Linux Or Windows 7 for gaming

[JaSauders]

Windows 7 is undoubtedly the king of gaming right now. In another year or two, I'm not so sure the scale will be so unevenly balanced. Steam is one of the most powerful gaming sources for computers, and they've taken a severe disliking to Windows 8 and where Microsoft is heading. It's pretty obvious that Steam's interest in Linux is here for the long haul. It only further solidified their stance after they were able to successfully port several games to Ubuntu and with a minimal amount of development have them running as good or better in Ubuntu as they run in Windows 7. Different Linux distros have also been benchmarked to test their gaming capabilities, all of which did remarkably better than I expected. That being said, predicting the future of technology is pretty useless because things change so drastically on a regular basis. If you want a gaming rig set up and running tomorrow, I'd get Windows 7 for that. But like I said, months/years from now it might be a different story.

 

[sam_p_lay]

+ to JaSaunders - good post. Can you post links to the distribution benchmarking? I've seen Windows vs Mac before and Windows vs Linux, but never Linux vs Linux. Would be very interested to know which distributions are best for gaming performance.

 

[JaSauders]

+ to JaSaunders - good post. Can you post links to the distribution benchmarking? I've seen Windows vs Mac before and Windows vs Linux, but never Linux vs Linux. Would be very interested to know which distributions are best for gaming performance.

The articles I read were always comparing different Linux distros to Windows, never Linux to Linux. Now that you mention it I too am pretty curious about that...

 

[sam_p_lay]

Would be interesting! I'd assume heavyweight GUIs like KDE might have a more noticeable impact, but then surely that's gonna have more effect on RAM than on framerates... of course Steam and any other big league gaming that comes to Linux will focus primarily on best results in Ubuntu anyway, so Ubuntu (and derivatives) will likely be the distro of choice for Steam gaming. Still, purely for the sake of curiosity, I'd like to see somebody test this! I'll take a look on Phoronix and see if they've done it.

EDIT: Some good stuff here: http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=category&item=Operating%20Systems

 

[sam_p_lay]

Some interesting results... Linux beating BSD again and again, with the major exception of I/O performance (random writes) where Unix wins by far. Solaris significantly slower most of the time, but occasionally much faster in just one or two things. GUIs do have an impact on gaming performance, with LXDE (unsurprisingly) delivering the best results. These do vary quite a bit from game to game though, Xfce does well also and KDE and Unity are consistently the slowest.

This one is a little dated now, but major gains for Fedora:

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=fedora16_ubu1110_perf&num=3

Kernel versions have a considerable impact too, though it's not an improvement every time - v3.6 seems to be regaining performance lost in the versions immediately before it.

 

[JaSauders]

I'm sure that heavier environments like KDE might suffer some sort of impact, but I think we're starting to slice hairs there too since KDE has gotten significantly better over the years in terms of graphic requirements. Even Unity has gotten to the point where it doesn't feel like a molasses fueled sloth. Of course if we compare any of the above to LXDE we'd be singing a different tune, but still. I'm not trying to take a stab at Windows here, I'm all about the "use the best tool for the job" type of thing, but Windows 7 is just so dang heavy... the way it operates and the weight of DirectX certainly aren't doing W7 any favors here. I think the way Linux and OpenGL are designed under the hood are what gives Linux the potential to be the most powerful. But hey, developers gotta eat, and taking a shot on some blind development is surely a gamble in comparison to the significantly larger base of Windows. Thankfully there's companies like Steam who have the kahunas and the manpower to handle an undertaking like this. I certainly applaud them and anxiously await what future months bring to the table.

 

[sam_p_lay]

Well there's actually been a bunch of Windows vs Linux gaming benchmarks done and Windows tends to come out on top. Microsoft really do seem to have the best system for gaming. OSX games pretty poorly in the benchmarks I've seen, though there's been a bit of improvement (first time I saw it benchmarked, Left 4 Dead was 50-100% faster on Windows). This Source-based stuff isn't demanding anyway though so really doesn't matter if you're getting 100fps instead of 130fps.

 

[JaSauders]

Well there's actually been a bunch of Windows vs Linux gaming benchmarks done and Windows tends to come out on top. Microsoft really do seem to have the best system for gaming. OSX games pretty poorly in the benchmarks I've seen, though there's been a bit of improvement (first time I saw it benchmarked, Left 4 Dead was 50-100% faster on Windows). This Source-based stuff isn't demanding anyway though so really doesn't matter if you're getting 100fps instead of 130fps.

Windows is also seeing monumentally more development. Steam devs worked on L4D for less than a month and had that game running worlds faster on Linux than it did on Windows after months (years?) or development. In recent benchmarks I've seen, Ubuntu has always been neck and neck with Windows 7. I haven't seen any in recent years that suggest that either OS has a substantial leg up vs the other, however Steam's findings with game development is enticing to suggest otherwise.

 

[sam_p_lay]

Keep in mind not all development work is performance optimisation. Take a look at Phoronix anyway, or even Tom's - they did an article on this a while back.

 

[Malc Wells]

There's so much talk here about theoretical benchmarks and how devs have supposedly got greater performance out of Linux (the reference to L4D, in particular) than Windows. Truth is, it's a no-brainer and you can argue the toss all you want. If you want to play games, you need Windows 7 or 8. I refuse to accept XP or Vista due to their age and the fact that we need to move on and embrace the newer APIs (otherwise development will slow to a standstill). I'm not questioning the stability of XP, but I am saying that if you're a gamer, it's really time to get with Windows 7 as it's solid as a rock and has the best choice of games and most mature drivers. I'm sorry Linux fans but you're way off the mark right now even making a comparison. Yes, Steam is available and yes the Steam console is going to run Linux, but it'll never have the choice of games that an established OS like Windows does. Look at OSX; years in existence and many incarnations of leopards and lions, and the snowy ones too, and the best they've got is Portal 2. Great game but not cutting-edge. I love Steam and I love Valve games but I struggle to see how a Linux machine will oust the PS4 or XBOX one. The sheer number of XP gamers shows that even today people are afraid to move on from what they know. Given that you can build/buy a very capable gaming machine for under £800 these days, why would you want to waste time and money on a platform that has so little software and hardware support? If the Steam console creates a market for serious Linux variants, then that's great for everyone as it'll mean better competition but it didn't work for OSX as a gaming platform and that's got Apple behind it! Were it not for Steam, the Mac would be plodding away with Plants Vs Zombies.
Right now, it's Windows all the way; there really isn't a viable alternative at the moment, no matter what people say.

 

[sam_p_lay]

Necroposting is a little annoying (as is the lack of paragraph breaks), though I do agree. Even £450 would do a decent gaming setup (or £600 if including monitor, keyboard and mouse).