Unfortunately not. Even as an IT person I can say I just wanna come home and boot up my games without hassle. Sure alot of things have been done with proton etc but still a massive amount of games don’t work without Soo much dang tweaking. I don’t have time for that especially with a job/being a single parent. I am highly interested in steamos though.
that’s also my excuse, but then again, i don’t even game that much. and i’m on rtx 3070 which will be getting too old soon for new games and new GPUs are just too expensive.
And god i hate w11. i mean it’s not that different than w10 but things just don’t work!
my logitech mouse stutters for no fucking reason, 10 year old games lag for no fucking reason. the whole windows lags after being waken up from sleep after a few days, i could go on and on. none of these problems existed on w10.
Why not dual-boot with steamos in that case?
Sure, some things may not work out-of-the-box now, but work is constantly being done and at least won’t regress like the step from W10 to W11.
honestly, i’m just lazy. I would need to clear out one of my drives, i have three of them, 256gb, 512gb and 2tb. I keep windows on the smallest one. I would need to clear out the 512gb one and just get it done.
might get it done when w11 pisses me off a few more times :D
I had the same outlook before switching to Arch Linux, but honestly gaming on Linux is actually the lesser of my hassle. I can genuinely just grab msi files or exe files for games and feed them to Steam to get them playing via Proton. There’s only one (1!) game that I can’t play, and I’m 99% certain it’s a problem with my hardware, not my OS (Monster Hunter Wilds seems to hate my GPU and crash all the time). But even that was fixed with a mod (up until the latest update).
With that said, I’ve had a lot of hassle handling other things that are upstream of gaming so it’s not like you’re unreasonable in wanting an OS that is mostly stable. Then again, I made the decision to use Arch Linux, there’s distros that are simpler afaik.
Is Windows actually stable though? I used to have to use it for work, it’s a disgusting OS. Now I use Ubuntu for work, also disgusting, but it’s much better than Windows
“Mostly stable”. I’ve had my fair share of issues with Windows.
But one of the big benefit is that it is much easier to diagnose an issue on Windows, just by sheer volume of mainstream usage (IE users complaining about issues and seeking help online). Also, tech support won’t turn you around because you are on Linux, an OS they straight up refuse to support.
I thought the same, especially since I had tried Linux on my main several times since the 90s (my first dual boot was with Slackware).
Then maybe 8 months ago I did the transition, and installed Pop!OS since I’m a gamer plus I have a NVidia graphics card and didn’t want to go through the whole hassle related to that (Pop!OS has a version which already comes with those drivers).
Mind you, I did got a separate SSD for Linux and meanwhile added a new one, which is where my games directory is mounted and upgraded the root one to something a bit bigger,
So, this time around, what did I find out in about 8 months of use:
Once, I did had to boot into CLI mode and have apt do some failed upgrades, which included doing some kind of rebuild thing (you get instructions of what command to run when apt fails). This was due to a upgrade of the apt itself, I believe. All the other times it just boots to graphics mode (I’m using X rather than Wayland) or if it fails to start it (happened only a handful of time) you just reboot it.
In general even though I’ve done things like add and change hardware components, I have done little tweaking via CLI and some of it I did it because I’m just more comfortable with it or wanted so obscure options (for example, I wanted to mount the drive shared with Windows with a specific user and group, so I had to edit fstab). Except for the more obscure stuff there are UI tools for all management tasks and one doesn’t have to actually do much management and things almost always just work (for example, I changed graphics card - whilst staying with NVidia - and it just booted and worked, no tweaks necessary)
As for games, I use Steam for Steam Games and Lutris for all other game versions including GOG. Both have install scripts specific for each game, that configure Wine appropriately, so you seldom have to do anything but install, launch and play. That said in average I have had to tweak maybe 1 in 10 games. Further, about 1 in 20 I couldn’t get them to work. If you do install pirated games, then there is no install script and you do have to do yourself the whole process of figuring out which DLLs are missing and configure them in Wine using Winetricks (curiously, I ended up having to install a pirated game because the Steam version did not at all work, and the pirated version works fine). Note, however, that since I don’t do multiplayer games anymore, I haven’t had problems with kernel-level anti-cheat not working with Linux.
Interestingly, for gaming you have safety possibilities in Linux which you don’t in Windows: all my games launched via Lutris are wrapped in a firejail sandbox with a number of enhanced security restrictions and networking limited to only localhost, so there is no “phone home” for the games running via that launcher (Steam, on the other hand, is a different situation).
I still have the old Windows install in that machine, but I haven’t booted into it for many months now.
Compared to the old days (even as recently as a decade ago), nowadays there is way less need for tweaking in Linux in general and for gaming, even Windows games generally just install and run as long as you use some kind launcher which has game-specific install scripts (such as Steam and Lutries), but if you go out of the mainstream (obscure old games, pirated stuff) then you have to learn all about tweaking Wine to run the games.
If you have a desktop and the space to install the hardware, just get a 256GB SSD (which are pretty cheap) and install a gaming-oriented Linux distro (such as Pop!OS or Bazzite) there, separate from Windows and you can dual boot them using your BIOS as boot manager: since the advent of EFI, booting doesn’t go through a boot sector shared by multiple OSs anymore, so if you install each in their own drive then they don’t even see each other (you can still explicitly mount the Windows partitions in Linux from the Files app to access them, but otherwise they have no impact whatsever on booting and running Linux) and only the BIOS is aware of the multiple bootable OSs and you can get it to pop up a menu on boot (generally by pressing F8) to change which one you want to boot.
For the 20 or 30 bucks of a 256GB SSD it’s worth the try and if you’re comfortable with it you can later do as I did and add another bigger one just for the directory with you games (or your home directory, though granted to migrate your home like this you do have to use the CLI ;))
if you’re on Linux mint, check to see if mint itself is out of date. When I installed mint, the only install media I could find was 2 versions behind. Getting to the current version fixed my warframe problems.
Yeah I remember thr same thing. Everything else was suppose to be a package update.
But back-end technology and usage expectations change, and there’s a limit to what front-end changes an existing user tolerates. That was never a promise they could keep.
It has lasted a really long time, though. I don’t decry 11 existing. I’m upset they’re sunsetting 10 without giving us a chance to wait for 11 to get better, let alone for ‘oops we fixed the fuckups’ W12.
No complaints about Fedora KDE specifically. I’ve had it on my spare laptop since version 30 or so. Desktop is on 41 now. The only “issues” I’ve had running this full-time is lack of support for Fidelity Active Trader Pro (which kinda sucks anyway), I haven’t been able to make my bluetooth shipping label printer work yet, and I haven’t gotten my Logi MX Keys / Master S mouse working as it works in Logi Options (on windows or mac) to switch over to my work mac as intended. Otherwise, I prefer it to other distros I’ve used.
My friend was unable to update to windows 11 due to the TPM requirements and looking to switch to linux. I upgraded my CPU and said they should buy my old one. They finally said OK and asked if I could help them install it before they switched to Linux. I installed the CPU and they never switched to Linux because now they have a CPU that meets the TPM requirements.
Windows users really hate change. Microsoft will force them to update and the users will whine but 1 week later they will be used to it then they will stick on windows 11 till EoL.
I want to move to Linux, but I need to be able to use the VPN service my work uses and I’m just not sure how to get it working on Linux. I should just dual boot.
Without prodding too much into what VPN you work uses
Most VPN solutions run on linux just fine, even Microsoft PPTP VPN solution works fine. I would probably check with your IT department what protocol they use and any connection caveats (like machine certificates used for authentication) and look into the different VPN solutions (some examples; WireGuard and OpenVPN are very well supported, IPSec (libreswan or strongswan are options here) depends on setup, PPTP/L2TP should work with most setups (I have to admin I havn’t touched those enough), vpnc works with Cisco base IPsec setups and openconnect works with most SSL VPN connection)
It’s Watchguard. Though looking at their site, it seems like there might be support that I wasn’t able to find last time I looked into this. Definitely want to dual boot at some point. I’ve got a Surface Book 3 though, and I know it needs special kernel stuff to get working properly, so I’d almost rather just wait until my boss retires and everyone’s out of a job to dive into Linux. Easier than finding spare time in my life. Living the dream
I have not any experience with WatchGuard, but it from some quick searching around it seems to not be far from the easiest to set up for linux. dual-booting is probably the easier solution.
I hope you find a solution to what sounds like not the best life situation, and may you have an otherwise have a nice Linux journey.
I finally committed to Linux at the end of last year. Enough is working to make it preferable to Windows now. I’m still having a lot of bugs, and it’s costing quite some time. But at least my computer is mine again. No more telemetry, ads, and UIs that treat me like a toddler. No more updates forced onto me instead of being done whenever I want it.
Me too. Most things just work for me BTW. Laptop battery went from 4 hours to 10+, with better performance too. But most important for me is privacy, which is way better/easier to manage in Linux.
Ironically my laptop, which has been Linux-only since 2015 or something, has finally stopped working properly. The dedicated GPU (NVIDIA Quadro K1100M) no longer has working drivers with the kernel from Ubuntu 24.04. Then again, it wouldn’t run windows 11 either probably.
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Unfortunately not. Even as an IT person I can say I just wanna come home and boot up my games without hassle. Sure alot of things have been done with proton etc but still a massive amount of games don’t work without Soo much dang tweaking. I don’t have time for that especially with a job/being a single parent. I am highly interested in steamos though.
that’s also my excuse, but then again, i don’t even game that much. and i’m on rtx 3070 which will be getting too old soon for new games and new GPUs are just too expensive.
And god i hate w11. i mean it’s not that different than w10 but things just don’t work!
my logitech mouse stutters for no fucking reason, 10 year old games lag for no fucking reason. the whole windows lags after being waken up from sleep after a few days, i could go on and on. none of these problems existed on w10.
Why not dual-boot with steamos in that case? Sure, some things may not work out-of-the-box now, but work is constantly being done and at least won’t regress like the step from W10 to W11.
honestly, i’m just lazy. I would need to clear out one of my drives, i have three of them, 256gb, 512gb and 2tb. I keep windows on the smallest one. I would need to clear out the 512gb one and just get it done.
might get it done when w11 pisses me off a few more times :D
I had the same outlook before switching to Arch Linux, but honestly gaming on Linux is actually the lesser of my hassle. I can genuinely just grab msi files or exe files for games and feed them to Steam to get them playing via Proton. There’s only one (1!) game that I can’t play, and I’m 99% certain it’s a problem with my hardware, not my OS (Monster Hunter Wilds seems to hate my GPU and crash all the time). But even that was fixed with a mod (up until the latest update).
With that said, I’ve had a lot of hassle handling other things that are upstream of gaming so it’s not like you’re unreasonable in wanting an OS that is mostly stable. Then again, I made the decision to use Arch Linux, there’s distros that are simpler afaik.
Is Windows actually stable though? I used to have to use it for work, it’s a disgusting OS. Now I use Ubuntu for work, also disgusting, but it’s much better than Windows
“Mostly stable”. I’ve had my fair share of issues with Windows.
But one of the big benefit is that it is much easier to diagnose an issue on Windows, just by sheer volume of mainstream usage (IE users complaining about issues and seeking help online). Also, tech support won’t turn you around because you are on Linux, an OS they straight up refuse to support.
I thought the same, especially since I had tried Linux on my main several times since the 90s (my first dual boot was with Slackware).
Then maybe 8 months ago I did the transition, and installed Pop!OS since I’m a gamer plus I have a NVidia graphics card and didn’t want to go through the whole hassle related to that (Pop!OS has a version which already comes with those drivers).
Mind you, I did got a separate SSD for Linux and meanwhile added a new one, which is where my games directory is mounted and upgraded the root one to something a bit bigger,
So, this time around, what did I find out in about 8 months of use:
I still have the old Windows install in that machine, but I haven’t booted into it for many months now.
Compared to the old days (even as recently as a decade ago), nowadays there is way less need for tweaking in Linux in general and for gaming, even Windows games generally just install and run as long as you use some kind launcher which has game-specific install scripts (such as Steam and Lutries), but if you go out of the mainstream (obscure old games, pirated stuff) then you have to learn all about tweaking Wine to run the games.
If you have a desktop and the space to install the hardware, just get a 256GB SSD (which are pretty cheap) and install a gaming-oriented Linux distro (such as Pop!OS or Bazzite) there, separate from Windows and you can dual boot them using your BIOS as boot manager: since the advent of EFI, booting doesn’t go through a boot sector shared by multiple OSs anymore, so if you install each in their own drive then they don’t even see each other (you can still explicitly mount the Windows partitions in Linux from the Files app to access them, but otherwise they have no impact whatsever on booting and running Linux) and only the BIOS is aware of the multiple bootable OSs and you can get it to pop up a menu on boot (generally by pressing F8) to change which one you want to boot.
For the 20 or 30 bucks of a 256GB SSD it’s worth the try and if you’re comfortable with it you can later do as I did and add another bigger one just for the directory with you games (or your home directory, though granted to migrate your home like this you do have to use the CLI ;))
I got ahead of the game a little bit by switching to Linux in 2008.
Ah yes, back when Windows Vista and KDE 3 were the hot shit… laggy shit, but still hot…
I’m using 10+ years old hardware, Microsoft has already told me I can’t upgrade, followed by several messages asking me to upgrade…
In other news, Linux Mint works nice and I just need to check Protondb to get Warframe running at frames per second and not seconds per frame
if you’re on Linux mint, check to see if mint itself is out of date. When I installed mint, the only install media I could find was 2 versions behind. Getting to the current version fixed my warframe problems.
I thought I read some time ago that Windoze 10 would be the last version of Windoze ever…
i remember it as “the last version of windows you’ll ever need” and they were absolutely correct.
Well, it can be the last version of Windows for you. 🙂
Ubuntu is nice. I use it daily. Others in my family too. And there are other options too. I hear Mint is nice though I haven’t used it much.
Give it some thought. 🙂
Yeah I remember thr same thing. Everything else was suppose to be a package update.
But back-end technology and usage expectations change, and there’s a limit to what front-end changes an existing user tolerates. That was never a promise they could keep.
It has lasted a really long time, though. I don’t decry 11 existing. I’m upset they’re sunsetting 10 without giving us a chance to wait for 11 to get better, let alone for ‘oops we fixed the fuckups’ W12.
I run Fedora KDE now, but I’m going to keep my Windows 10 install on Windows 10.
How are you finding it?
No complaints about Fedora KDE specifically. I’ve had it on my spare laptop since version 30 or so. Desktop is on 41 now. The only “issues” I’ve had running this full-time is lack of support for Fidelity Active Trader Pro (which kinda sucks anyway), I haven’t been able to make my bluetooth shipping label printer work yet, and I haven’t gotten my Logi MX Keys / Master S mouse working as it works in Logi Options (on windows or mac) to switch over to my work mac as intended. Otherwise, I prefer it to other distros I’ve used.
Thanks for the feedback - currently weighing up disros (was thinking mint, but a few folks have praised fedora KDE based distros now).
My Windows 10 PC’s only function at this point is to play FFXIV in my living room, so I’m not super worried about viruses or anything.
But maybe eventually I’ll switch to Linux on that box and do that weird set-up to get FFXIV running there.
I think I will switch to Linux, possibly dual boot with Win 11 just in case there are games I can’t play on Linux.
I switched to Mint a year ago. Don’t miss a thing.
I’ve seen a lot of people praising Mint in here. It sounds like that’s the distro for me to try first.
Good. The one issue I’ve had installing it is needing to choose Grub2 instead of Grub for the bootloader. No idea why or what the difference is.
Being a deck owner not over obsessed in the latest tripe A games.
My friend was unable to update to windows 11 due to the TPM requirements and looking to switch to linux. I upgraded my CPU and said they should buy my old one. They finally said OK and asked if I could help them install it before they switched to Linux. I installed the CPU and they never switched to Linux because now they have a CPU that meets the TPM requirements.
Windows users really hate change. Microsoft will force them to update and the users will whine but 1 week later they will be used to it then they will stick on windows 11 till EoL.
Already on Linux. And proud.
Never again, bye Microsoft Windows 😁 Hi GNU/Linux my new friend.
43% of Steam is still on Windows
10 with support…
Seems not so many.
And if they are ending in 7 month why bother.
Just put the lin
e break right, the
n it’s understanda
ble.
I want to move to Linux, but I need to be able to use the VPN service my work uses and I’m just not sure how to get it working on Linux. I should just dual boot.
Without prodding too much into what VPN you work uses
Most VPN solutions run on linux just fine, even Microsoft PPTP VPN solution works fine. I would probably check with your IT department what protocol they use and any connection caveats (like machine certificates used for authentication) and look into the different VPN solutions (some examples; WireGuard and OpenVPN are very well supported, IPSec (libreswan or strongswan are options here) depends on setup, PPTP/L2TP should work with most setups (I have to admin I havn’t touched those enough), vpnc works with Cisco base IPsec setups and openconnect works with most SSL VPN connection)
It’s Watchguard. Though looking at their site, it seems like there might be support that I wasn’t able to find last time I looked into this. Definitely want to dual boot at some point. I’ve got a Surface Book 3 though, and I know it needs special kernel stuff to get working properly, so I’d almost rather just wait until my boss retires and everyone’s out of a job to dive into Linux. Easier than finding spare time in my life. Living the dream
I have not any experience with WatchGuard, but it from some quick searching around it seems to not be far from the easiest to set up for linux. dual-booting is probably the easier solution.
I hope you find a solution to what sounds like not the best life situation, and may you have an otherwise have a nice Linux journey.
Sorry for that, it gets hard sometimes when I start accidentally living the examined life for a second
Dual-booting was how I first got into Linux; it truly leaves open the ability to keep everything you’re worried about not having.
What’s the VPN?
I finally committed to Linux at the end of last year. Enough is working to make it preferable to Windows now. I’m still having a lot of bugs, and it’s costing quite some time. But at least my computer is mine again. No more telemetry, ads, and UIs that treat me like a toddler. No more updates forced onto me instead of being done whenever I want it.
Me too. Most things just work for me BTW. Laptop battery went from 4 hours to 10+, with better performance too. But most important for me is privacy, which is way better/easier to manage in Linux.
Ironically my laptop, which has been Linux-only since 2015 or something, has finally stopped working properly. The dedicated GPU (NVIDIA Quadro K1100M) no longer has working drivers with the kernel from Ubuntu 24.04. Then again, it wouldn’t run windows 11 either probably.