I’m definitely a recent convert. I hate Windows 11 and all the various features it shoves down my throat these days. I bought a steam deck and ended up dabbling in the desktop mode enough to realize the learning process will be mostly fun for me. I’m mostly gaming these days anyway. I don’t use the computers I have at home for much more than that.
Like it or not, this is the easiest way to get Linux further into the mainstream. I’ve had Linux on my laptop for about a year or so and have been loving it, but I’ve still been wary about switching my gaming PC. I think the biggest issue with most people hesitant to switch is ease of use. From the outside Linux looks cryptic and kinda scary for most people. I mean you have to do research just to find out which distro to use and even then might not even find one you like on the first try. With Windows… You just install Windows and you can already do everything you need to do.
One could argue it’s been mainstream for a while. We just don’t call it Linux. We call it android, game consoles, TVs etc… for consumers they look at hardware and software as one in the same.
If I were to guess, if steam os takes off, we will have another word other than Linux for these machines.
Honestly Linux market share doesn’t matter much.
With that being said Linux can be used however you see fit as long as you aren’t violating licensing
Unless your game bans you from playing because you’re on Linux, then market share matters a ton
Gaming has nothing to do with Linux. I wish that we could just move on from that. It isn’t the fault of Linux or anyone in the community that some companies choose to ban from you to running there software. Market share is unlikely to cause major changes.
If it was 50% market share, nobody would ignore Linux
I don’t think that’s ever going to happen.
But even if it did, do you seriously think legacy companies would want to support it? Linux encourages knowledge, tinkering and vendor independence which is not what these companies want. They want a locked down platform that keeps the companies safe.
@possiblylinux127 @iopq
in reality, gaming on Linux became since a long time way better than on winlol, and Mesa & CodeWeavers are actively working to make it better every day, the problem comes from developers, mainly kernel-level anticheat, according to members on the fediverse or one of the communities I follow on fb, it all comes down to a simple checkbox if you want the game to allow running on Linux or nay, so the blame falls down to stupid devs not the OS
I want to move to Linux but the value proposition for game pass is too damn good, I haven’t bought games the last 3 years because the last 5 games that I bought all got into game pass. It’s like they have this one executive that has the same taste as me.
I’ll stick with windows for gaming (sadly) until my financial situation improves ಥ‿ಥ
My daughter uses game pass on Linux. I think she streams it though.
The biggest hurdle by far is that you need to compile the software you want to use from source more often that is acceptable for the average user. There is also a serious lack of proper hardware driver support.
Linux is way too fragmented and trying to get up and running with basic apps requires way too much technical skill.
I really do hope that SteamOS will finally solve these problems by having the backing of a foundation (company) that has years of UX experience (with multiple failures and successes under their belt) that targets a wide range of audiences. This should give hardware manufacturers confidence that developing drivers for that OS will not be a waste of time.
Wtf, I use Linux and have never compiled anything.
That doesn’t mean that others don’t have to. I installed Debian on a partition and couldn’t get the WiFi USB stick to work. The manufacturers drivers couldn’t be installed because they were ancient, and installing a generic one for the chip didn’t work. Had to give up. In windows it’s plug and play.
I had the same experience with an old printer: Linux recognized it directly whereas Windows didn’t. I wouldn’t say that Linux has a strong disadvantage at these things.
compile the software you want to use from source more often that is acceptable for the average user.
Wut? I’ve been using Linux in some form or another for years and that is greatly exaggerated even for back then
Linux is way too fragmented and trying to get up and running with basic apps requires way too much technical skill.
Um. WHAT. most distros are just some flavor of one of the handful of major ones, like Debian (Even Ubuntu is based on Debian). If it’s a Linux application, it’ll probably work on your distro. There’s some other cases, like FreeBSD which isn’t a Linux kernel, so things differ there, but it’s unlikely you’ll be running it at home unless you’re venturing out of “average user” domain, like Arch for Linux.
Things have never been easier
The majority of users won’t even touch the command line if they’re on a noob friendly distro. Been that way for a long time. Only Gentoo users are compiling from source, and even then, not that frequently
The biggest hurdle by far is that you need to compile the software you want to use from source more often that is acceptable for the average user.
I’ve been using Linux as my main OS since 2007 and not had to do that once.
Linux is way too fragmented and trying to get up and running with basic apps requires way too much technical skill.
> open app store
> search
> install any flatpak you like
If anything Windows is the complicated one in this regard.
@TheGrandNagus @Shirasho I remember doing that in high school in 2018 but I forgot all about it because I never again after class did that
I’ll install it on my gaming desktop day 1…
Any big distro will do now, maybe no HDR.
Yea I use Mint. So I’m kinda already there.
Works with Wayland btw, though still experimental
If you haven’t already, take a look at Bazzite for your desktop. I’ve actually replaced SteamOS with it.
What’s the benefit of the os vs say steam os?
@mesamunefire @themadcodger in tunisia at least, the number one way to play games is:-through piracy (I hate piracy but if you are born in tunisia then it is very very hard to pay for anything virtual like games) -via launchers like Battle.net for HS -via custom .exe like for Project Celeste… in short Steam is not the only way to get games, Steam OS and by consequence the Steamdeck is not even officialy on sale in tunisia anywhere and going to desktop mode requires intellect which is not common
Interesting. Yeah I can see that being an issue.
I’ve heard it can be hard to get a steam deck or steam deck adjacent machines outside official stores.
Ill take a look today!
The built-in Proton WINE does pretty darn well for me already. Baldur’s Gate 3 plays fine on my Pop!_OS system.
Same bg3 works great! I’m running on steam deck and pop os at different intervals. It’s fun.
Same. Doesn’t play Deadlock very well which I find really funny since it’s a Valve game. But it’s a play test so I’ll give it a pass for now.
I hope this helps give Linux some love. Been using Bazzite and it seems to do the job pretty well.
