d3Xt3r
The problem is that games don’t run at all or require major effort to run without issues.
A major cause for that is the distro - when it comes to gaming, the distro makes a huge difference as I outlined previously. The second major cause is the flavor of Wine you chose (Proton-GE is the best, not sure what you used). The third major cause is checking whether or not the games are even compatible in the first place (via ProtonDB, Reddit etc) - you should do this BEFORE you recommend Linux to a gamer.
In saying all that, I’ve no idea about pirated stuff though, you’re on your own on that one - Valve and the Wine developers obviously don’t test against pirated copies, and you won’t get much support from the community either.
Unfortunately you chose the wrong distro for your friend - Linux Mint isn’t good for gaming - it uses an outdated kernel/drivers/other packages, which means you’ll be missing out on all the performance improvements (and fixes) found in more up-to-date distros. Gaming on Linux is a very fast moving target, the landscape is changing at a rapid pace thanks to the development efforts of Valve and the community. So for gaming, you’d generally want to be on the latest kernel+mesa+wine stack.
Also, as you’ve experienced, on Mint you’d have to manually install things like Waydroid and other gaming software, which can be a PITA for newbies.
So instead, I’d highly recommend a gaming-oriented distro such as Nobara or Bazzite. Personally, I’m a big fan of Bazzite - it has everything you’d need for gaming out-of-the-box, and you can even get a console/Steam Deck-like experience, if you install the -deck variant. Also, because it’s an immutable distro with atomic updates, it has a very low chance of breaking, and in the rare ocassion that an update has some issues - you can just select the previous image from the boot menu. So this would be pretty ideal for someone who’s new to Linux, likes to game, and just wants stuff to work.
In saying that, getting games to run in Linux can be tricky sometimes, depending on the game. The general rule of thumb is: try running the game using Proton-GE, and if that fails, check Proton DB for any fixes/tweaks needed for that game - with this, you would never again have to spend hours on troubleshooting, unless you’re playing some niche game that no one has tested before.
Bazzite. Here’s why:
- Optimised for gaming (gaming optimised kernel, common tweaks pre-applied, all common gaming apps pre-installed like Steam, Mangohud etc)
- All necessary drivers pre-installed (game controllers, RGB, and even proprietary nVidia)
- A Steam-Deck like gaming experience, if you want (the Deck variant boots directly to Steam)
- Immutable and atomic (image-based OS updates, so updates either work or don’t - there’s no chance of a broken state)
- Easy rollbacks (just select the previous image in the GRUB menu)
But since you said:
how to squeeze the best performance out of this
and if you’re really serious about squeezing the best performance, then check out the Arch-based CachyOS - unlike most other Linux distros, Cachy has optimised x86-64-v3 and v4 packages in their repos, which means apps can make use of advanced CPU instructions such as SSE3, AVX512 etc. Most other Linux distros on the other hand still use x86-64-v1 for compatibility reasons, which unfortunately means that you’d be missing out on all the cool new optimised CPU instructions introduced over the past 16 years.
You can read more about microarchitecture levels (aka MARCH) here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X86-64#Microarchitecture_levels
In addition to the MARCH, Cachy’s packages have other optimisations such as LTO/PGO, optimised kernel with the BORE and Rusty schedulers which are better for gaming, plus several performance-oriented tweaks which you’d otherwise have to do manually on Arch (such as makepkg.conf tweaks, pacman.conf tweaks etc).
Finally, Cachy are always on the bleeding edge when it comes to gaming/driver/kernel/performance related stuff, so you’ll get all the good stuff even before Bazzite or other optimised distros. For instance, Cachy was the first distro to include the new nVidia driver which has explicit sync support for better Wayland compatibility, and they’re always on top of major Arch developments and provide detailed announcements which are relevant to gamers and performance freaks.
Eg, here’s their recent recent nVidia announcement:
Hi @here,
as you maybe noticed, we have rolled out the new NVIDIA Driver, which includes the explicit sync protocol and tearing for Vulkan. We have been prioritized to move this forward to finally resolve the wayland situation. Additionally arch has pushed CUDA to 12.5, which is NOT compatible with the current 550 driver (it needs the 555 Driver).
The beta driver is not perfect, but so far we are applying some fixes to avoid issues and restore performance problems with disabling the GSP Firmware load. This is handled via the “cachyos-settings” package.
Anyways, since some people maybe have problems with this driver, here is a short instruction to manually downgrade and block the driver:
[…]
If you are facing issues with the new NVIDIA Driver, reproduce the issues and then run “sudo nvidia-bugreport.sh” and report it to their forum: https://forums.developer.nvidia.com/c/gpu-graphics/linux/148
We are also shipping now an precompiled nvidia-open module. This will be also as default installed for users, which have supported cards as soon NVIDIA releases the 560 drivers.
The CachyOS Team
So as you can see, they’re pretty on to it with this sorta stuff.
Now the Bazzite team are also like the Cachy guys and keep up with this stuff, but because they’re based on Fedora, they can’t be as bleeding edge or as optimised as Arch. So it’s up to you - if you prefer stability, a primarily gaming-focused optimisations, and want something that “just works” then get Bazzite; or if you want an ultra-optimised distro to squeeze out the most performance out of your box but also don’t mind ocassionally diving into the terminal and getting your hands dirty, then get CachyOS.
cc: @01189998819991197253@infosec.pub
IMO you shouldn’t look at it as “should I become an x user”, because that sort of implies you’re getting married to that distro. Instead, you should be asking, “should I use x to solve y?” For instance, I use RHEL, Debian (Raspbian), Fedora (Asahi), Fedora Atomic (Bazzite) and Arch. I also use Windows, macOS and FreeDOS. All solve different needs and problems. There’s no rule saying you should only stick to one distro/OS use whatever suits your needs, hardware and environment the best. :)
Nice writeup, but it would’ve been nice if you added some screenshots or a short video of your setup!
- I used OneDrive, and especially the file on-demand (all files on server visible in explorer but only downloaded when needed) feature a lot
You can continue to use OneDrive. I use the OneDriver client and it works really well - your drive appears just like a local drive, but files only get downloaded when you try to access them. Once downloaded, it gets cached locally and is available offline, and is kept in sync automatically. Other cloud providers should have similar FUSE clients available.
- What are best practices for managing apps?
Best practice is to stick to packages provided by your distro’s repos. Flatpak should be your second option if you can’t find your app there, and AppImages should be your third option (since Flatpaks are superior as they can share dependencies, unlike AppImages). Avoid Snap. In fact, avoid any distros that even use Snap (*buntu). Also, if you’re on a Debian/Ububtu based distro, avoid adding PPAs (thirdparty user repositories) as far as possible, as these can cause dependency issues and may cause pain when you upgrade your distro.
Is there a GUI (I know) way to see all applications
That should be provided by your distro - Gnome-based ones have “Software” and KDE-based ones have “Discover”.
Forget Linux for a second. What you need to be aware is that both the variants come with only 4GB soldered-on RAM and eMMC storage. That means, even if you do manage to get Linux going on them, it’s going to be super slow for any sort of practical Web/GUI needs. 4GB RAM is barely enough to run a browser these days, and if you tack on a full-fledged DE and multitasking with other apps, you’ll be pushing memory pages to the disk (ie, swapping). And when that happens, you’ll really feel the slowness. Trust me, you don’t want to be swapping to eMMC - that’s super old tech, something like 3x slower than UFS, which in turn a LOT slower than m.2 NVMe (the current standard used in “proper” laptops/convertibles).
Also, consider this for perspective - even budget smartphones these days come with at least 6GB RAM and UFS storage. So this laptop/convertible - a device meant for productivity - is a complete ripoff.
If money is an issue, then just buy a used laptop (from eBay, or whatever you guys use there). If you’re aiming for good Linux compatibility then ThinkPads are a safe bet. But since you’re after a Surface-like device, then you could just get any older Surface device. Why settle for an imitation when you can get the real thing? In any case, most older x86 laptops from mainstream brands should work fine in Linux in general, just do a google for it to see if there are any quirks or issues.
Regardless of your choice, avoid the Duet 3. 4GB RAM is completely unacceptable for a laptop in 2024.
Anyone here know how to disable shorts? I could’ve sworn there was an option to disable it previously, but I can’t find it any more.
