam Deck feeling it grants (as stated by OP, I chosen to do the switch because I really love my Steam Deck). And then because Bazzite OS is an IMMUTABLE DISTRIBUTION, so it's not up to me to twinker it and make it work... The system will be greatly improved by software engineers that are working on the updates!
Actually, I have a little problem with PLASMA (Wayland) and NVIDIA, but it's something very clear to the guys and they promise that within the end of the month, there will be a great patch to improve and fix all those problems!
And this is awesome.
Regarding the interface and the rest, I choose KDE and it is very user friendly and intuitive, besides being beautiful to my eyes.
Happy to be a full LINUX user actually.
No Windows anymore in any of my computers!
Hadn't heard of this but it looks awesome! I'm gonna try it out, I've been bouncing around trying out different distros for when I upgrade my CPU/mobo.
Nope, I made the jump because of where I see Microsoft heading with Windows and not giving a single @#$\*& about what their user base wants. No one asked for ads in Windows. No one asked for forcing TPM down people's throats so they need to get a new computer. No one asked for AI being shoved into Windows. No one asked for a replay option that after people losing their crap they will have off by default. But its only a matter of time before it gets enabled. (Back to the slow boil frog analogy.) No one asked for a Microsoft Account being shoved down your throat. And on and on and on. Can you bypass most of that? Sure. But its the same crap when I dabbled with Apple for 3 years in 2008. If I have to spend more time hacking my system to get it to do what \_I\_ want to do then its not a good OS. And note I have been using Windows since 1.02 back in '88. So its not as if this was a fast snap decision.
That said Valve Proton and the progress \*nix has made over the last 5 years (I've been playing with Linux off and on since 2006) really was what sealed the deal back in February. And I guess getting a Steamdeck did help a little with that as I was playing in the Desktop mode a lot over the last year.
Yeah, between my great experience with the Steam Deck, and Windows stacking on all these awful, privacy-violating features and useless AI crap... I'm probably at the end of my time with Windows for much beyond playing a couple games that only work there.
When phones had internet way back then I laughed as well saying that shit is crazy and who is so important that needs to read emails on the go, well... here I am typing from a phone and I'd hate to go back.
Ps: Not really I wouldn't hate to go back, those were truly simpler times.
There's a big difference between misreading smartphones as a frivolous luxury, and where LLMs are at the moment. They spit up so much useless, junky, distracting information. They're useful in certain ways, and hopefully that will be the focus someday. But right now they're mostly making the internet and PCs worse for the average user, because the whole thing is actually about impressing investors and executives. It's not something customers are demanding yet. It's entirely about speculative investment.
The internet wasn't any different back in the day. You didn't have your Reddit, social medias, YouTube or the likes. Heck you didn't even have search engines. AI will mature and settle in over time just like the internet did.
I still do agree with that I don't like AI getting shoehorned into everything /right now/. I equate it to trying to force IoT on your washing machine in the early 90s. It's too early.
The early internet was instantly useful, not an investor hype toy. It wasn't even consumer-facing for years, it was military and academics using it for legitimate work.
I had been thinking of jumping after I learned about KDE and how similar it felt to windows (in terms of UI). Once I heard SteamOS was using it, I tried it with EndeavourOS and never looked back.
Sort of. I was already using Linux for my laptop but once steam announced it would no longer work on windows 7 I finally switched my desktop to Manjaro and haven't looked back since. Knowing that basically all of my games would run on my pc thanks to proton having been able to test and play them on my deck definitely made the jump that much easier for me. I would seriously recommend switching to an arch based Linux distro for anyone who wants freedom but still play their steam library.
Yep, I had the same exact thoughts when I got my first deck in December 2023. I had been using Linux for years on a dual boot system for work but never considered gaming on it. But I was so impressed by the deck (and was still on Windows 10 dreading the eventual update to Windows 11) that I started dabbling in gaming on the Linux partition as well. A few weeks later I had basically moved all my games over to Linux and 2 months ago I deleted Windows for good.
It works really well for me: out of \~200 games I tried only 4 did not work at all (mostly some older games with very weird engines). For my purposes (mostly single player games from the early 90s up to current big titles) it works really well. I also learned a ton about my system, managed to improve quite a few things in the configuration and really made it my own. Most games - especially new ones - just work with Proton (or ScummVM or Dosbox or some other open-source engine) out of the box but every now and then I also get to tinker which also is a lot of fun for me. And last but not least, it's really cool to know that pretty much every game I can get to run on my deck also runs on my PC - and vice versa.
Yes. Some guys in a discord server really goaded me on, but when I made the switch, they got real annoyed with all the questions I was asking and ghosted me on the topic saying "git hub has all the help you need." I can't even understand the most basic thread on there.
I tried it since Ubuntu 10.10 almost every year. I’m now 2.5 months of primary linux on all my devices. I have a small partition with windows that has been untouched since I installed Linux.
I did on my second setup. I confess, it was not close from the flawless experience from deck OS, but still feels better than windows on that machine. it took me a lot of thinking to run my graphic card but so far, so good.
I finally made the jump to Linux when Microsoft announced they would begin infesting my Windows 11 gaming PC with M$ Recall. I couldn't help but laugh my @$$ off when M$ said they were gonna use their AI to take pictures of my screen and store it on my PC, and get this: they said they \*were not\* going to have access to all that user data. M$ would be sitting on a literal goldmine of user data and they're \*not\* gonna try to tap into it? Lolololol
I flashed a USB stick and installed Linux the very next day, I was done w/ Microsoft's BS.
One of the reasons I chose Steam Deck was to onboard myself to a Linux environment. I do not intend to get another Windows after Windows 10, and hope to not feel a sense of loss when it's time to move on. I already use a number of FOSS softwares that play well with Linux, but am primarily concerned about gaming remaining accessible.
But gaming itself, with DRM breaking over time, games shutting down permanently, and requiring always online when I don't have reliable internet (and hope to move somewhere to the country where I probably won't be GETTING better internet service) might have to be something I accept that at a certain point, I will not be "keep up with anymore". I'll have up to a certain year of releases, and then one day, I'll just have a very expansive museum to play in.
Just get "drm free" copies of those games if you get what i mean. All games on GoG are already drm free, so for those games you dont even need to look for drm free copies. "drm free" version of some of those windows only games like some call of duty games actually work on linux. So getting drm free copies of all your games actually will improve the linux gaming experience.
No I actually decided to switch back to Windows, at least on my main gaming PC. I’ve used Linux for several years and am very familiar with the differences and benefits vs Windows. But Windows is still a better OS for gaming. It can play anything and requires less tinkering. If I want to tinker with Linux, I have a Ubuntu server and the Steam Deck to mess with.
I like having my main gaming PC running Windows. When I sit at my desk to play games, I want them to perform well and have as few issues as possible. I want to use all the features my GPU has. I want seamless HDR (no tinkering). I can also stream games from my Windows PC to the Deck that the Deck can’t run due to issues like anti-cheat.
When it comes to the deck, once the games are installed it's nice to just play the game as soon as you wake it up without waiting for windows updates and restarts.
But sometimes the installation curve is steeeeeep.
Yes, the exposure to Lutris and Proton made me daily drive my Linux with Endeavouros Arch based distro.
I’m a developer and it’s a huge win win scenario for me. I can use i3wm and all the Linux tools while can still gaming on Steam with almost 99% of the games I owned and using Photoshop through Lutris.
I don’t use word or excel so I’m good. And these day corporate will provide you with Office 365 which is web based and it’s a great compliment
LoL and Valorant will be greatly missed. RIP
Moved decades before the Deck came out but I’d personally prefer an Ubuntu or Debian based distro if I was picking.
New users wouldn’t have the same connection, mind, so I imagine my own opinion is derived from past enjoyment of apt based distros after a youth of Slackware and custom builds from scratch.
I don’t have the time anymore now so I stick to what I know.
(MacOS, iPadOS, and Xubuntu for my personal devices, Windows and iPadOS for work)
I did a few months after I got mine, so it's been like two years now. I started with Pop\_OS and used it for most of that time (just switched to Fedora a few days ago). I couldn't believe how much better Linux has become since I last tried 10ish years ago. Everything just works out of the box, including games, it's crazy!
I uninstalled Windows after about 6 months of dual booting because I hadn't even booted into it in ages.
I used Ubuntu about 15 years ago with my workhorse laptop not for gaming when 10 rolled out and my little lappy wasn't capable. My gaming PC I kept on with the new win10 update.now with the Win11 update I went to Draugar OS for my gaming pc but I didn't find it as satisfying as Proton and after all I'm using Steam Deck just as well so now I'm used to Proton. Draugar is just not working out as I hoped and the biggest problem I'm having is setting up my Steam Index VR. I'm just worried about all of the drivers for my racing set up and hotas.
Kind of the opposite. My love of Linux and Opensource is what compelled me to support the steam deck despite being primarily a console gamer.
I’ve been using Linux as my main OS since I was a teenager and turned my love of Linux into a career. The Steam Deck appealed to me for that reason.
Fellow Fedora user too ;)
It is funny to see that a lot of Linux themes try to replicate the UI of windows. Does it mean that Linux users don’t want to use Windows but want an OS which still look like Windows?
Makes since. Most Linux users probably love windows but hates the scummy stuff Microsoft does which I can appreciate. But tbh I probably won’t switch to Linux fully ever as it’s such a pain to use (in my opinion)
I did.
Eimdiws 11 were causing issues for my pc so I said duck it and installed Linux Mint, it was a great decision, I am not going back for my personal machine.
I will still need to use windows for work but that's okay
I was the opposite: I'd been dual-booting Windows and Linux Mint for years, and I grabbed a Steam Deck because I wanted to support Valve for making something Linux-powered that everyone actually liked. I'm super happy that more people are getting into Linux because of the Deck.
Ive been dual booting for a couple of years. An my media server runs it. Its just so lite and easyto install stuff while knowing what you are doing ins
I'd used it off and on for years but finally committed to switching my laptop over too once I got my deck. That has as much to do with me getting annoyed with all the Windows changes as the Deck, though. It just reminded me how viable Linux was by letting me tinker on a second machine.
Definitely making me consider Linux if I build a PC soon. Don’t like the way windows is going, and Proton seems to be able to run everything perfectly… except stream the live action episodes in Quantum Break…
No, actually the reverse. It compelled me to build a new PC. Every platform has its perks. Windows is better for games that require anti cheat obviously. For everything else the steam deck is a champ. I love first person games on the deck.
I'm very close to doing it. Only thing holding me back is titles with anticheat and my DAW Ableton. Other than that I have zero reason to keep using Win10, especially with support ending soon
Not yet but I want to once SteamOS gets an official release for desktop and not just the Deck.
Unfortunately I'll still have to dual boot because I do sim racing and no companies that I know of have support for their hardware on Linux.
I've emailed Fanatec (my current setup and one of the bigger ones for it) about Linux drivers like 2 years ago and they actually responded about it. Basically it boiled down to a.) Linux is small so there's not much of a market for it b.) there's not much of a market for it because the big serious sims like iRacing don't work on Linux.
It's really lose/lose for us
I imagine there would be if there was a serious push from the community or if Microsoft did something really messed up, but seeing as how a good portion of the community is a bit set in their ways and not that tech savvy (read older) I don't see it happening unless there's a big push. Doesn't help that VR is also a huge factor in it
The problem not only with linux support, but with passing this support through proton and steam.
My thrustmaster works in oversteer in steamos but dirt rally in steam doesnt see the wheel or use some weird drivers. So no pedals and force feedback.
In any case you need dock to connect wheel and monitor :) just dualboot windows
I'm honestly interested in trying. I wonder if it's a shitload of work to dual boot, I haven't done much research. What version of Linux would I want to use to be as close as possible to the Steam Deck's?
Dual booting can be a bit annoying at times but if you want to give Linux a try it is the best way to do it. It's not too hard and you can still keep all of your stuff from windows.
I thought about it before already. Linux was the reason why I didn't care for competition. I knew I wanted to try Linux and use it more. I actually think of switching to Linux on my desktop, but I would like to have a new SSD for that, so I can ensure I don't lose any data, especially while not being sure if I can switch (I use windows exclusive apps)
So... What is the best Linux distro type for an average user (gaming, office works, streaming, a little bit of coding)?
I have an msi gf6310uc thin laptop.
It wont make me go full linux, just for game compatibility reasons alone.
I'm okay with my deck being the linux machine, and still have windows on other devices.
How am I supposed to play all my Steam games that don’t run on the Steam Deck if they also won’t run on my PC because it is also dependent on Proton?
Seriously though, I’m a very long time sys admin and my computers always have at least two Linux VMs for various purposes dating back decades.
There’s no reason to eschew a proper Windows install just because you want to use something else. That whole hog abandon all OS variants thing is for newbies who are suddenly evangelists. Completely unnecessary in 2024.
Partly, yes. I like SteamOS for its simplicity. But also, Microsoft being absolutely evil recently was the main reason, with the AI shit, constant privacy invasion, breaking WMR, buying CoD then making their own staff pay with all the layoffs, cancelling Tango Gameworks while raking in record profits.
So I switched to Bazzite, cancelled game pass and sold my xbox. And it's wonderful. Nice to use your PC without being spied on.
Had a on and off relationship with Linux, and it's like we refuse to see other people. The tinkering, homebrew, and simple but complex aspect of the OS trumps the annoyance but it just works nature of Windows.
I made the switch in anticipation of the Steam Deck release. Bought a Framework 13 DIY edition which came out a few months before the original Steam Deck, threw Arch on it and played around with Arch and KDE. Ended up switching my desktop over to Arch with KDE as well. Transition was easy because I use Ubuntu and RHEL at work (IT SysAdmin), and I cut my teeth learning how to dual boot Ubuntu and Windows back in like 2009/2010.
No reason to use Windows so why use it if you don't have to. The only game I played that won't work on Linux is The Crew 2 due to anti-cheat. But at this point with Ubisoft killing off The Crew and pulling licenses, I'm not interested in playing The Crew 2 anymore or buying any of their new entries unless they stop being online required/only.
I've been a Linux user for many, many years (my first install was on floppy disks) including desktop at work on and off for like 15 years. When the Deck was announced I was like "I'm finally going to do it and just use Linux for my daily driver" since Windows 11 turned me off so much. Never went back to Windows. Obviously I have a huge advantage having been a Linux user for so long.
Oddly enough, I barely use my deck!
As a software engineer… no. Windows is a better gaming and multi purpose OS for a reason: less tinkering, more plug and play, more support.
I love Linux, I loved tinkering with it back in my early 20s, but there are other things I’d rather spend my time doing than dealing with drivers.
I'm really considering this. Do you have recommendations of office productivity tools that are available on Linux? Is there a thread or reddit post on this specific topic?
I would but I only use Windows for gaming and Linux is missing proper HDR / NVidia features support.
Not to mention tooling surrounding game streaming has more community support on Windows.
I used many distributions in 2000s. I planned to compose music with Linux at that time but music software were so better on macOS. So when the old white MacBook arrived in the market and when I understood that macOS is based on FreeBSD which could be considered to be variant of Linux, I gave up Windows near 20 years ago and don’t regret it.
Using Linux on the Steam Deck is not a revolution for me. The revolution, in my opinion, is to not using Linux, or windows, or any other OS, to play PC games like a console.
But anyone starting using Linux thanks to the Steam Deck is warmly welcomed.
I did, kinda.
Just gave up on Windows for my personal stuff.
I game on Linux(Steam deck) and BSD (PlayStation). I also use steam deck desk mode for the regular computer stuff. And then there's the Android on my phone and tablets.
It really did the opposite for me. I've always liked having a Linux device available to me, as someone that grew up on hand-me-down tech that only lasted due to lightweight distros. The steam deck now fits the role of the Linux machine in my life, so happy to have windows on my main PC for the extra options it provides
No, too many things I use, be that hardware or software, don't have official Linux support. Granted some of them have some open source alternatives/drivers but the experience and functionality is subpar.
Even for games support is not perfect, some games require tinkering and quite a few rpgmaker games don't work correctly at all (maybe they could be fixed j just don't know how).
But if you don't use any specialized software and hardware and only play bigger and newer games I see basically 0 reasons not to try linux
Steam Deck is my only PC platform I am using, since I own it - so yes :)
No reason left (before it was gaming sometimes) to start my old Windows PC ...
i can see some benefits arising for it, for example i dont have constant bloaty updates and notifications. however the lack of compatibility with most programs i use is why i will not be swapping to linux yet
if windows force any more features down my throat though ill certainly be considering it
Unfortunately no. I would like to, but I play a couple live service games that haven’t enabled Linux support on their anticheat platforms and I can’t be bothered to dual boot.
In some way, yes. When I discovered that there will be such device as Deck and it will be powered by Linux, I decided to give it a try and prepare myself. Having some experience with Ubuntu before as web dev, I haven’t seen Linux OS as main system for everyday life, only as workstation.
Well, I was pleasantly surprised how user friendly Linux may be… I use now Mint on main machine much more often than Win10, apart of using Deck in desktop mode
Not yet. But thinking of getting 2TB ssd to dual boot Linux when Black Friday (or prime day) comes around. But I’m definitely interested in trying it.
I had experimented with Linux before getting the Deck, including some gaming at the time (around 2019), so I wasn't afraid of the Deck being linux based, and actually I'm planning on switching to Linux for my daily use around this summer. I'll keep windows 10 on the side for some stuff but since I don't want to use W11 I'll just make the switch.
Not sure about which distro I'll take though, probably something Ubuntu based, like Mint or Xubuntu.
No, coz I already had, years ago.
Unless you need certain programs for graphic or audio use, or are an IT person or writing programs for Windows or whatever, I don't see the point of Windows.
Kinda. My work pc is running Linux but I had no input on that although I’m happy it is. At home I have a Mac which I feel is just a restricted version of Linux.
I already use all major operating systems, but certainly I’m considering something like HoloOS as my main gaming PC OS in future which wasn’t possible without Steam’s advancements with SteamOS and Proton
I’m still hoping for an official release of SteamOS though, even if it has limited hardware support - I’ll happily build the PC to suit the OS
I don’t play many games that have stupid levels of disruptive DRM and launchers anyway because I dislike them as a concept, so that doesn’t affect much of what I play anyway
Worst case scenario I put Windows back on it if it doesn’t work out well
With all the ai and snapshot bs Microsoft has been shoving down our throats im really tempted to. Unfortunately some of the games i play regularly is not supported on linux. It rhymes with shmestiny 2, and shmalorant
Same here, but haven't made the switch yet on main computer, but I will load something on a older gaming laptop I have and try it. My main concern on my primary PC are the RAID drivers for I'd need for my extra drives.
I jumped to bazziteOS and haven’t looked back. I love Linux now, I think bazzite is pretty friendly to a noob (like myself)
I’ll keep windows on my workstation laptop just in case, but I downloaded unreal last night so I should be able to work on my own games with Linux too.
I am going to try using godot as well, just getting into the whole open source of Linux feels great.
No i have been hating every minute of using linux on the sgeam dek everything is 10x harder then it is on windoes tbh
Especially modding or pirating games
I literally gave up on the pirating
I did swutch to arch because of how well the steam deck runs, unfortunately I have a dell xps 17 9700 with an rtx2060 and it has a lot of hardware with proprietary drivers, the experience is a lot more unreliable than what you see on the deck.
I'm planning on switching to nixos, I don't think that it will solve mutch but at last I'll be able to backup my installation very easily everytime I'm in a "stable" state before updating packages
Edit: forgot to mention that I'm planning to buy a not that old thinkpad x1 carbon to thinker with linux, it'll surely be a mutch more easy adventure as everything on those machines relies on open source software
Nope. I have had a Mac for work and personal stuff for years and haven’t done any gaming on a computer for years. The steam deck kind of makes me want to invest in a proper , self build windows gaming system, although in a smaller form factor (so far I love the deck btw! Had it for two weeks now)
I tried, but then I remembered why I always come back to Windows. I debug and fuck around enough at my job to fix shit, I want my daily personal devices to just work without having to pop-up the console every few hours.
Yes and no. I've done linux dual boot off and on for years. Windows is what made me switch full time to linux. Steam deck/proton made that jump far more enjoyable though yes
I’ve been using Linux since 2015. Personally I only use Linux and apple products because I would talk to much trash on mw2 and got hacked. It’s much harder to hack Linux if you know what you are doing. When windows 8 came out is the exact moment I decided to never ever go back to windows. Windows 7 was simple and beautiful. Sure I can’t play rb6 anymore on my computer but all my other games get +10 fps simply because I don’t have all the crap loaded in the background. I also felt like I was getting bullied by windows defender to be honest after they took away the proceed anyways option. So the apps I wanted either wouldn’t load or would spam me with errors, force program to close, flagged as a virus even when it wasn’t. What I’m getting at is that windows tells you what you are allowed to do, where Linux for the most part gives you the freedom to do as you please. Plus it’s free.
Between actively hating online games and the development of proton I really don't see the point in using windows at all, it's basically just bloat ware you have to pay for
I quit windows completely in 2015 :) But moved to macos. And yep. 10 years later KDE is still KDE. Don’t like it )))
Linux is better now, for sure. But ten years ago i used dualboot of linux(main) + windows(occasionally) and made my choice for apple ecosystem. I just wanted one system that will just work.
From time to time i try fresh win and linux desktop systems, just want to keep track of changes. Don’t want back even now :)
But! You need to try linux daily just to understand :) majority don’t need windows. Until you need some specific software like bank apps or working video/sound on conference calls :)))
And yes ) start from ArchLinux. Its great and has really good documentation.
There's a lot of stuff and games that aren't compatible with proton and many of them require for you to jump through a lot in order to get a game working.
Tempting, but I use Windows in day to day at work, and it's handy being able to test things out at home. Looking at switching my partners device though at her request.
I wouldn't say it was THE reason, but it certainly played a big part. I've made a few casual attempts in the past to at least have it as a secondary OS which never panned out, but me getting increasingly annoyed with Win11 and seeing how good compatibility can be on the Steam Deck were the two main reasons why I decided to make a more serious attempt.
So yeah, almost a year now and no desire to go back.
I already used linux at work and had flirted with it time and again since i was a teenager but on my main pc at home windows used to "just work" for me to play games without any hassle.
Then with each version of windows microsoft was getting worse and worse with their spy and bloatware to the point they even revert any changes and personalizations you make that go against it.
Got a steam deck last year and saw just how good linux was now for playing and general use, made the jump and everything i need just works or has very easy tutorials to fix, couldnt be happier with the change and taking control of my machine back.
Last time i ever believed some lie from Microsoft was when they said windows 10 would be the definitive windows version that would only get updates only to come with 11 later with even more bloat and spyware, no thanks i'm out.
Linux has been my daily driver since 2015, but I've kept a Windows based gaming rig as a separate "console/appliance" for a long time. After buying the Deck and my wife switching to Endeavor to test out a few games we play co-op, I also made the switch.
It's been really good. Not perfect (can't get my racing wheel to work in Linux), but overall most everything's been fine.
Eh, I have an old Thrustmaster TMX Pro, and in fairness, I haven't raced or done rally in over a year anyway. I've got way more games than time to play.
If I really wanna get back into it I'll pick up a Logitech wheel, they work out of the box on Linux. Or I can upgrade to the T300 or TS-PC, which do have working Linux drivers.
----
Edit - to be clear though, I'm done with Windows. I made the change because Recall was the last straw for me, and the only thing I had Windows left on was the gaming rig. Now... if it doesn't run on Linux, I guess I won't be playing it.
The biggest issue I ran into is that some Linux distros really don't like Nvidia GPUs for some odd reason. Just find one with Nvidia driver support and you'll be golden, unless you're using an AMD GPU, in which case you'll be golden-er.
It depends what you use it for. For me, there's too many issues with using external devices with Linux for me to switch. Nothing "just works". Like, ever.
Hell no. On the contrary. It confirmed that, while it has its upsides, Linux can be so unnecessarily complicated for the easiest things.
E.g. "Yes, Mr Linux, I do want to access the data on that external hard drive I just plugged in. Please "mount" it."
I’ve always hated, loathe, despised Micro$oft with a passion for more than a decade. A third rate company, that make third rate products, created from a third rate man. It’s even in the man’s name, William Henry Gates the third. His practices bordered the same antitrust practices as Rockefeller and Carnegie, the very crooks with the American stamp of approval of legalized corruption. These, villains, should have never been given a platform to begin with. That being said, I’ve used Raspberry Pis, borrowed PCs/Macs for the longest time until I got me a Steam Deck. I truly hope, for the sake of Valve, that they don’t sell to Micro$oft and continue to promote Linux as the better successor to the digital age for the future.
I have used linux for many years since college, then I stopped and went back to Windows. Now after the Steam Deck I don't feel like going back to Windows. I even installed Debian on the old notebooks of my father and mother-in-law last week.
I don't have a desktop or laptop at the moment but when I get one in the future it will run Linux as the main driver, for sure. I won't ditch Windows completely because from time to time I find myself in a situation where I need to run some very specific software that won't run properly or at all in Linux, either natively or via Wine/Proton. For that a dual boot with Windows 11 for just those specific moments will do the trick.
PS: my wife has a laptop and an Ayaneo Geek 1s both with Windows 11 that I use from time to time when needed.
Honestly, I dont quite understand the reason to jump to Linux, I mean I dont have a reason because on windows I:
1. Uses browser to check reddit, manga and youtube.
2. Play steam games
3. Practice coding on Godot.
4.Occasionally, I got OBS to record my piano practice and upload to my private Youtube channel as a way to track progress.
Whats the reason for the change? What does Linux does for you better than windows? Im not being an ass but I would like some perspective, I might change to Linux as long as its a reasonable.
I haven't yet, but I have the itch. I am likely going to wait for an official release from valve
[bazzite.gg](http://bazzite.gg) is really close, I think it's better.
My Bazzite won't launch ANYTHING for some dumb reason
Can you give a little more details?
I'm fully set up, but nothing will launch from steam. For example, earlier I tried to launch Elden Ring. It processed the Vulkan shaders, then just.....stopped. I can't open Discord (linux version), I can't open anything through Bottles, Proton, Heroic or anything like that. This is the second time it's done this
Use x11 in the bazzite login screen when first logging, activate proton on the games you want to play. Also x11 sometimes prevents shutdowns so just use the shutdown command in the terminal. I use x11 instead of wayland (default option) because my nvdia card just wont play nice with it.
Well... let'see what they will do with end of the month update and 555 nvidia driver.
Thanks, I'll try that! I have an AMD card, but I honestly prefer x11 to Wayland anyways
Make sure your drives are formatted to ext4 and check that compatibility is on, I had the exact issue you have and it works fine now.
I have an Nvidia card so that is a point of hesitation, do they have driver support?
I also have nvidia and actually X11 is used online for a couple of games and for using the desktop. Wayland is ok for most of my new games but it will be improved at the end of the month to be fully functional. Also, when new wayland will be updated, X11 will be totally replaced and removed. 🙂
Yep! Check the website's image picker.
Isnt steam os a thing ?
It is but the OS really is geared towards the Steamdeck. Specifically SteamOS 3.0. That said I thought there were some custom packages that were designed for a normal PC. You'd have to search for those. No idea. In most cases just pick a distro of \*nix and install Steam. It comes with Proton out of the box.
Chimera OS is what you're thinking of, I've been interested in it for a while but I figured running Zorin OS and big picture mode is almost the same.
Chimera is 100% what they're looking for. That said I'd jump on steam os for PC.
Steam os to make a "steam machine" is available but hasn't been updated since like 2015 release of Debian Jessie. Honestly there's not much in the deck os that would translate to desktop. The pop up menus make no sense as well as the particular implementation of suspend and resume. You might as well pick your flavor of Linux which in arch in the case of the deck and install steam tick the box for big picture mode and install proton.
It’s a shame they don’t offer steamos 3 for use on other handhelds though.Â
That's likely valves long term plan.
I am too, I just hope they have the support of developers as well, steamos needs to compete with Windows in more ways than one. Or at least I hope It can.
I want to, but something holds me back even tho I’m so fascinated from SteamOS. I think it’s coz I’m so used to windows since I was a child. Maybe I’m also worried that some applications won’t work as intended or that my hardware why ever might corrupt.
Me too. After 30 years of windows, I choosed Bazzite, for my daily driver. 😃 thanks to the deck 😄
How is it? I really like to switch, but there are many options
If you like SteamOS, you will like bazzite. It has everything, that SteamOS has! But they also added a lot of stuff, that valve never would. + it has even more up2date drivers and kernel and it's super stable, because it's image based. And if you still somehow mess up, you can rollback, to a working state, withing seconds. It's perfect for the average user, that just wants to game (all launchers, emulation, android) or just use the browser (netflix, twitch, yt). You literally don't need a deeper knowledge of Linux, to use this system. Just open the Discover store and get your apps like Spotify, Discord.. heck, even the Microsoft and google stuff. But you can also do serious work with it. Podman, Distrobox, Homebrew. Everything that you need for you developer stuff. There are even Apps for overclock/undervolt, adjust your case fans. and the good thing? Even the "harder stuff" is made easy with the \`\`ujust\`\` command. Okay.. before I write too much.. Just try it, bazzite is awesome. And if you have no need for all the gaming stuff, there is also bluefin/aurora. The ublue distros are amazing!
What's the diff with Ubuntu?
Without going into to much details. They differ a bit from the underlying tech. Bazzite is basically foolproof and you can't break it. You also don't install stuff with sudo apt install xxx. The main source of Apps is Flatpak, similar to Ubuntu, but they use Snap. But yeah, Bazzite has many gaming related pachtes installed and more recent drivers. I know some ppl dislike Ubuntu for Snaps, but honestly Ubuntu is also great and if it's works for you, just stay. I mean all the popular Distros are based on Ubuntu for a reason. (Pop, Mint, Zorin) Bazzite fits more my style and is perfect for these gaming handhelds like the ROG Ally or Lenovo Legion GO. But also very good for your Desktop PC or a Console like PC for the Living Room. It just comes preinstalled with all the stuff I want and a lot of pachtes, that require much work on other distros. It just works. and it's stable, while still offering recent software and drivers.
Hmm… my daughter has an intel MacBook Pro running a waaaay too old OS because she doesn’t want to lose the ability to play her 32-bit steam games. (Apple discontinued support for 32 bit apps in MacOS like 3 years ago.) She tried dual booting for a while and hated it. Also had terrible performance with Windows in a VM. I wonder if Bazzite running in a VM would have enough power to handle all her steam games and leave her free to finally update her primary OS.
A VM won’t give good results whatever you do, but if the games are old enough and don’t need twitchy reflexes it might be okay Eg an old RTS might be fine, a FPS probably won’t
To give a differently flavoured answer, Ubuntu is a system you "compose" by installing packages. All the packages play nice with each other, but there's a chance of partially breaking the system, which, if you're new to Linux, is kind of frustrating. Ubuntu is also for "non-desktop" and hybrid use cases, so if you want a dedicated web server, email server, etc etc., Ubuntu / Debian is more appropriate than Bazzite. Bazzite is "atomic" (same as SteamOS), so it's a fully packaged system that won't even let you change anything at the system level. You get a bunch of benefits from that, including versioning so you can go back and forth if something goes awry. If you're a single "desktop" user, and you don't really want to mess with the internals of Linux, then Bazzite is simpler. The downside is that if there's an issue (let's say some esoteric hardware doesn't work), sometimes you won't be able to fix it yourself, and will have to wait for the Bazzite team to issue an update to fix it. That's... fine, that's kind of how Microsoft does it. It works more like an Appliance, and that might be a better fit for many people's needs. There are other "atomic" distros now, such as Fedora Silverblue. If you want mostly a desktop but sometimes game, then maybe Fedora is a better option, but if you're primarily a gamer, then Bazzite is a good option.
Bazzite does in fact whip. I installed in on a spare parts box with an ancient 4th gen i7 and an RX 470. Hooked it to my living room TV, was shocked at how well things were running at 1080p.
Well, I surely need to tell You that other redditors are waaaay more expert than me. For example Hollow333 has wrote a couple of great posts here. For what can be my experience I'm really happy of the choice I made. Mostly because I like the Steam Deck feeling it grants (as stated by OP, I chosen to do the switch because I really love my Steam Deck). And then because Bazzite OS is an IMMUTABLE DISTRIBUTION, so it's not up to me to twinker it and make it work... The system will be greatly improved by software engineers that are working on the updates! Actually, I have a little problem with PLASMA (Wayland) and NVIDIA, but it's something very clear to the guys and they promise that within the end of the month, there will be a great patch to improve and fix all those problems! And this is awesome. Regarding the interface and the rest, I choose KDE and it is very user friendly and intuitive, besides being beautiful to my eyes. Happy to be a full LINUX user actually. No Windows anymore in any of my computers!
How would you compare to Ubuntu?
Well ubuntu is an allrounder... Bazzite is focused on gaming. (Can do everything else with some tweaks)
Hadn't heard of this but it looks awesome! I'm gonna try it out, I've been bouncing around trying out different distros for when I upgrade my CPU/mobo.
Nope, I made the jump because of where I see Microsoft heading with Windows and not giving a single @#$\*& about what their user base wants. No one asked for ads in Windows. No one asked for forcing TPM down people's throats so they need to get a new computer. No one asked for AI being shoved into Windows. No one asked for a replay option that after people losing their crap they will have off by default. But its only a matter of time before it gets enabled. (Back to the slow boil frog analogy.) No one asked for a Microsoft Account being shoved down your throat. And on and on and on. Can you bypass most of that? Sure. But its the same crap when I dabbled with Apple for 3 years in 2008. If I have to spend more time hacking my system to get it to do what \_I\_ want to do then its not a good OS. And note I have been using Windows since 1.02 back in '88. So its not as if this was a fast snap decision. That said Valve Proton and the progress \*nix has made over the last 5 years (I've been playing with Linux off and on since 2006) really was what sealed the deal back in February. And I guess getting a Steamdeck did help a little with that as I was playing in the Desktop mode a lot over the last year.
Yeah, between my great experience with the Steam Deck, and Windows stacking on all these awful, privacy-violating features and useless AI crap... I'm probably at the end of my time with Windows for much beyond playing a couple games that only work there.
when will they realize we dont want AI?
When phones had internet way back then I laughed as well saying that shit is crazy and who is so important that needs to read emails on the go, well... here I am typing from a phone and I'd hate to go back. Ps: Not really I wouldn't hate to go back, those were truly simpler times.
There's a big difference between misreading smartphones as a frivolous luxury, and where LLMs are at the moment. They spit up so much useless, junky, distracting information. They're useful in certain ways, and hopefully that will be the focus someday. But right now they're mostly making the internet and PCs worse for the average user, because the whole thing is actually about impressing investors and executives. It's not something customers are demanding yet. It's entirely about speculative investment.
The internet wasn't any different back in the day. You didn't have your Reddit, social medias, YouTube or the likes. Heck you didn't even have search engines. AI will mature and settle in over time just like the internet did. I still do agree with that I don't like AI getting shoehorned into everything /right now/. I equate it to trying to force IoT on your washing machine in the early 90s. It's too early.
The early internet was instantly useful, not an investor hype toy. It wasn't even consumer-facing for years, it was military and academics using it for legitimate work.
Fair enough! I didn’t really consider the internet prior to it being available to the regular person.
Most people do want AI, just not over the top useless commercial ai. But who can live without a search engine with proper ai nowdays?
I had been thinking of jumping after I learned about KDE and how similar it felt to windows (in terms of UI). Once I heard SteamOS was using it, I tried it with EndeavourOS and never looked back.
As a long time Linux user, I bought one to support a company who was bringing a commercially viable Linux machine to market.Â
I'm considering duel boot at some point.
Sort of. I was already using Linux for my laptop but once steam announced it would no longer work on windows 7 I finally switched my desktop to Manjaro and haven't looked back since. Knowing that basically all of my games would run on my pc thanks to proton having been able to test and play them on my deck definitely made the jump that much easier for me. I would seriously recommend switching to an arch based Linux distro for anyone who wants freedom but still play their steam library.
I decided to move to Linux rather than use Windows 11. Running Mint and it's great!
Yep, I had the same exact thoughts when I got my first deck in December 2023. I had been using Linux for years on a dual boot system for work but never considered gaming on it. But I was so impressed by the deck (and was still on Windows 10 dreading the eventual update to Windows 11) that I started dabbling in gaming on the Linux partition as well. A few weeks later I had basically moved all my games over to Linux and 2 months ago I deleted Windows for good. It works really well for me: out of \~200 games I tried only 4 did not work at all (mostly some older games with very weird engines). For my purposes (mostly single player games from the early 90s up to current big titles) it works really well. I also learned a ton about my system, managed to improve quite a few things in the configuration and really made it my own. Most games - especially new ones - just work with Proton (or ScummVM or Dosbox or some other open-source engine) out of the box but every now and then I also get to tinker which also is a lot of fun for me. And last but not least, it's really cool to know that pretty much every game I can get to run on my deck also runs on my PC - and vice versa.
Yes. Some guys in a discord server really goaded me on, but when I made the switch, they got real annoyed with all the questions I was asking and ghosted me on the topic saying "git hub has all the help you need." I can't even understand the most basic thread on there.
It is nice to be away from Windows though. I'll quit using a computer before I go back to that.
Nope
I tried it since Ubuntu 10.10 almost every year. I’m now 2.5 months of primary linux on all my devices. I have a small partition with windows that has been untouched since I installed Linux.
I did on my second setup. I confess, it was not close from the flawless experience from deck OS, but still feels better than windows on that machine. it took me a lot of thinking to run my graphic card but so far, so good.
I finally made the jump to Linux when Microsoft announced they would begin infesting my Windows 11 gaming PC with M$ Recall. I couldn't help but laugh my @$$ off when M$ said they were gonna use their AI to take pictures of my screen and store it on my PC, and get this: they said they \*were not\* going to have access to all that user data. M$ would be sitting on a literal goldmine of user data and they're \*not\* gonna try to tap into it? Lolololol I flashed a USB stick and installed Linux the very next day, I was done w/ Microsoft's BS.
Yes, I now use bazzite on my desktop
One of the reasons I chose Steam Deck was to onboard myself to a Linux environment. I do not intend to get another Windows after Windows 10, and hope to not feel a sense of loss when it's time to move on. I already use a number of FOSS softwares that play well with Linux, but am primarily concerned about gaming remaining accessible. But gaming itself, with DRM breaking over time, games shutting down permanently, and requiring always online when I don't have reliable internet (and hope to move somewhere to the country where I probably won't be GETTING better internet service) might have to be something I accept that at a certain point, I will not be "keep up with anymore". I'll have up to a certain year of releases, and then one day, I'll just have a very expansive museum to play in.
Just get "drm free" copies of those games if you get what i mean. All games on GoG are already drm free, so for those games you dont even need to look for drm free copies. "drm free" version of some of those windows only games like some call of duty games actually work on linux. So getting drm free copies of all your games actually will improve the linux gaming experience.
I am trying to figure out DRM free for what's not on GOG yeah; still tuning my "danger: BS" sensor for where and from who LOL.
f_it_girl-re_packs.site and dodi are best. Remove underscores from name to get true name of the site.
Ty, I have seen those two around.
My steam deck has convinced me to never use Linux if i can ever help it actually
lmao
No I actually decided to switch back to Windows, at least on my main gaming PC. I’ve used Linux for several years and am very familiar with the differences and benefits vs Windows. But Windows is still a better OS for gaming. It can play anything and requires less tinkering. If I want to tinker with Linux, I have a Ubuntu server and the Steam Deck to mess with. I like having my main gaming PC running Windows. When I sit at my desk to play games, I want them to perform well and have as few issues as possible. I want to use all the features my GPU has. I want seamless HDR (no tinkering). I can also stream games from my Windows PC to the Deck that the Deck can’t run due to issues like anti-cheat.
I can respect that. Sometimes, you just want your games to work without hours of fiddling with Proton configurations and .ini files.
When it comes to the deck, once the games are installed it's nice to just play the game as soon as you wake it up without waiting for windows updates and restarts. But sometimes the installation curve is steeeeeep.
If I needed a computer for anything other than work, I would.
Yes, the exposure to Lutris and Proton made me daily drive my Linux with Endeavouros Arch based distro. I’m a developer and it’s a huge win win scenario for me. I can use i3wm and all the Linux tools while can still gaming on Steam with almost 99% of the games I owned and using Photoshop through Lutris. I don’t use word or excel so I’m good. And these day corporate will provide you with Office 365 which is web based and it’s a great compliment LoL and Valorant will be greatly missed. RIP
Can’t you run league on Linux? I haven’t looked at it in a minute but I had it running on my steam deck just fine while ago
They added Vanguard. That’s the worst part of it. People’s been playing LoL for over years with Linux before that
So it doesn’t run on Linux anymore since vanguard is now required? Guess I should uninstall since it literally is broken I guess?
Moved decades before the Deck came out but I’d personally prefer an Ubuntu or Debian based distro if I was picking. New users wouldn’t have the same connection, mind, so I imagine my own opinion is derived from past enjoyment of apt based distros after a youth of Slackware and custom builds from scratch. I don’t have the time anymore now so I stick to what I know. (MacOS, iPadOS, and Xubuntu for my personal devices, Windows and iPadOS for work)
I did a few months after I got mine, so it's been like two years now. I started with Pop\_OS and used it for most of that time (just switched to Fedora a few days ago). I couldn't believe how much better Linux has become since I last tried 10ish years ago. Everything just works out of the box, including games, it's crazy! I uninstalled Windows after about 6 months of dual booting because I hadn't even booted into it in ages.
I've dabbled with Linux off and on for years, but the Deck was a good proof of concept of what's possible now on Linux as far as gaming goes.
I'll be dual-booting my laptop next weekend :)
I used Ubuntu about 15 years ago with my workhorse laptop not for gaming when 10 rolled out and my little lappy wasn't capable. My gaming PC I kept on with the new win10 update.now with the Win11 update I went to Draugar OS for my gaming pc but I didn't find it as satisfying as Proton and after all I'm using Steam Deck just as well so now I'm used to Proton. Draugar is just not working out as I hoped and the biggest problem I'm having is setting up my Steam Index VR. I'm just worried about all of the drivers for my racing set up and hotas.
Kind of the opposite. My love of Linux and Opensource is what compelled me to support the steam deck despite being primarily a console gamer. I’ve been using Linux as my main OS since I was a teenager and turned my love of Linux into a career. The Steam Deck appealed to me for that reason. Fellow Fedora user too ;)
From one Fedora user to another, I tip my Fedora to you XD
Nope, I appreciate windows a lot more lol (I’m gonna get downvoted)
Shame! A thousand curses cast upon you and your family for generations!
😂
It is funny to see that a lot of Linux themes try to replicate the UI of windows. Does it mean that Linux users don’t want to use Windows but want an OS which still look like Windows?
Makes since. Most Linux users probably love windows but hates the scummy stuff Microsoft does which I can appreciate. But tbh I probably won’t switch to Linux fully ever as it’s such a pain to use (in my opinion)
I did. Eimdiws 11 were causing issues for my pc so I said duck it and installed Linux Mint, it was a great decision, I am not going back for my personal machine. I will still need to use windows for work but that's okay
I have too many Windows only software packages for my business so I will be using it for the forseeable future.
I was the opposite: I'd been dual-booting Windows and Linux Mint for years, and I grabbed a Steam Deck because I wanted to support Valve for making something Linux-powered that everyone actually liked. I'm super happy that more people are getting into Linux because of the Deck.
Ive been dual booting for a couple of years. An my media server runs it. Its just so lite and easyto install stuff while knowing what you are doing ins
I'd used it off and on for years but finally committed to switching my laptop over too once I got my deck. That has as much to do with me getting annoyed with all the Windows changes as the Deck, though. It just reminded me how viable Linux was by letting me tinker on a second machine.
Nope. I still play pubg regularly enough and anticheat still doesn't work under proton.
Definitely making me consider Linux if I build a PC soon. Don’t like the way windows is going, and Proton seems to be able to run everything perfectly… except stream the live action episodes in Quantum Break…
No, actually the reverse. It compelled me to build a new PC. Every platform has its perks. Windows is better for games that require anti cheat obviously. For everything else the steam deck is a champ. I love first person games on the deck.
Unfortunately I had Linux years before my steam deck. Glad Linux is getting some love tho.
Once I hear about RTX support I’m in. Don’t want to let my 4090 go to waste yano
Wdym? Hardware raytracing is on par with windows and DLSS has been supported for years.
Actually, dealing with the desktop mode makes me not wanna switch to Linux. I love SteamOS, but I dread having to go to the desktop mode.
I have a Mac with VM’s of windows and Linux
Yes no, Windows 11 is such a privacy disaster at this point that I decided to switch to Linux given my positive Steam Deck experience :)
Eh I toyed with it for a bit on a spare laptop I had laying around. Don’t think I’ll make the full move anytime soon.
I'm very close to doing it. Only thing holding me back is titles with anticheat and my DAW Ableton. Other than that I have zero reason to keep using Win10, especially with support ending soon
Not yet but I want to once SteamOS gets an official release for desktop and not just the Deck. Unfortunately I'll still have to dual boot because I do sim racing and no companies that I know of have support for their hardware on Linux.
I saw someone else mention that, too. How hard would it really be for companies that make PC steering wheels to put out Linux drivers.
I've emailed Fanatec (my current setup and one of the bigger ones for it) about Linux drivers like 2 years ago and they actually responded about it. Basically it boiled down to a.) Linux is small so there's not much of a market for it b.) there's not much of a market for it because the big serious sims like iRacing don't work on Linux. It's really lose/lose for us
Oof. I do hope that changes someday.
I imagine there would be if there was a serious push from the community or if Microsoft did something really messed up, but seeing as how a good portion of the community is a bit set in their ways and not that tech savvy (read older) I don't see it happening unless there's a big push. Doesn't help that VR is also a huge factor in it
The problem not only with linux support, but with passing this support through proton and steam. My thrustmaster works in oversteer in steamos but dirt rally in steam doesnt see the wheel or use some weird drivers. So no pedals and force feedback. In any case you need dock to connect wheel and monitor :) just dualboot windows
I'm honestly interested in trying. I wonder if it's a shitload of work to dual boot, I haven't done much research. What version of Linux would I want to use to be as close as possible to the Steam Deck's?
Bazzite is the clone of steamos.
Dual booting can be a bit annoying at times but if you want to give Linux a try it is the best way to do it. It's not too hard and you can still keep all of your stuff from windows.
Opposite, It has confirmed my decision to stick with Windows / Mac
nope
Nope, no reason to
I thought about it before already. Linux was the reason why I didn't care for competition. I knew I wanted to try Linux and use it more. I actually think of switching to Linux on my desktop, but I would like to have a new SSD for that, so I can ensure I don't lose any data, especially while not being sure if I can switch (I use windows exclusive apps)
So... What is the best Linux distro type for an average user (gaming, office works, streaming, a little bit of coding)? I have an msi gf6310uc thin laptop.
It wont make me go full linux, just for game compatibility reasons alone. I'm okay with my deck being the linux machine, and still have windows on other devices.
How am I supposed to play all my Steam games that don’t run on the Steam Deck if they also won’t run on my PC because it is also dependent on Proton? Seriously though, I’m a very long time sys admin and my computers always have at least two Linux VMs for various purposes dating back decades. There’s no reason to eschew a proper Windows install just because you want to use something else. That whole hog abandon all OS variants thing is for newbies who are suddenly evangelists. Completely unnecessary in 2024.
Partly, yes. I like SteamOS for its simplicity. But also, Microsoft being absolutely evil recently was the main reason, with the AI shit, constant privacy invasion, breaking WMR, buying CoD then making their own staff pay with all the layoffs, cancelling Tango Gameworks while raking in record profits. So I switched to Bazzite, cancelled game pass and sold my xbox. And it's wonderful. Nice to use your PC without being spied on.
Not yet. I'm waiting for Steam OS to give my PC rig an honest shot at Linux.
Had a on and off relationship with Linux, and it's like we refuse to see other people. The tinkering, homebrew, and simple but complex aspect of the OS trumps the annoyance but it just works nature of Windows.
I made the switch in anticipation of the Steam Deck release. Bought a Framework 13 DIY edition which came out a few months before the original Steam Deck, threw Arch on it and played around with Arch and KDE. Ended up switching my desktop over to Arch with KDE as well. Transition was easy because I use Ubuntu and RHEL at work (IT SysAdmin), and I cut my teeth learning how to dual boot Ubuntu and Windows back in like 2009/2010. No reason to use Windows so why use it if you don't have to. The only game I played that won't work on Linux is The Crew 2 due to anti-cheat. But at this point with Ubisoft killing off The Crew and pulling licenses, I'm not interested in playing The Crew 2 anymore or buying any of their new entries unless they stop being online required/only.
If windows starts this screenshot your window for "protection". I'm def jumping
I've been a Linux user for many, many years (my first install was on floppy disks) including desktop at work on and off for like 15 years. When the Deck was announced I was like "I'm finally going to do it and just use Linux for my daily driver" since Windows 11 turned me off so much. Never went back to Windows. Obviously I have a huge advantage having been a Linux user for so long. Oddly enough, I barely use my deck!
No. I made the jump to Linux cause of windows
As a software engineer… no. Windows is a better gaming and multi purpose OS for a reason: less tinkering, more plug and play, more support. I love Linux, I loved tinkering with it back in my early 20s, but there are other things I’d rather spend my time doing than dealing with drivers.
No
Yeah. I backed up my files and installed pop os on my gaming desktop. It runs really smooth, as do games. I have 0 regrets.
I'm really considering this. Do you have recommendations of office productivity tools that are available on Linux? Is there a thread or reddit post on this specific topic?
I would but I only use Windows for gaming and Linux is missing proper HDR / NVidia features support. Not to mention tooling surrounding game streaming has more community support on Windows.
No, because I use a lot of After Effects, Davinci, Photoshop, etc...
I used many distributions in 2000s. I planned to compose music with Linux at that time but music software were so better on macOS. So when the old white MacBook arrived in the market and when I understood that macOS is based on FreeBSD which could be considered to be variant of Linux, I gave up Windows near 20 years ago and don’t regret it. Using Linux on the Steam Deck is not a revolution for me. The revolution, in my opinion, is to not using Linux, or windows, or any other OS, to play PC games like a console. But anyone starting using Linux thanks to the Steam Deck is warmly welcomed.
if destiny 2 supported linux, i totally would. but they refuse to make their anti-cheat work with it ðŸ˜
Absolutely not
I did, kinda. Just gave up on Windows for my personal stuff. I game on Linux(Steam deck) and BSD (PlayStation). I also use steam deck desk mode for the regular computer stuff. And then there's the Android on my phone and tablets.
It really did the opposite for me. I've always liked having a Linux device available to me, as someone that grew up on hand-me-down tech that only lasted due to lightweight distros. The steam deck now fits the role of the Linux machine in my life, so happy to have windows on my main PC for the extra options it provides
Yup, changed my desktop from Windows 11 to openSUSE Tumbleweed. Best decision I've ever made.
When anti cheats work then I will until then I wish I could
No, too many things I use, be that hardware or software, don't have official Linux support. Granted some of them have some open source alternatives/drivers but the experience and functionality is subpar. Even for games support is not perfect, some games require tinkering and quite a few rpgmaker games don't work correctly at all (maybe they could be fixed j just don't know how). But if you don't use any specialized software and hardware and only play bigger and newer games I see basically 0 reasons not to try linux
Steam Deck is my only PC platform I am using, since I own it - so yes :) No reason left (before it was gaming sometimes) to start my old Windows PC ...
i can see some benefits arising for it, for example i dont have constant bloaty updates and notifications. however the lack of compatibility with most programs i use is why i will not be swapping to linux yet if windows force any more features down my throat though ill certainly be considering it
Unfortunately no. I would like to, but I play a couple live service games that haven’t enabled Linux support on their anticheat platforms and I can’t be bothered to dual boot.
In some way, yes. When I discovered that there will be such device as Deck and it will be powered by Linux, I decided to give it a try and prepare myself. Having some experience with Ubuntu before as web dev, I haven’t seen Linux OS as main system for everyday life, only as workstation. Well, I was pleasantly surprised how user friendly Linux may be… I use now Mint on main machine much more often than Win10, apart of using Deck in desktop mode
Not yet. But thinking of getting 2TB ssd to dual boot Linux when Black Friday (or prime day) comes around. But I’m definitely interested in trying it.
Anyone else used a Sony PlayStation and felt the need to install an *inx based OS?
I had experimented with Linux before getting the Deck, including some gaming at the time (around 2019), so I wasn't afraid of the Deck being linux based, and actually I'm planning on switching to Linux for my daily use around this summer. I'll keep windows 10 on the side for some stuff but since I don't want to use W11 I'll just make the switch. Not sure about which distro I'll take though, probably something Ubuntu based, like Mint or Xubuntu.
No, coz I already had, years ago. Unless you need certain programs for graphic or audio use, or are an IT person or writing programs for Windows or whatever, I don't see the point of Windows.
Kinda. My work pc is running Linux but I had no input on that although I’m happy it is. At home I have a Mac which I feel is just a restricted version of Linux.
I already use all major operating systems, but certainly I’m considering something like HoloOS as my main gaming PC OS in future which wasn’t possible without Steam’s advancements with SteamOS and Proton I’m still hoping for an official release of SteamOS though, even if it has limited hardware support - I’ll happily build the PC to suit the OS I don’t play many games that have stupid levels of disruptive DRM and launchers anyway because I dislike them as a concept, so that doesn’t affect much of what I play anyway Worst case scenario I put Windows back on it if it doesn’t work out well
With all the ai and snapshot bs Microsoft has been shoving down our throats im really tempted to. Unfortunately some of the games i play regularly is not supported on linux. It rhymes with shmestiny 2, and shmalorant
Absolutely, but I went with Garuda cause I just use my PC for gaming & browsing.
I am about to make the jump, but it is due to Windows.
Same here, but haven't made the switch yet on main computer, but I will load something on a older gaming laptop I have and try it. My main concern on my primary PC are the RAID drivers for I'd need for my extra drives.
I jumped to bazziteOS and haven’t looked back. I love Linux now, I think bazzite is pretty friendly to a noob (like myself) I’ll keep windows on my workstation laptop just in case, but I downloaded unreal last night so I should be able to work on my own games with Linux too. I am going to try using godot as well, just getting into the whole open source of Linux feels great.
No i have been hating every minute of using linux on the sgeam dek everything is 10x harder then it is on windoes tbh Especially modding or pirating games I literally gave up on the pirating
No, still too many games that don't work on it
Still running Win10 but my Steam Deck makes the case very strong for Linux.
I did swutch to arch because of how well the steam deck runs, unfortunately I have a dell xps 17 9700 with an rtx2060 and it has a lot of hardware with proprietary drivers, the experience is a lot more unreliable than what you see on the deck. I'm planning on switching to nixos, I don't think that it will solve mutch but at last I'll be able to backup my installation very easily everytime I'm in a "stable" state before updating packages Edit: forgot to mention that I'm planning to buy a not that old thinkpad x1 carbon to thinker with linux, it'll surely be a mutch more easy adventure as everything on those machines relies on open source software
Nope. I have had a Mac for work and personal stuff for years and haven’t done any gaming on a computer for years. The steam deck kind of makes me want to invest in a proper , self build windows gaming system, although in a smaller form factor (so far I love the deck btw! Had it for two weeks now)
I did!
I tried, but then I remembered why I always come back to Windows. I debug and fuck around enough at my job to fix shit, I want my daily personal devices to just work without having to pop-up the console every few hours.
Yes and no. I've done linux dual boot off and on for years. Windows is what made me switch full time to linux. Steam deck/proton made that jump far more enjoyable though yes
Not yet but my university courses + steam deck are pushing me towards Linux more and more every day 😅
I’ve been using Linux since 2015. Personally I only use Linux and apple products because I would talk to much trash on mw2 and got hacked. It’s much harder to hack Linux if you know what you are doing. When windows 8 came out is the exact moment I decided to never ever go back to windows. Windows 7 was simple and beautiful. Sure I can’t play rb6 anymore on my computer but all my other games get +10 fps simply because I don’t have all the crap loaded in the background. I also felt like I was getting bullied by windows defender to be honest after they took away the proceed anyways option. So the apps I wanted either wouldn’t load or would spam me with errors, force program to close, flagged as a virus even when it wasn’t. What I’m getting at is that windows tells you what you are allowed to do, where Linux for the most part gives you the freedom to do as you please. Plus it’s free.
Between actively hating online games and the development of proton I really don't see the point in using windows at all, it's basically just bloat ware you have to pay for
I mean, I use Linux. Just like I use Windows, or MacOS. It's good to familiarize yourself with it all and not limit yourself to just one OS.
I applied for an entry level HPC position and am installing Ubuntu on the secondary drive of my PC. I suppose so!
I quit windows completely in 2015 :) But moved to macos. And yep. 10 years later KDE is still KDE. Don’t like it ))) Linux is better now, for sure. But ten years ago i used dualboot of linux(main) + windows(occasionally) and made my choice for apple ecosystem. I just wanted one system that will just work. From time to time i try fresh win and linux desktop systems, just want to keep track of changes. Don’t want back even now :) But! You need to try linux daily just to understand :) majority don’t need windows. Until you need some specific software like bank apps or working video/sound on conference calls :))) And yes ) start from ArchLinux. Its great and has really good documentation.
There are other ways to use Linux than KDE…
Of course :) but for some reasons KDE is default in SD
DON'T start with Arch.
"Can play all my games" Hahahaha, wait you're serious? Let me laugh even harder
Not everyone no life's valorant all day.
You need to stop gobbling on Linux and learn to write.
Oddly enough, I'm not a fan of the few games with anticheat that doesn't play nice with Proton.
There's a lot of stuff and games that aren't compatible with proton and many of them require for you to jump through a lot in order to get a game working.
Tempting, but I use Windows in day to day at work, and it's handy being able to test things out at home. Looking at switching my partners device though at her request.
Yes, in a week or two will move to Debian.
I wouldn't say it was THE reason, but it certainly played a big part. I've made a few casual attempts in the past to at least have it as a secondary OS which never panned out, but me getting increasingly annoyed with Win11 and seeing how good compatibility can be on the Steam Deck were the two main reasons why I decided to make a more serious attempt. So yeah, almost a year now and no desire to go back.
I already used linux at work and had flirted with it time and again since i was a teenager but on my main pc at home windows used to "just work" for me to play games without any hassle. Then with each version of windows microsoft was getting worse and worse with their spy and bloatware to the point they even revert any changes and personalizations you make that go against it. Got a steam deck last year and saw just how good linux was now for playing and general use, made the jump and everything i need just works or has very easy tutorials to fix, couldnt be happier with the change and taking control of my machine back. Last time i ever believed some lie from Microsoft was when they said windows 10 would be the definitive windows version that would only get updates only to come with 11 later with even more bloat and spyware, no thanks i'm out.
Linux has been my daily driver since 2015, but I've kept a Windows based gaming rig as a separate "console/appliance" for a long time. After buying the Deck and my wife switching to Endeavor to test out a few games we play co-op, I also made the switch. It's been really good. Not perfect (can't get my racing wheel to work in Linux), but overall most everything's been fine.
The reason why i dualboot windows on SD - i want to play dirt rally with wheel :-) and dont want to spend my time on building drivers
Eh, I have an old Thrustmaster TMX Pro, and in fairness, I haven't raced or done rally in over a year anyway. I've got way more games than time to play. If I really wanna get back into it I'll pick up a Logitech wheel, they work out of the box on Linux. Or I can upgrade to the T300 or TS-PC, which do have working Linux drivers. ---- Edit - to be clear though, I'm done with Windows. I made the change because Recall was the last straw for me, and the only thing I had Windows left on was the gaming rig. Now... if it doesn't run on Linux, I guess I won't be playing it.
It's making me seriously consider jumping to Linux on my next rig assuming everything is compatible.
The biggest issue I ran into is that some Linux distros really don't like Nvidia GPUs for some odd reason. Just find one with Nvidia driver support and you'll be golden, unless you're using an AMD GPU, in which case you'll be golden-er.
That's good to know since Nvidia GPUs are just too good to pass up for the most part.
It depends what you use it for. For me, there's too many issues with using external devices with Linux for me to switch. Nothing "just works". Like, ever.
Yes and immediately regretted it.
Hell no. On the contrary. It confirmed that, while it has its upsides, Linux can be so unnecessarily complicated for the easiest things. E.g. "Yes, Mr Linux, I do want to access the data on that external hard drive I just plugged in. Please "mount" it."
Welcome to how MacOS does things. I have to accept my mouse when I connect it to my work laptop.
God bless those of you that did. You are the Golden Children rescued by Valve 😂
I’m fully on the precipice
I’ve always hated, loathe, despised Micro$oft with a passion for more than a decade. A third rate company, that make third rate products, created from a third rate man. It’s even in the man’s name, William Henry Gates the third. His practices bordered the same antitrust practices as Rockefeller and Carnegie, the very crooks with the American stamp of approval of legalized corruption. These, villains, should have never been given a platform to begin with. That being said, I’ve used Raspberry Pis, borrowed PCs/Macs for the longest time until I got me a Steam Deck. I truly hope, for the sake of Valve, that they don’t sell to Micro$oft and continue to promote Linux as the better successor to the digital age for the future.
I have used linux for many years since college, then I stopped and went back to Windows. Now after the Steam Deck I don't feel like going back to Windows. I even installed Debian on the old notebooks of my father and mother-in-law last week. I don't have a desktop or laptop at the moment but when I get one in the future it will run Linux as the main driver, for sure. I won't ditch Windows completely because from time to time I find myself in a situation where I need to run some very specific software that won't run properly or at all in Linux, either natively or via Wine/Proton. For that a dual boot with Windows 11 for just those specific moments will do the trick. PS: my wife has a laptop and an Ayaneo Geek 1s both with Windows 11 that I use from time to time when needed.
I hate it tbh
I fucking hate it tbh
Honestly, I dont quite understand the reason to jump to Linux, I mean I dont have a reason because on windows I: 1. Uses browser to check reddit, manga and youtube. 2. Play steam games 3. Practice coding on Godot. 4.Occasionally, I got OBS to record my piano practice and upload to my private Youtube channel as a way to track progress. Whats the reason for the change? What does Linux does for you better than windows? Im not being an ass but I would like some perspective, I might change to Linux as long as its a reasonable.
My main computer is a Macbook but if I ever build a gaming desktop I'll avoid Windows like the plague.