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I dumped Windows 11 for Linux, and you should too

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Re: I dumped Windows 11 for Linux, and you should too

#121

Post by IshKebab »

ndepoel wrote: post #112
IshKebab wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

80% is really impressive, but another way to state it is that 20% of the games you try won't work. I don't think I'd put up with that if I was a gamer. I guess maybe it's not evenly distributed. Do a higher percentage of the most popular games work?

That 20% is mostly covered by competitive online multiplayer games that use kernel-level anti-cheat systems which will only work on Windows. There's not a whole lot Valve can do about that, other than continuing to push Linux for gaming and hope that it gets popular enough to create an incentive for anti-cheat providers to start targeting Linux as well.

I never understood why game devs don't just segregate players based on their anti-cheat status. Have a setting in the game like "only play with anti-cheat verified players" that defaults to yes.

That way Linux gamers can still play with other Linux gamers if they want (and cheaters).

Not an ideal situation but probably better than nothing.

Re: I dumped Windows 11 for Linux, and you should too

#122

Post by ndkap »

Jackknife9 wrote: post #42

I tried to leave Windows 11 for Linux - it just didn't work for me. I installed EndeavourOS onto my main gaming desktop. It worked great for a while and ran all the games I played with my friends. However, one night when I went on to play a game I ran a system update and it seemed to completely break my nvidea drivers - I tried reinstalling them and also using the open source driver. This meant I just couldn't play a…

I think using an atomic distro like Bazzite would have solved your problem.

Re: I dumped Windows 11 for Linux, and you should too

#123

Post by Telaneo »

IshKebab wrote: post #81
Saoshyant wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. Valve (Steam) spent more than a decade building and refining a translation layer called Proton. Nearly 80% of the vast Steam library is now compatible with Linux to the point they are releasing actual Linux consoles (Steam Deck and Steam Machine). For your regular PC, you can install a gaming-focused distribution like Bazzite to get everything sorted out automatically.

80% is really impressive, but another way to state it is that 20% of the games you try won't work. I don't think I'd put up with that if I was a gamer. I guess maybe it's not evenly distributed. Do a higher percentage of the most popular games work?

Games with kernel-mode anti-cheat consistently don't work and probably never will (barring them having it removed or made optional). Titles released more recently are more likely to not work simply due to not having had fixes applied to them, although a rather large amount of newer games work fine out of the box if they aren't doing weird stuff. Other than that it's a toss-up, since while it's usually the same few things that prevent games from working properly on Linux, it's not something you as Jonothan S. Gamer will know about unless you go and do research and check ProtonDB and whatnot.

A good rule of thumb is that single player games generally just™ work and that older games generally just™ work.

Re: I dumped Windows 11 for Linux, and you should too

#124

Post by dominicm »

dividedbyzero wrote: post #23

Not saying I'm not considering it given the current political climate, but I'm spoiled by my Macbook Air. The Thinkpad I've been issued for work costs about the same, runs hot like crazy, always has fans running, is cheap-feeling plastic, thicker, heavier, garbage touchpad, weird keyboard layout (printscreen right next to the arrow keys, what were they thinking?), mushy keys, barely serviceable display ... what do I…

I mean, it's certainly not as seamless as an open x86 machine, but if you have an Air already you can always try Linux on it? The Fedora Asahi spin [1] supports pretty much everything on M1/M2 devices.

[1] https://asahilinux.org/fedora/#device-support

Re: I dumped Windows 11 for Linux, and you should too

#125

Post by nickjj »

I also switched to Linux last month. It hasn't been a smooth experience with my GPU as I'm encountering memory leaks in popular compositors. I also get 150-200ms keyboard input delay in all games using some compositors but not all. I documented as much as I could here https://nickjanetakis.com/blog/gpu-memory-allocation-bugs-wi....

Still, despite all of that when it works it is better than Windows. It's just ironic that my Linux desktop is less stable than Windows 10 since I have to reboot 2-3 times a day from GPU memory leaks. Windows 10 was really stable with the same hardware and had no input delay in games. I only rebooted when the OS pushed an update since I keep my machine on 24 / 7.

Re: I dumped Windows 11 for Linux, and you should too

#127

Post by rasur »

nickjj wrote: post #117
rasur wrote: post #111

Gaming is all well and good, but I'd be interested to hear of experiences with moving and using Audio apps (Ableton Live, Cubase and other Steinberg apps, plus many VSTs) from Windows to Linux. I see Wine, YABridge and LinVST mentioned in searches, but while I've got plenty of Linux experience, I'm time-poor and would prefer to make computers make noises rather than spend my time making things work. I have Reaper whi…

I can't speak for DAWs but in 2019 when I tried switching to native Linux my Scarlett 2i2 3rd gen USB audio interface did not play nicely with Debian at the time. I'd get an endless amount of crackles and pops during recordings / playback and I spent days going over tons of audio configs / tools (Jack, Alsa, PulseAudio, etc.). They weren't xruns, at least Jack wasn't reporting them as that. Buffer sizes were normal t…

Yeah, these days the Scarletts are fine (as is the aging Firewire connected Edirol FA-101 I've got attached). Non-DAW things such as Supercollider work fine, but I focus less on that sort of environment (which isn't a dis - SC is great!).

Re: I dumped Windows 11 for Linux, and you should too

#128

Post by ahartmetz »

foobarbecue wrote: post #28
dividedbyzero wrote: post #23

Not saying I'm not considering it given the current political climate, but I'm spoiled by my Macbook Air. The Thinkpad I've been issued for work costs about the same, runs hot like crazy, always has fans running, is cheap-feeling plastic, thicker, heavier, garbage touchpad, weird keyboard layout (printscreen right next to the arrow keys, what were they thinking?), mushy keys, barely serviceable display ... what do I…

So the weird answer is... a better model Lenovo. They vary from plastic disaster to metal or carbon fiber dream machine.

Yeah, if you don't like the case quality of a T model Thinkpad, you are the problem ;) - fiber reinforced plastic is arguably a more suitable laptop case material than aluminum.

Lenovo's cheap laptops are as bad as anyone's.

Re: I dumped Windows 11 for Linux, and you should too

#130

Post by JCattheATM »

dividedbyzero wrote: post #23

Not saying I'm not considering it given the current political climate, but I'm spoiled by my Macbook Air. The Thinkpad I've been issued for work costs about the same, runs hot like crazy, always has fans running, is cheap-feeling plastic, thicker, heavier, garbage touchpad, weird keyboard layout (printscreen right next to the arrow keys, what were they thinking?), mushy keys, barely serviceable display ... what do I…

Mac hardware is overrated. Asus ExpertBooks, Thinkpads and Dell XPS models are all very nice, and have lasted for just as long as Macbooks do.
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