I’m currently on Win11 but I’m getting that familiar Linux itch and want to dual boot a while again. I tend to gravitate towards Ubuntu simply because it’s so big and well supported by most things.
I’ve run Arch in the past but I’ve gotten too old and lazy for that if I’d be completely honest. I have played with manjaro and endeavour though… and opensuse tumbleweed, rolling is kind of nice.
Not sure what I’d try out first this time so I figured I’d get some inspiration from you guys!
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I use Pop!_OS and have been happy with it for the last couple years or so.
I think I just might have to give pop a go and see what all the fuss is about. :)
I would take a look at pop_os. It’s Ubuntu, but without Snap and a closer to mainline kernel version. They have a lot of great usability tweaks too.
I run Arch BTW. I just like to make things difficult :)
I installed Kubuntu… I couldn’t be assed to resize my efi partition to a gig and disrupt windows… Done that in the past with varying results. Wish they didn’t require it to be that big tbh.
I do miss Arch… wouldn’t surprise me if I’ll install it again soon.
Kubuntu works. But where’s the fun in that? :)
It’s like… I installed it, messed with lutris a bit (needed a newer version) and installed Diablo 4, everything works… and now I feel like I’m missing out somehow. :)
You’re missing out on chasing the dragon for the latest and greatest. :)
Arch is fine once you get it setup, but I feel like the nerd in us can never just leave it be. I’ll probably go back to pop_os next major release they have.
Sometimes I wish I had a machine dedicated to nothing but reinstalling different distros. :)
It can get a bit disrupting to do it on your main rig too often.
Use a VM?
I know, I do that too but it’s just not quite the same for some reason.
VMs are great for that
I’ve been running Linux Mint for a few years now and it’s been really good for me. Runs games through Steam and Lutris about as good as I’ve had it.
I’ve also run other distros like Pop! and Fedora here and there but they seem to give me more issues.
I’ve been on Manjaro for 3 years, honestly love it, it’s treated me great for gaming and given me so little to have to fix that my wife has also been running it for 2 years.
Got to love the wife rating :D
But yeah, I had manjaro on an old chromebook at University, it was pretty nice!
It’s funny, she’s become more of a Linux evangelist than me, she really went all in.
Sounds like a keeper! :)
She certainly is <3 celebrating 10 years this year
Good for you guys!
Thank you!
I have been quite happy with Arch Linux, up until I got my Steam Deck, at which point I stopped playing on my non-Deck PCs, so… SteamOS, I suppose.
Came here to say SteamOS as well. I am surprised more people aren’t saying it. But the thing is, the Steam Deck works so well I have to wonder how many people don’t know/care the OS it runs, or maybe they have forgotten it’s running Linux, or maybe they know but don’t consider themselves “Linux Gamers” just because they are using it.
Sort of like how people playing on a Switch or PS3/4/Vita are technically FreeBSD gamers deep down.
… which is an immutable variant of arch.
It is, but I still count it as it’s own thing, in the same way most people count Debian and Ubuntu as two seperate distributions.
Yes, you’re correct, just a little funny that you moved from arch to basically steamarch, or as I’ve recently taken to calling it, arch plus steam
I weirdly did not see anyone mentioning SteamOS? Formerly based on Ubuntu, now based on Arch, I believe.
It’s the distribution that the #SteamDeck is packaged with, and so it’s become my main gaming distrib now. :]
Are they providing the arch based version for download now? I was under the impression they’ve only set it up for steam decks but not for general use?
According to the website the public release is based off of Debian still.
Yeah, thought so. Hope they’ll publish their newer versions as well soon.
Ah cool!
Not something I’d use now then but still neat that you can get it :)
I tried HoloISO and had pretty mixed results. I’ve had much better luck with ChimeraOS.
The devs on ChimeraOS are excellent too, they take in community feedback and are very helpful.
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Tumbleweed’s always treated me very nice, you ought to try it out!
Kind of makes me wish I opted for that right now… It’s always given me a very polished feeling!
EOS / Arch.
A very simple, almost stock setup of Arch + KDE.
X11 or Wayland? I find games like csgo stutter on Wayland.
I used Manjaro with Wayland last year and had no issues at all playing games.
Wayland. I’ve had no issues, but then I don’t play CS:GO. However I’ve played Cyberpunk on ultra with no issues, for example.
Make sure you’re running the sdl environment variable that makes them native on Wayland, in my experience when that’s on it makes my games that are native significantly more performant.
I use Arch with KDE. I’ve been daily driving Arch coming up a decade now and despite testing various other distros on laptops over the years, I haven’t seen anything yet to tempt me away. I heart Pacman.
Personally I find most of the laziness factor with Arch is a non issue once you get installation done. My previous install was 6 years old and the only reason I reinstalled was because I got a new PC.
That said if an installer is a must-have then I would recommend Endeavour OS or Manjaro for best of both worlds.
True, it’s not that hard to get going either I suppose. Isn’t there a bunch of manual configuration after updates though? I have a faint memory of pacman telling me stuff that needed fixing after each update?
Last time I played around with Arth i tried their archinstall script I think it was. Pretty neat cli installer that worked rather well.
Endeavour is nice as well…
Gah, you guys are making me want to spin up a whole bunch of distros :D
Does StreamOS count?
Sure does!
I’ve been using Mint without any issues for a while now. I only play Steam games, though.
Also on the latest Mint. I really like it. I was previously on PopOS and enjoyed that, too.
Native steam with linux supported game makes things rather peachy.
I do tend to end up in Blizzard land again and again… they tend to run smoothly with some tinkering though.
I am on Mint, but I have a GPU accelerated VM running Windows 10 for gaming. It performs very well, but you run into the occasional game that detects VMs and will refuse to run.
You get a decent performance out of that? Sounds like it would take a bit of a hit?
I’m really comfortable with mint cinemon
I use Arch with XFCE. Yes, it took a while to get running properly, and just the other day I went to print something and realized cups hadn’t even been installed yet, so I spent 15 minutes getting my printer up and running, so I totally get that it’s not for everyone. I like it because of the detailed wiki with great tutorials and instructions on getting things working, like the one I used to get a nextcloud installation working on my computer. And I like it because of the extensive Arch User Repository, so I know I can install whatever I like. I mostly just play Stardew Valley and trackmania on it. I’ve used Manjaro before and enjoyed that too, and it comes with all the benefits of arch.
I installed Mint on my friends computer, which works totally fine, but I don’t know how it is for gaming; she definitely doesn’t game.
Arch really is a documentation project rather than a distro, their wiki tops most everything out there :)
Seriously, ArchWiki has taught me most of what I know about Linux.
Yeah, that’s basically where you go if you ever have some obscure problem, it’s incredibly useful really.
