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5 reasons Linux is better than Windows for gaming handhelds
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this post was submitted on 08 Dec 2023
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Linux desktop? I feel like a Linux desktop requires too much tinkering. It's nice for the steam deck because of valve's direct support for the hardware and os both in hand. If you take a common gaming desktop you'll probably run into lots of issues like 75% of gaming desktops on steam use Nvidia. 60% of controllers on steam are Xbox which has a bit of setup requirements and sometimes even then the drivers don't work.
Overall I love Linux. I love it in an environment where it's directly supporting me and my hardware. I simply do not get that with my common gaming desktop.
It depends which distro you're on and what their priority is. I'm told that Linux Mint is very friendly to users. Ubuntu is also financially invested in making their OS as streamlined as possible. PopOS too.
The more a distro is targeting a specific user experience, the less tinkering it has. You just generally only see those deliberate user experiences in the mobile space (android, steamdeck, etc.) where the user's expectations are well defined. A desktop could be used for anything, and most people don't even have a desktop these days, so there's not a lot of financial incentive to design a user experience there.
But at the end of the day, when someone says they "use Linux", they almost never mean that they interface directly with the Linux kernel, but that whoever maintains the distro they run happened to choose to Linux.
Mint is the distro I use. I started with it in 2008 after being on some free-only Ubuntu-derived distro for about a year. After that, I went to Fedora, Arch, Manjaro then Fedora, then finally back to Mint recently.
I don't know if that's true unless you separate desktops from laptops. I think most Americans at least have at least one home PC. https://www.ibisworld.com/us/bed/percentage-of-households-with-at-least-one-computer/4068/ shows this to be true. As well as https://www.statista.com/statistics/756054/united-states-adults-desktop-laptop-ownership/ and I am sure more stats can be pulled up. I guess if you mean custom-built desktop computers that number is probably low but of things that need to run a 32-bit/64-bit desktop environment computer, there is probably one in every house.
Yes, desktops and laptops are two different form factors that address completely different use cases. Laptops made up the "mobile" market before the smartphone era. The power/thermal requirements, as well as peripherals for a laptop all need a completely different solution to create a reasonable user experience. Desktop UX innovations haven't seen much recently beyond all-in-ones. Most people these days don't even have a desk they could put it at, let alone enough room at the desk. And the under 18 crowd does everything on their phone or on a tablet, often not even needing a laptop.
Rather than tinkering, I often just omit the games that don't work well and buy AMD rather than Nvidia. I've got a Windows partition, but the last times I've booted into it were to update firmware on a fighting game controller and to play Dragon Ball FighterZ, which is basically the only game I have left in my library that I'll play with friends and won't work on Proton (online, anyway). Tinkering isn't even a thing I'm thinking about one way or another, but the nagging and removal of control that Microsoft annoys me with is something I actively seek to avoid. Different stokes, I suppose.
There are a few games where I still hold on to Windows for. I do wonder if I could just use Linux as the host OS and virtualize a windows environment that has pretty good VirGL support.
Prior to Proton, it was a popular recommendation to use GPU passthrough to a virtual machine running Windows, with Linux as the host OS, but I never did it myself. Which games are your holdouts? Live service stuff with anti-cheat?
No, it's pretty basic but older games like Castle Crashers, Never Alone, and A Hat In Time. They all get about half the FPS they should on proton but also sometimes they'll launch and get less than 5 FPS the entire time. I just relaunch and they'll get about half again. At all times there seems to be a latency between my XBox controller to those games specifically where I don't notice this lag in rocket league.
The controller lag might just be a symptom of the same problem, but it's strange regardless. Bummer. In my neck of the woods, Proton has been so good that I often find myself not even checking compatibility ratings before buying a game. I'm actually struggling to remember the last time that Proton failed me, since the things it struggles with these days, like certain kinds of anti-cheat or DRM, are the exact reasons I wouldn't buy a game even if I was on Windows. Kubuntu/AMD, if you were curious.
That is true, but some people just like to tinker.
That is somewhat the beauty of it. I don't game, I just go to work and go home, so I have some free time to tinker and share what I have done/found/made.
Absolutely and that's a great way to look at it. If you like to tinker as a hobby then Linux is amazing. I even have a Linux computer meant for tinkering and do enjoy it. That said I switch to my Windows computer when I want to focus on playing games purely because that Linux computer isn't up to the task even with proton.
I use Windows basically for work only. It's just easier cuz everything is stacked against Microsoft products.
Or if I'm at home, I RDP to the PC at work and just use that.
I use Linux as my daily driver. I use the Steamdeck as my desktop when I am out of the country and on business trips.
The desktop does not require "tinkering" unless you want to. By default it is better set up than windows is. Windows has yet to get a decent file manager for example.
I game on my linux desktop. Its not uncommon and it works great.
I feel like you missed my point. It's not about the steam deck, it's about a desktop computer filled with random parts where Linux now needs to support and get all these things working together.
Not really random parts.... heck my deckstop gpu doesn't even need drivers. No tinkering at all. Windows is far worse at having to screw around with drivers.
proprietary GPU drivers ship with windows and are updated via the windows updater.