News I've been gaming on Windows for over 30 years, but now I'm giving Linux a shot

[Sicilybeby]

I am a noob learning the ropes. I’ve built 10 gaming p.c.’s this year for family and it’s been a blast. Learned a lot from you geniuses. Where I hit the wall was when I built an all amd pc with 9600x, asrock a620wifi, gskill 32 6000m/t, and rx 6700 non xt and loaded steam os. Everything worked until it didn’t. Steam os only say the apu, not the graphics card, and I was lost. So I tried and tried, and then gave into windows begrudgingly.

 

[bit_user]

Where I hit the wall was when I built an all amd pc with 9600x, asrock a620wifi, gskill 32 6000m/t, and rx 6700 non xt and loaded steam os. Everything worked until it didn’t. Steam os only say the apu, not the graphics card, and I was lost. So I tried and tried, and then gave into windows begrudgingly.

Did you configure the BIOS to prefer the dGPU, not the iGPU? There's usually a setting for that. Also, in Linux, I'd run sudo lspci and make sure the dGPU is actually detected. I'd guess it should be, since Windows apparently found it. The next step would be to run vulkaninfo --summary and see which devices are listed.

I have no experience with SteamOS, so I can't offer much more advice than that.

 

[Sicilybeby]

Did you configure the BIOS to prefer the dGPU, not the iGPU? There's usually a setting for that. Also, in Linux, I'd run sudo lspci and make sure the dGPU is actually detected. I'd guess it should be, since Windows apparently found it. The next step would be to run vulkaninfo --summary and see which devices are listed.

I have no experience with SteamOS, so I can't offer much more advice than that.

That was mighty kind of you!!!!! Thank you!

 

[Heat_Fan89]

Just use Ubuntu, then almost anything can work with wine64 and dxvk. All these boutique distros run into package maintainence issues.

I learned that the hard way. I now use Ubuntu exclusively and things tend to break less with Ubuntu.

 

[salgado18]

What I do is go to my library and filter games that are available on Linux and play those on Linux, while going back to Windows for the others. E.g. I play Cities Skylines and Northgard on Linux and the performance is brilliant. I was initially surprised how many of my library games had Linux support.

The big thing is that most Windows games are playable on Linux using Proton. So even those you filtered out would work. This expands the Linux gaming library by a lot, and almost makes Windows unnecessary for playing.

 

[nrdwka]

As for me, I wait for cheatengine mods to work on Linux 🙈

 

[rambo919]

They are both Debian derivatives and Ubuntu is after that RHEL money. Personally I prefer RHEL like distros but can't stand Fedora and ultimately Debian derivates won that fight. And while Mint is one of the better boutique distributions due to it being a repackaged and scaled down Ubuntu, it still has the same issue all other boutique distro's do, limited support. Ubuntu is still the gold standard for Linux user distro's and practically every bit of user how-to or documentation is going to work on it. The native package repository is seconded only to Debian and you'll have the least amount of conflicts if you do end up having to bring in third party repositories.

With linux it always comes down to repository management and ensuring you don't stumble into dependency hell.

It also adds GUI end user tools Ubuntu does not have as well as stripping out snapd and opting for flatpak.

Advanced users often forget how most users appreciate good GUI tools that demystify the small mountain of config files.

And here I have to mention the MASSIVE difference between Ubuntu and Debian derivatives..... trying to use third party repos for the former on the latter is a surefire method of breaking your install because Ubuntu repackages beta packages a lot of the time.

 

[rambo919]

The big thing is that most Windows games are playable on Linux using Proton. So even those you filtered out would work. This expands the Linux gaming library by a lot, and almost makes Windows unnecessary for playing.

Gamescope alone was silently revolutionary, takes all the pain out of scaling and mouselock for older games.... still slightly fiddly sometimes though but it's improving.

 

[palladin9479]

And here I have to mention the MASSIVE difference between Ubuntu and Debian derivatives..... trying to use third party repos for the former on the latter is a surefire method of breaking your install because Ubuntu repackages beta packages a lot of the time.

All boutique distros repackage repositories, Mint is just Ubuntu repackaged with the Mint dev team adding their own packages to the mix. If a "beta" package makes it into Ubuntu main, then that same beta package is going to how up in Mint the next time they do a version bump as Mint is downstream of Ubuntu and Ubuntu is downstream of Debian. It's how they can manage an entire distribution at a fraction of the manpower.

The reason for Ubuntu is simple, over 90~95% of all instructions on the web are written for it. When anyone googles "how to install application X on linux" or "how to get game Y working on linux", what shows up is instructions on how to get it to work on Ubuntu. There may or may not be other distros listed, but Ubuntu will definitely be one of the ones listed.

This is much to the dismay of Arch and Gentoo users, not to mention all those minor communities who go tribal over userbase.

 

[rambo919]

All boutique distros repackage repositories, Mint is just Ubuntu repackaged with the Mint dev team adding their own packages to the mix. If a "beta" package makes it into Ubuntu main, then that same beta package is going to how up in Mint the next time they do a version bump as Mint is downstream of Ubuntu and Ubuntu is downstream of Debian. It's how they can manage an entire distribution at a fraction of the manpower.

The reason for Ubuntu is simple, over 90~95% of all instructions on the web are written for it. When anyone googles "how to install application X on linux" or "how to get game Y working on linux", what shows up is instructions on how to get it to work on Ubuntu. There may or may not be other distros listed, but Ubuntu will definitely be one of the ones listed.

This is much to the dismay of Arch and Gentoo users, not to mention all those minor communities who go tribal over userbase.

What makes Ubuntu better than Mint though instead of worse from a non-enterprise perspective?

Ignoring my irrational hatred of all things gnome as that is besides the point, even popos is better than Ubuntu.

And Mint mostly seems to strip out the Ubuntu spyware to boot.

 

[palladin9479]

What makes Ubuntu better than Mint though instead of worse from a non-enterprise perspective?

This is already answered, specifically for the novice / new Linux user.

The reason for Ubuntu is simple, over 90~95% of all instructions on the web are written for it.

Ignoring my irrational hatred of all things gnome as that is besides the point, even popos is better than Ubuntu.

And Mint mostly seems to strip out the Ubuntu spyware to boot.

This is what is known as an irrational argument. You have a personal distaste / hatred / <insert negative prejudice here> against Ubuntu, there is no room for discussion.

I'm running KDE on an old gaming laptop that I installed Ubuntu on as a POC to see if I could migrate off Windows for my gaming desktop. KDE plasma or Cinamon are not exclusive to Mint and Ubuntu has versions of both. My preferred Linux distro is AlmaOS as I'm a RHEL guy (well technically Solaris but we've been orphaned) so I really don't have a bone in the whole "which Ubuntu derivative is the best" game. From an engineering point of view, readily available use documentation that just works is very important because barely technical people will be copy pasting and do not tolerate "well on my distro it's mostly the same" well.

 

[bit_user]

The reason for Ubuntu is simple, over 90~95% of all instructions on the web are written for it. When anyone googles "how to install application X on linux" or "how to get game Y working on linux", what shows up is instructions on how to get it to work on Ubuntu. There may or may not be other distros listed, but Ubuntu will definitely be one of the ones listed.

This is much to the dismay of Arch and Gentoo users, not to mention all those minor communities who go tribal over userbase.

It's funny you mention Arch, because I've profited on several occasions from their docs (when they've turned up in my search results), to the extent they apply to things that aren't distro-specific. That said, I've never actually run Arch, so I can't say anything further about it.

BTW, one negative thing I can say about all the docs to be found for Ubuntu is that many of them apply to older Ubuntu revisions and do not work on something as current as 24.04, which is what I'm currently running!

 

[dalauder]

I’ve swapped most PCs at home to Linux. I think it takes some perseverance to get used to it. Once you move passed that adaptation phase, most won’t miss Windows. Something like Bazzite is more gaming centric and takes the complication out of having all the necessary gaming apps installed out of the box. For more general purpose use, I like and will recommend Mint.

It's definitely something I'm moving towards. I've switched my desktop and a family laptop to dual boot Linux Mint. With Heroic Games Launcher and Steam, I'm pretty much the only one in my family that notices a difference.

Mint really softens the learning curve as I really only know DOS commands and have a lot to brush up on--like commands that didn't exist in 1982.

 

[rambo919]

This is already answered, specifically for the novice / new Linux user.

This is irrelevant to the argument though because it applies equally to both Mint and Ubuntu without exception.

This is what is known as an irrational argument. You have a personal distaste / hatred / <insert negative prejudice here> against Ubuntu, there is no room for discussion.

Which is why I just pointed it out, it has no bearing on my argument other than personal dislike.... but also a LOT of people have this particular personal dislike which is not something to be ignored.

I'm running KDE on an old gaming laptop that I installed Ubuntu on as a POC to see if I could migrate off Windows for my gaming desktop. KDE plasma or Cinamon are not exclusive to Mint and Ubuntu has versions of both. My preferred Linux distro is AlmaOS as I'm a RHEL guy (well technically Solaris but we've been orphaned) so I really don't have a bone in the whole "which Ubuntu derivative is the best" game. From an engineering point of view, readily available use documentation that just works is very important because barely technical people will be copy pasting and do not tolerate "well on my distro it's mostly the same" well.

I think the fear is overblown as pointed out above. The same way that any guide for doing something on Debian applies equally to any Debian derivative. All a derivative does is tweak a few things and add a few tools. Ubuntu is kinda different in that it's a semi-fork of Debian more than a derivative.... and it has it's own derivatives.

As long as the user can easily keep track of the family tree as it were he wont have any trouble.... the only problem I have ever actually noticed is the confusion that the release code names cause, at some point someone has to figure out it's time to stop being cute and use version/build numbers instead because this harem of releases is impossible to keep track of if you keep going by name.

Also I think some confusion entered into this conversation early. MX is a Debian derivative and Mint is an Ubuntu derivative. For most users it makes more sense to use Mint instead of Ubuntu and MX instead of Debian. The problems come when you use a derivative of a derivative I think, too many layers of middlemen.

 

[rambo919]

It's definitely something I'm moving towards. I've switched my desktop and a family laptop to dual boot Linux Mint. With Heroic Games Launcher and Steam, I'm pretty much the only one in my family that notices a difference.

Mint really softens the learning curve as I really only know DOS commands and have a lot to brush up on--like commands that didn't exist in 1982.

I have found that you only need to actually memorize 10-30% of the commands and you are good to go. What's more important is understanding how they function so you can figure out what you need to know as you need it.

Same as with windows really only this time you actually CAN understand what is going on.

 

[rambo919]

It's funny you mention Arch, because I've profited on several occasions from their docs (when they've turned up in my search results), to the extent they apply to things that aren't distro-specific. That said, I've never actually run Arch, so I can't say anything further about it.

BTW, one negative thing I can say about all the docs to be found for Ubuntu is that many of them apply to older Ubuntu revisions and do not work on something as current as 24.04, which is what I'm currently running!

It's becoming even more of a problem with AI pages repeating decade old sources with current timestamps.

 

[bit_user]

Mint really softens the learning curve as I really only know DOS commands and have a lot to brush up on--like commands that didn't exist in 1982.

Slightly off topic, but what's funny is that I only realized last year that UEFI basically is the new DOS! I had a system where I was forced to do some things in the UEFI shell, and when I started looking into it, I came to see that it's really very DOS-like.

You can write your own programs for UEFI, as well. It does seem like a somewhat better-featured version of DOS, where you get basic services like hardware abstraction and a network stack.

https://www.tomshardware.com/softwa...at-runs-entirely-inside-the-motherboards-uefi
​

If I needed to use a PC for something where I had virtually exclusive control over the CPU (e.g. some sort of simple, realtime control), I might be tempted to explore running it in UEFI.

 

[bit_user]

the only problem I have ever actually noticed is the confusion that the release code names cause, at some point someone has to figure out it's time to stop being cute and use version/build numbers instead because this harem of releases is impossible to keep track of if you keep going by name.

Yeah, the release naming thing is just dumb. The usual reason why companies use internal codenames is to decouple them from whatever the marketing department decides to call the version or product. This is important so that when marketing inevitably decides to change a product name or release number, you don't either have to rename a bunch of internal documents and branches, or just have all of this internal stuff that's referencing releases by the wrong version numbers and product names.

Ubuntu has none of that, as their releases follow a well-known numbering system. So, there's zero need or benefit from having that layer of indirection. It's just something they do by tradition. I don't expect them ever to drop it, but you're 100% right that having two names for every release (e.g. "Noble Numbat" and 24.04) only gets in the way.

FYI, here's the official list, in case anyone needs to map from name -> number or vice versa:

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Releases
​

 

[usertests]

I know that horrible Logitech keyboard! One of the worst trackpads in existence. Linux is being set up to fail!

 

[rambo919]

I know that horrible Logitech keyboard! One of the worst trackpads in existence. Linux is being set up to fail!

Is that supposed to be sarcasm? I can't tell....

 

[Madelaki]

"And with that we should get some decent performance"? With a nvidia GPU on Linux? You expect that to be a good experience? Why?

 

[beer4duke]

I bought a steamdeck 2 years ago and this confirmed that linux was great at gaming, bought some games, but the competitive FPS is out of reach...
Last month I built myself a new PC: AMD9600X + 32GB DRR5 + 2TB NVME + 5060Ti 16GB (and got Monster Hunter Wild for free from AMD with the CPU!).
Recent setup, but something that is reasonable in terms of evolution and power consumption with *enough horsepower*: got the 5060Ti on release date at MSRP (stars were aligned).
I went for fedora 42 with third party repos enabled and I got everything from nvidia kmod (latest driver builds automatically for my kernel) to Steam client.
Up and running in 10 minutes for OS, drivers,steam client installation (just one reboot from LIVE USB stick to boot on NVMe system disk).
Then getting 1TB of games took some time but the result is incredibly effective...
I got all the recent bells and whistles from 5060Ti at decent levels but RTX is not a killer feature for fast paced games: looks good but then what the point...
Time for me to try Moonlight/sunshine game streaming. I will also give GOG a try using heroic many thanks for this very practical review of Linux Gaming.

I really think that 2025 is the year of Linux Gaming.

 

[Kindaian]

I used Mint before with battle.net with lutris/wine and it kind of worked. Then it stopped working one update. I couldn't point out why and not even a clean install would make it work after that upgrade. The update client would just freeze at about 25%, and wouldn't progress any further.

 

[TechNomad]

I went with CachyOS because I prefer my software to be free of "other" concerns.

 

[ezst036]

It's becoming even more of a problem with AI pages repeating decade old sources with current timestamps.

Yeah the AI are perpetuating the old myth that Linux is still entirely terminal based in use like its DOS.

Its too bad the AIs didn't offer up more modern GUI-based answers since just about everything can be done with a point and click anymore.