I got the first gen rog ally while it was on a sale because I was curious if I’d like it more than my steam Deck.
Yeah the ally is collecting dust…
I wanted to then give it to my (not technically inclined, plays all games on a switch) partner when steam family library went live so she could play the vast library I have (and I was gonna setup emulators too) but I just couldn’t give it to her in good conscience. I’ve been working in IT for over 20 years and the UX for windows on a small device like the rog ally is such an utter pain in the ass that it basically ruined the experience. I used it as a living room PC for awhile by hooking it up to my TV with a KB/M but that’s just defeated the purpose of it’s form factor. It’s just a desktop PC now.
If using a Windows handheld as a traditional PC is the only comfortable way to use it for someone like me, there’s no way I’m giving that experience to someone that is used to console experiences.
Having steam OS on the rog ally (yes I’m well aware of Bazzite already existing and I’ve played around with it on the Ally, it’s just not quite there yet) would be a godsend to make the rog ally a useable device not just for myself, but definitely for the average person that grew up on consoles.
And yeah anything that can be done to get away from windows is better in my opinion. Even if Microsoft turned around tomorrow and made a “great UX for handhelds” it would still be windows. No thanks. I’ll keep a PC for the few things that just work better (or at all) on one just in case, but I don’t currently play any of the games that have the anti cheat issue on Linux anyway.
It’s great for hardware manufacturers, the consumers, and it’s great for Valve too. I for one welcome this expansion (finally) of the steam OS platform.
I’m so fucking ready to ditch Windows. I’m listening.
Very excited for the super new inductees that just want to build a Steam home console.
Buuuuut I really have not had issues with anything except Anti-Cheat (which Steam Deck has issues with anyway) using Pop!_OS on my PC.
It did take some learning, but most of that was done through just using the OS.
The only time I had issues doing something I wanted to was when I initially tried to install Mod Organizer 2 for Fallout: New Vegas. That took some reading up. Ended up being an easy fix and then all I had to do was learn how to install Windows components to my F:NV prefix in Protontricks to get almost any mod running.
So for anyone who wants to plug in and play their games, Linux is basically there. And for anyone more technical, it’s not a crazy amount more work to do the stuff you’re already doing.
I’m definitely a recent convert. I hate Windows 11 and all the various features it shoves down my throat these days. I bought a steam deck and ended up dabbling in the desktop mode enough to realize the learning process will be mostly fun for me. I’m mostly gaming these days anyway. I don’t use the computers I have at home for much more than that.
I hope this helps give Linux some love. Been using Bazzite and it seems to do the job pretty well.