Bazzite: Operating System for Linux gaming • Hacker News Board

Re: Bazzite: Operating System for Linux gaming

#131

Post by KyleGospo » Sun, Nov 30, 2025, 3:09 AM UTC

d3Xt3r wrote: post #107

uncletaco wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Weird question probably but outside of the super esoteric distros running a bespoke package manager what stops someone who installs a distro like bazzite from just continuing to update packages? If they use apt for example then they'll still get updates when the repos are updated and most of these distros reuse existing software repositories.

Bazzite works a bit differently as it's an immutable distro. Whilst updates for normal/user-level packages (Steam etc) will continue to work (as these are Flatpaks), your core system packages won't and you can't just change your repo to say Fedora's repos, as system updates are image-based and are pulled directly from Bazzite's github repo (which in turn pulls from Feodra). The good news is, you can easily rebase to…

Steam is not a flatpak on Bazzite.

Re: Bazzite: Operating System for Linux gaming

#132

Post by vips7L » Sun, Nov 30, 2025, 3:10 AM UTC

debo_ wrote: post #106

haunter wrote: post #21

As much as I love Bazzite at end of the day it's still a custom distro and every single day there is a chance they just close the project down and move on. Happened to so many distros in the past, this is not out of question. I’m not saying “big corporate” distros are better but personally I'd rather stick to something more mainline. Hopefully Valve will release a general version of SteamOS with Steam Machine coming…

I don't know why people bring this up so much whenever a new Linux distro shows up. I think one of the coolest things about Linux is that normal people can feasibly roll a useful distro. How much of a longevity guarantee do you need from a distro that is used for gaming, of all things?

I’ve been running the same gaming setup for almost 10 years. Having to upgrade or change OS is a major thing. Don’t minimize longevity.

Currently I literally can’t find the time to convert my drive from master boot record to GPT for Windows 11. I can’t imagine having to completely switch operating systems/distros because it just disappeared. Worrying if it will still be around is legitimate.

Re: Bazzite: Operating System for Linux gaming

#133

Post by oreally » Sun, Nov 30, 2025, 3:10 AM UTC

timschmidt wrote: post #90

subjectsigma wrote: post #49

Known Linux detractor, been sticking with Windows for years because I’ve had one too many ‘apt-get update’ brick my entire system. Decided to try out Bazzite specifically because of the immutable root partition thing. Overall I will say things are going like 80% smoothly but there are still some very Linux-y problems with it: The default grub has options for ostree:0 and ostree:1. 0 is the default and if you pick 0 i…

> 90% of games work fine, but many have weird bugs like crashing when you Alt-Tab out. This isn't particularly linux-y of an issue. I've had the same sort of behavior in numerous games on Windows, up to and including crashing the graphics driver when alt-tabing out of a full screen game. Seems to be something gamedevs are not commonly testing, and perhaps difficult to defend against when a game is directly interactin…

> Seems to be something gamedevs are not commonly testing, and perhaps difficult to defend against when a game is directly interacting with the GPU.

I can guarantee you any gamedev worth his salt will have used alt-tab at some point in the game's development on windows. It's an incredibly common hotkey to use, and the devs very likely have multiple ides, notepads, image editing software running concurrently. You seem to be trying really hard.

> when a game is directly interacting with the GPU.

Most devs are using cross platform graphics APIs. OpenGL/DirectX/Vulkan. Alt-tab breaking is likely an OS issue.

Re: Bazzite: Operating System for Linux gaming

#134

Post by _cenw » Sun, Nov 30, 2025, 3:13 AM UTC

jsheard wrote: post #69

MrDrMcCoy wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally, I hope that corporate rootkits will never be permitted on Linux in any form. Game studios need to learn that anticheat needs to live on the server side where it belongs.

Easier said than done for some genres, unfortunately. To catch things like aim assistance from the server-side you'd have to resort to handwavy statistical analysis and somehow thread the needle between catching well-crafted aimbots, but without accidentally banning legitimate players under any circumstances, even if they're extremely skilled and/or lucky. It's been tried but I don't think it's ever been very success…

Cheating creates two problems. Obvious cheats aiming to upset other players and subtle cheats that don't want to be noticed as such. Now, I'm not saying it doesn't matter if people cheat as long as nobody notices or that competitive integrity is not important, but the first category is a much more immediate threat for most games and easy to detect. On a server analyzing locally recorded sampled demos.

Re: Bazzite: Operating System for Linux gaming

#135

Post by d3Xt3r » Sun, Nov 30, 2025, 3:13 AM UTC

SamDc73 wrote: post #56

I’ve been using it for a couple of months on my main dev machine (I don’t game much). It’s my first exposure to immutable systems. I love the idea, but honestly, juggling all these package managers gets annoying really fast; for now what I use is rpm-ostree (which you really shouldn’t touch unless you absolutely have to), Flatpak, Homebrew (some package are mac only or mac first), and distrobox (with arch). Every now…

I get what your saying, but it's just a matter of finding the right workflow.

I'm very much like you infact, so I ended up resorting to just using an Arch Distrobox for pretty much everything. I leave rpm-ostree and Flatpaks alone as far as possible, so I only really have to worry about my Arch for updates and everything else takes care of itself.

You may ask then why not just use Arch? Well of course you can, but I like the idea of having a rock solid base where I know for a fact that I can let it happily update without breaking something. Arch still requires manual intervention every now and then (such as package migrations or some dependency conflicts). Not a big deal if you keep up with the Arch News and Discord announcements etc, but sometimes IRL gets in the way and I'm not up-to-speed with what's happening. With my Bazzite+Arch setup, I'm not super bothered with this, plus it's easy to blow my whole container and set it up again, and in fact I've got a bash script to do just that on one of my other PCs that I don't use regularly (because Arch needs to be updated regularly, otherwise you're in for a nasty surprise when you find out your keyring is out-of-date and pacman has been upgraded and nothing works... with a container, just blow it up and fetch the latest version, reinstall your packages and you're up and running in no time).

Re: Bazzite: Operating System for Linux gaming

#136

Post by d3Xt3r » Sun, Nov 30, 2025, 3:20 AM UTC

periodjet wrote: post #74

Kinda seems like they’re relying a lot on all of the work Valve has done with Proton. Difficult to tell what Bazzite per se is bringing to the table.

- Additional hardware support (like proprietary nVidia drivers, several game controllers, laptop-specific stuff (like some ASUS sensors etc))

- Newer core packages (kernel, graphics drivers, desktop environment). This often translates to better hardware support (especially if it's recent hardware), and often better game compatibility (newer graphics drivers often include fixes for games), and often better performance as well.

- More suitable as a general purpose OS. SteamOS heavily leans into the gaming use-case (naturally), and whilst you can use it as a regular PC, its immutable nature can make it a bit annoying depending on your workflow. Bazzite includes a bunch of useful defaults (apps/config/shortcuts) that makes it much more conducive for regular PC usage, or advanced gaming usage (like if you want to install an overclocking utility or do something more "advanced", it's far more easier and convenient).

Re: Bazzite: Operating System for Linux gaming

#137

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Nov 30, 2025, 3:20 AM UTC

doener wrote: post #15

ecshafer wrote: post #11

Outside of console or handheld like experiences, I am not sure what this distro gives that Mint, proprietary nvidia drivers and Steam dont give me? I basically just download windows games as external applicationd through steam and use proton. Though I suppose a one click like “run this as proton” and “run this in this proton environment” could be useful. But once you learn how to change targets its not super complica…

A few points from the website: - Out-of-the-box support for Xbox, Wii, Switch, PS3, PS4, PS5, and numerous other controllers. - Nvidia drivers and the latest Mesa for AMD & Intel pre-installed, with tweaks applied as needed - Bazzite ships with support for additional Wi-Fi adapters, display standards like DisplayLink, and more - Out of the box support for not only desktop PCs, but handhelds, tablets, and home theater…

[deleted]

Re: Bazzite: Operating System for Linux gaming

#138

Post by wlesieutre » Sun, Nov 30, 2025, 3:22 AM UTC

KyleGospo wrote: post #96

0xakhil wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

@KyleGospo, Any plans for an arm64 version?

Yes, it'll happen eventually. I can't promise it'll be a good gaming experience anytime soon though.

With the upcoming Steam Frame relying on FEX, Valve will be throwing a bunch of money making it work well

Re: Bazzite: Operating System for Linux gaming

#139

Post by dralley » Sun, Nov 30, 2025, 3:25 AM UTC

mmh0000 wrote: post #93

KyleGospo wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi, I'm the founder. While what you're saying isn't impossible, it's unlikely. In the event it did happen, Bazzite is a fork, a signing key, and a couple forked Fedora Copr repos away from being made completely in someone else's control.

Weren’t you threatening to shutdown Bazzite just a few months ago? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44381265

Someone on HN really ought to know the difference between a request for comment / change proposal and a dictat.

If nothing else, the only way these problems ever get solved is by bringing them up, surfacing the issues and providing an impetus to get them solved.

Re: Bazzite: Operating System for Linux gaming

#140

Post by ptsd_isv » Sun, Nov 30, 2025, 3:25 AM UTC

wiradikusuma wrote: post #126

I want to create a "gaming streaming platform" like Stadia as a weekend project, does anyone know where to get started? Basically where the input device and the game are in different machines.

For off the shelf shadow.tech has worked pretty reliably for me, even to the point of being usable for streaming vr using alvr (uk based).

For diy you can use moonlight / sunshine or steam remote play. I find latencies lower than around 30ms perfectly playable for everything except twitch shooters etc.

For true diy look into leveraging nvenc or equivalent hw encoder using a “zero latency” profile and build on top of UDP. TCP could be feasible for client input -> remote traffic, but even then building a minimal custom reliable layer on top of UDP probably makes sense to avoid nagle type issues. If you want to support arbitrary input devices (joysticks, wheels etc) that can’t be represented as an Xbox controller things will get pretty tricky. Especially if those devices require drivers, at that point your into proxying usb.

DIY in a weekend? Definitely.

True DIY in a weekend… probably not :)