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SteamOS expands beyond Steam Deck
(store.steampowered.com)
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this post was submitted on 07 Jan 2025
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Here’s hoping it matures enough for desktop use by the time my Win10 desktop is EOL.
My man, have you heard of Bazzite?
But SteamOS is also immutable 🤔
I can attest to this. I daily drive bazzite exclusively now.
Rocket league specifically only uses 40% of the GPU and 25% CPU and refuses to use any more at all. It is only a bazzite problem. Other distros are completely fine and other bazzite users have reported the same thing, regardless of settings, launch options, etc...
It is hell when trying to do embedded firmware development. Pretty much everything has to be done through distrobox related to it because JLink needs to be accessible by NRF connect which has to be accessible by VSCode, etc... vscode and oss versions simply don't work if you have to install more than the very basic UI extensions.
Plus then you have udev rules that you have to manually place in the read only file system (recommended by a Bazzite maintainer on their discord) which they explicitly tell you never to do in the docs. There is absolutely nothing regarding JLink (the most widely used industry flashing tool for ARM) in any universalblue docs, even the bluefin and aurora versions "for developers".
Also, there is absolutely no known way to handle eID credentials, crypto keys, etc in order to digitally sign documents. Also key management and access simply does not work at all in flatpak.
Network scanning simply doesn't work at all (yes, saned is set up). It is completely nonfunctional, it can't discover anything.
Outside of those cases though, it works fine. Themes work, font installation works as expected: the firewall, KiCAD, freeCAD work, browsers, media players, etc... All work fine. Distrobox, while start menu applications via distrobox sometimes simply don't start, they often work fine. However, I haven't had to worry about updating my system in 4 months because updates are in the background and completely seamless and not a single thing breaks during updates which by itself is the reason I switched from arch.
(Arch never became unbootable or seriously broken in 8 years, but I would have update problems and have to search for forum solutions to make a full update work every month or two)
I'm a daily driver of Bazzite and Bluefin. I felt this way initially but it's been generally painless. I typically check flatpak -> app image -> homebrew -> distrobox when I need something. If that fails, I use rpm-ostree and reboot.
I work in development/devops/infosec by trade and to date there hasn't been a single package or program that I needed that I couldn't get running with minimal fuss. I've even run a couple of MDM packages that my work requires.
I'm not shy about Linux but my eyes glazed over reading that flow chart. Don't pretend this is okay for typical users switching from Windows
If they went through this, they wouldn't.
I've also been able to find 99% of what I need through discover.
https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/quick-docs/installing-from-source/
That's why we got dem tar and dnf
And also that's just not true. There's also Space Cadet Pinball
No, on bazzite because it's a fedora distro
Edit: wasn't trying to to come off as a dick, reread it and I could see it taken that way
Also I'm relatively new to Linux, so I'm sure with some things that may not be true, but 100% of what I've had to do has been either within discover, or I've followed pages on fedora to find out and it's worked Everytime. Whatever bazzite installation you have whether it's 38/39 etc, those line up with fedora versions as far as I'm aware.
It's been solid for me. It's the same or less amount of troubleshooting I'd have to do on windows, and I'm familiar with windows. Making windows work is my job. That coupled with the absolute mess that is windows support pages, bazzite has been good for me. Arch was pretty cool too, not nearly as bad as people said it was going to be, I just had an issue with audio I couldn't figure out. I just wanted a works right now solution, and that's what it's been.
Or literally any other distro.
Pop is probably much easier to be up and running vs. Bazzite.
Dude, you don't need SteamOS for a desktop. Just download a more widely used desktop distro. I use Garuda, and it's great for starting up gaming.
SteamOS will be great for a console-like experience out of the box, which is not what you want for desktop.
The comment above says they want to replace their W10 desktop, so it isn't what they want. If it's what you want then fine, but I was writing the comment for someone who wants a desktop, not a console. If you want a console, go ahead and wait or use Bazzite. If you want a desktop then the best options are already available and SteamOS isn't going to be it.
Bump for Garuda. It's decent, as simple as any installation I've ever had to do, comes well configured out of the box, and has a very active forum that the Devs keep an eye on and answer questions quite quickly.
What's keeping you from using a distro that's already designed for desktop use?
Have you tried getting help on a basic question from a Linux forum?
Successfully, many times, it's extremely rare that I have to actually talk with someone directly because so much has already been accurately documented.
I work with windows and those forums don't do shit
I've gotten to the point that every time I'm directed to Microsoft Help I automatically downvote whatever the MS rep posts, because it will never not be garbage
They just keep saying shit like "what version are you on?" Motherfucker, the latest, and honestly, we know there isn't a version where you fixed this problem thousands have been trying to solve for months and in a lot of cases years.
Idk how accurate this is, my boss had mentioned it, but apparently they've outsourced that shit to a third party, and they just keep opening tickets and solving them and keep asking you simple shit so they can bill per ticket solved. It's a godamn mess. I'm just hoping Linux catches on enough to enter the corporate world at the user level.
We're at a point where when something breaks, usually a Linux update fixes it, and it's windows equivalent just keeps further breaking itself.
From what I've heard at work and from others, MS uses version queries to stall tickets because they constantly release updates that they can point to and say "you need to update before we can help".
The ones on Lemmy are pretty good!
Not necessary, you can use dozens of distros where playing Steam games is pretty much plug and play
What about my alternatively acquired games? I've tried using Mint and Steam with whatever that is that runs compatibility. Sometimes doesn't work for them.
Heroic Launcher, Lutris, Bottles, or just launching them through the command line if you really want to for some reason, are your options. Heroic I just started using and it's great. It's especially good for games from other stores, but you can add anything to it. Lutris is pretty good, but you have to add everything manually (which you'll have to do no matter what for what you're asking about). Bottles is functional, but it is much harder to use than the others, but probably lighter weight if that matters to you at all (and I'll tell you now, it doesn't).
It's just arch isn't it?
No, it's based on arch. There's a bunch of polish on top of it that makes it more stable and such
I don't speak polish though so that makes it difficult and scary.
You don't have to talk to them, they just hold the thing together. Very strong men
I didn't think it's just Arch , though. IIRC it's also immutable.
Yeah I don't see any need for desktop use, except for making a Steam console under your TV.
You can use Steam with Proton on whatever distro you want.
Man, Steam has a real opportunity here to make Linux desktops more palatable. Imagine a SteamOS computer that's as easy to use as Windows for people who don't know Linux...
There are plenty of distros that have been doing that for years now
I really want to switch my main desktop to Linux, but use it for remote work too, so I have MS Teams… is there a way to reliably virtualize it?
Teams can run as a chrome app, I use it daily.
Don't use SteamOS as a desktop OS, that's not what it's meant to. You might be used to Windows and think that a different distribution of Linux is just a different customization of the OS, but it's almost an entirely different OS that happens to run the same binaries.
If you're interested in getting an alternative to Windows, try some beginner friendly Linux distros on a Virtual Machine or an old laptop. I recommend Linux Mint to newcomers, but if you're used to the desktop mode on SteamOS maybe Kubuntu. The closest you can get is Bazzite but that's also not a desktop OS so I wouldn't use that unless it was for a Steam Machine. The second closest (that's also somewhat beginner friendly) is Manjaro K DE version, but being Arch based I don't tend to recommend it to new Linux users, but of you're dead set on getting something as close as possible to SteamOS that's it.
What?
As far as I know, it's literally just an immutable build of Arch Linux.
Yes, for you and me who understand what that means it's just the same, but for someone with no Linux experience is going to be very different. Googling any issue he has will direct him to alter config files or install packages, neither of which would be permanent on SteamOS, while the OS is the same the usage of it is completely different, so for a person with no Linux experience to try to use it as their daily desktop system it would be frustrating because none of the help online would apply to him.