Source is this video:
Windows Was The Problem All Along - Dave2D
We could obviously compare performance between windows and steamOS before on the steam deck, or between windows and Bazzite on other handhelds. But this is the first time we have had official windows and SteamOS builds for the same hardware.
Valve doubling down on Linux as the default OS on the Steam Deck was such a great decision. It obviously has given them a massive competitive edge. Windows has become so horribly bloated, and Microsoft has almost zero interest in making it run more efficiently.
Personally I feel what it gave them - primarily - was the ability to be independent of Microsoft, not beholden to them in any way whatsoever, and not having to pay them any license fees.
The fact that after putting so much work into making Proton and that whole toolchain amazing it actually turned out faster than Windows, well, that’s juat the delicious icing on the cake, from a commercial perspective.
Hmm, it’s like having spyware constantly run in the background slows down the computer?
Goes to show how much bloat is in Windows that it kills hardware like this.
Maybe I need Cortana, Microsoft Excel, and OneDrive while I play Doom Eternal. You don’t know me.
Me looking up from my speed-running Excel sheets: “what”
Thibking bout that time a discord admin told me windows and linux use the same amount of resources and she knows cause she works in it.
Well yeah duh windows and Linux use the same resources. I don’t put more memory in my computer when I boot into Linux…
Valve won. Maybe it’s lucky timing, or maybe Gabe is actually a genius, but it’s only going to get worse for Windows as there is no way in hell Microsoft shifts resources from AI projects to make Windows better for PC gaming. Recently, Capcom announced that their PC gaming sales surpassed their console sales, and I don’t think it’s likely we’ll see that trend changing, and it’s also likely other publishers will make similar announcements soon (although idk if they count SteamOS as a console). The Switch 2 is coming out soon, but people already say it’s too expensive, and there are controversies surrounding some of their product decisions.
Will this bring about the era of the Linux desktop? Idk, but the era of the Linux gaming PC is inevitable now.
Will Steam do for the gaming PC what porn did for the internet?
Windows Gamers (who will never switch to Linux): Linux still isn’t ready for mass adoption
Windows Gamers (who will never switch to Linux)
So you accept that Linux is not the problem. We are litterally at the point where it will get mass Adoption in the next few years. That is what this post is about. That you can litterally go out and buy a fully complete gaming system preinstalled with Linux that performs better than the same system with Windows.
We are very close to the point where the only thing holding Linux gaming back is marketing.
Marketing and market availability are the biggest problems. People need to be able to go into any store, buy a handheld/laptop/desktop and have it include Linux without them asking.
Don’t forget educational institutes. Linux should be the defacto OS at such places. The younger generation’s first interaction with a PC is at school. If they are used to Linux from a young age, this is greatly help them ease into the Linux mindset (package manager, terminal).
Which is exactly why Google and Apple give free computers to public schools. Good luck getting them to turn that down.
That too, as well as in professional and government settings.
100% agree. That is coming soon though. Microsoft has had vendor lock’in for the last 30 years which guaranteed engineering dollars (drivers, software, testing) spent by OEMs to support Windows. SteamOS is breaking the grip of Microsoft though. If Microsoft is too slow to react, SteamOS will become entrenched for gaming and that will guarantee engineering dollars are spent on SteamOS support (again, drivers, software, testing), which will upstream to Linux. At that point, 3rd party hardware, peripherals, and software will be targeting SteamOS and Linux. OEMs will have already spent engineering dollars to support their hardware in SteamOS (and Linux), so they wouldn’t hesitate to start shipping Linux machines to the big box stores. It’s Microsoft’s market to lose though.
Keep in mind Linux had this opportunity during netbooks, Microsoft simply forced them to abandon Linux and threatened contracts. Yes, many computers shipped Linux and in what I can only describe as a blatantly illegal move (and cornering of the market) Microsoft forced them to use Windows. If OEMs like Dell or HP start selling as many Linux PCs as Windows PCs Microsoft can just threaten contracts.
I had figured that would be the case this time as well. There is no way Microsoft will let their OEMs off their leash if they can help it. At first I thought there was no way any Windows OEM would be allowed, SteamOS on their handheld officially supported, or even sold that way. But I learned recently, at BUILD 2014, Microsoft made Windows free for devices with screens 8" or less, mostly IoT. I think that would count for these handhelds as well. So I think this time will be different.
The way I understand the contracts you are mentioning, the deal is, they have to sell a Windows license with every PC they sell. When a company like Dell or Lenovo sell machines with Linux, it’s usually in the 10,000 range, (at least that I can tell) which is something Dell or Lenovo can eat the cost of. Plus, most of the machines go to companies that already have Volume Licensing deals already, so basically the Windows Tax is paid for in some way already.
But I think this time will be different because there will be a ramp up of devices and competition in the handheld space where there is no Windows Tax required. Valve will surely release a Steam Console and that will probably become the new PS2/DVD player that everybody buys. When people are buying consoles instead of PCs, OEMs are already spending engineering dollars on Linux for the handheld market, and 3rd party software and devices are suddenly competing in the Linux space. It’s a stretch, but I really think SteamOS is breaking the grip of Microsoft’s vendor lock’in strategy and we are just seeing the very beginning stages with Windows OEMs officially supporting SteamOS.
I hadn’t heard of free windows for smaller screen devices, but from reading on it I think it only applies to phones/tablets/IoT devices. I’m guessing handheld PCs would be excluded from that discount.
From reading on how Windows licenses are priced before, there’s also usually variable rate license pricing depending on the “power” of the device, with more powerful devices having to pay a larger OEM license fee. With handheld PCs being gaming focused devices, I would assume that means Microsoft is charging more per license than the base rate.
I believe you. I know I’m stretching it here. Only because it’s just not like Microsoft to allow their OEMs off the leash. It’s not unlike Microsoft to bring the full force and weight of the legal system down on their partners. And we definitely know Microsoft wouldn’t hesitate to tie another company up in court just the for the sake of draining them of their operating cash. I’m just thinking, maybe there is a way that these handhelds fit into the free Microsoft licensing. I mean, knowing Microsoft is just going to crack the whip, why even spend the engineering dollars supporting Linux hardware in the first place. Maybe to give them leverage against Microsoft I guess.
My partner and I have been transitioning to Linux over the past month or so, dual booting for now.
Linux still isn’t ready for mass adoption.
If you don’t mind me asking: What problems did you run into? And what distro were you using?
I’ve tested out Manjaro, KDE Neon, Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Debian, Mint, and Fedora - across two desktops and a laptop.
Problems have been all over the spectrum. Not being to install at all, trouble getting it to dual boot after installing (despite following a guide), getting NAS drives to be writeable, hardware compatibility, finding alternatives to proprietary software which may or may not do everything the original did, and more.
I’m semi enjoying the tinkering for now, and I’m not regretting trying to de-Windows as much as possible, but I think people who say Linux is ready for mainstream are out of touch with the average person’s computer literacy.
dual booting anything with windows (including another copy of windows) is an insufferable nightmare caused by windows.
Not all instances were dual booting, nor are all of the problems I’ve encountered or described above related with dual booting.
👍 completely valid. just pointing out windows is a malicious cohabitant on a drive
Even among that I’ve varied. In one installation I have Windows sharing a drive, separate partition for Linux. In another computer they’re on completely different drives.
If you want gaming you should try the nobara distro, great stuff
I do a lot of things other than gaming.
Oh ok very interesting. Thanks for the insight.
And good luck :D
Imagine the hardware compatibility issues you’d have trying to install MacOS on your machine. Probably a nightmare. Better to just buy hardware that is compatible with the OS you want to run.
Well it’s not a very compelling sales pitch to tell me to ditch the multiple thousands of dollars of hardware and just buy new stuff. If the goal is to get people to switch to Linux from Windows, I hope you’re not the one leading the charge.
I think setting expectations appropriately is a reasonable expectation of new users. Microsoft expects it of Windows users. Apple expects it of MacOS users. For Linux, nope, we must have a different standard. If we don’t, Linux isn’t ready for the average user. Got news for you, average users don’t install Windows, they don’t install MacOS, and they don’t install Linux or any other OS. They buy pre-built machines where everything is taken care of. Average users buying pre-built machines do not experience the woes of a tech nerd.
Even gamers do more than just game on their PC, though.
That’s fair, but unless what you do requires windows in some way (like, say, Photoshop), Linux tends to be better for productivity as well, if you learn it
But of course, I understand that it takes some upfront work and learning to change your workflow, so I don’t blame people for not doing it
i’m using photogimp and haven’t looked back, it’s surprisingly robust
Sure, but they are comparing SteamOS, which is a stripped down OS that does not have all the capabilities of a full Linux OS.
Just try using any photo editing software on SteamOS. Even ones compatible with Linux.
Most people dont use Windows because its compatible with more software, they use it because thats what their computer came with. If computers just starting shipping Linux then software will come.
Most people just need a web browser for most of their needs, unless you have a need for a specific software that’s Windows only and doesn’t have a good Linux alternative,
It’s gotten so seamless now, and wine has gotten pretty good. I can download a Windows executable, double click it, go through the regular Windows installer, and then have it make a shortcut on my desktop which will launch it.
Your average user won’t even know all the Dark Magics making it possible, or that they were supposed to have looked around for a Linux alternative, it just works
I personally like using my Legion Go for LLM training /s
I’m still waiting for games with big anticheats to run on Linux. Until I can play Fortnite with my nephew on Linux I won’t swap over.
Unfortunately the Epic CEO is explicitly blocking Linux. Fortnite runs, but he doesn’t like Linux.
Holy shit triple the hours
Finally an extra 3 1/2 hours of… dead cells? 3 more hours of… FPS? the hell is this graph?
i expected a small performance hit.
this is actually very impressive considering it runs through a compatibility layer.
makes a lot of sense honestly. I never knew the numbers behind it (tks for sharing). when I was ripping witcher 3 on nobara and then changed my OS back to Windows due to work related issues, I felt a SIGNIFICANT performance drop. the game became laggy, when it used to run top on Linux with the same settings. good share - the time for Linux gaming is now.
Back in ~2010, my first dual boot was an Ubuntu. It was fairly easy to run WoW from Linux and it gave me a solid >15fps while Windows ran at less than 10fps.
I was very young at the time but still aware that this was super impressive with extra compatibility layers. That definitely took part in selling Linux to me.
I could barely get Minecraft to run 20fps on this old laptop I had given to me a few years ago. Loaded Ubuntu on it and Minecraft ran near 60fps. Blew my mind.
Pull the DE out and you could probably squeeze that performance out on a modded instance
I am a little curious how something like Ubuntu would do on one of these gaming handhelds. Steam OS is a nicer user experience but I always wonder if it also adds any significant optimization.
I think you’re a bit better off with SteamOS’s gamescope rather than going through gnome-shell.
What do you mean? It’s just steamos is arch linux with a fancy suit.
Arch can be configured many different ways.
iirc the original SteamOS for the SteamBox was Debian-based (like Ubuntu), i think they switched it to Arch since it moves a bit faster and offers a bit better compatibility.
No, they switched because Arch has a rolling release
i know but it’s a thread full of windows gamers and that’s more or less the important takeaway for them. i know there’s a lot more to it than that.
Potayto potahto
Spoderman no
I’d love to know what windows figures would be like with a stripped down guts ripped out windows, such as revi.cc.
pls dont suggest this blatantly obvious russian/us/chinese surveillance tool jesus chriat pls dont tell me people actually use this… if youre worried about security use a hardened linux distro this is just crazy
No, this one is different. It’s not an ISO you download (those are extremely sus and you would be right to be skeptical of them), but instead an open source set of scripts you apply to an existing Windows OS.
Edit: see my comment below, it seems to be partially closed source.
Care to explain ?
Not OP, but I assume it’s got something to do with entrusting an unaudited, closed-source 3rd party to significantly alter your OS.
There are plenty of similar tools available, which are both open source and can be run by the end-user over a stock Windows installation.
But it is open source …
https://github.com/meetrevision
The playbook is for Windows AME of which there are some other playbooks and is also open source.
Although it seems like there’s a cloudflare issue accessing their self hosted git but I’m pretty sure I’ve seen it before 🤔
There’s also the unattended scripts and other windows debloaters that can be ran. My original point being I’d like to see a stripped down windows 11 vs steamos
This is only one half of the open source. Those scripts are not poweshell or bash scripts, but instead something simimar to Ansible, run through the Windows AME wizard.
Which I cannot find the source code for. Great!
I think this is the command line onlu version, but the GUI versiom appears to be closed source.
How does revi compare to AtlasOS?
Very similar. I preferred Revi in my testing last year as there was less added stuff and wasn’t as “gamers fuck yeah”
I might check it out for my Windows VM then. Thanks.
That’s interesting. But the second graph is designed to confuse.
Why is it confusing? Maybe I’m confused, not sure.
The Legion Go is on top and on the bottom, with the Deck in between. And the color scheme isn’t helping.
why is fps labeled with hours and minutes? what is “dead cells” and why is it also labeled hours and minutes?
edit wow i was even more confused about it than i thought. what a terrible graph.
The title is battery life, that’s why it’s hours and minutes. Dead Cells is a video game.
yeah it took me a while, it’s an awful graph and i haven’t had coffee yet
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So a specialized OS wins over a general OS in their specific tasks?
Amazing …
It’s impressive that’s still the case when SteamOS is running a translation layer that Windows doesn’t have to.
Also, SteamOS is actually a pretty fully-featured OS, and it’s based off of Linux, so it’s not that specialized, besides the UI.
Yeah it’s basically Arch with KDE Neon/gamescope that runs Steam in Big Picture mode with an immutable file system. That’s why Bazzite is able to make a StramOS-like experience. The hardest things are the hardware-specific tweaks.
SteamOS is able to launch a desktop environment where you can do anything you want. It is just an OS like Windows, but better.
Cool, can you run video rendering software on it? How about some cli? Can you delete packages? Or even remove the french language?
Yes, yes, yes, yes.
yes, it’s a desktop OS. it’s literally arch linux. i have a friend who slaps the steamos recovery image on every pc now and just uses it as their go-to daily driver.
If I had a trillion dollars, and no desire to add telemetry bloat to my OS, and I’m incentivized to compete in the market…
