Good to see someone using Linux for their platform on these handhelds. The big reason I don’t want to try the Ally or whatever the others are doing is I can’t imagine Windows is making the experience better.
I don’t really have evidence to support that, but more Linux investment is better overall.
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Its decades of abstraction hell.
In college, we learned about how old certain systems were inside Windows XP. And already, that was getting pretty thick! So when I hear things like Win10 has x feature all that way from Win95, I mentally scream.
There is a windows 3.1 database menu in windows 11.
To be fair to Microsoft (I can’t believe I actually typed that) it’s not something they can just fix without splitting Windows into a consumer and business SKU that is significantly different from current Windows. Currently the only real difference is the amount of control the end user has over the platform, but the features are pretty much the same. To make a fully “modern” version you would basically have to build Windows from the ground up to eliminate all the cruft. There is no money for Microsoft in that. Better to focus on business and let the consumer complain.
The thing is at this point with all the effort Microsoft has been putting into making Windows more linux like they could literally make future versions of windows a new Linux distribution and heavily invest in improving wine/proton to run legacy windows applications. That eliminates all those decades of ancient Windows code and keeps compatibility.
As a long time hand held user, Windows is dog shit (I mean, in general, too)
I stopped buying handhelds because of how many problems they had, until I got a steam deck. Now I’m back to being super interested in the market.
GPD Win’s were cool for what they were, but so many trivial issues related to windows.
The Ally has been great in my experience. Windows plus Asus’s overlay make everything pretty smooth to navigate.
Then if I feel like having the SteamDeck experience I can just launch Steam in big picture mode.
Then if I want the Xbox experience I can launch that app.
…and can play Switch games, and PS3/4 games…
There’s really zero downside too it. People spout hate because it’s trendy to dunk on Windows, but I just don’t see any issues.
Inb4 “but Windows is spying on you and full of bloat”… No it’s not because I took 10 min to get rid of all that shit just like I would on any gaming PC.
Not saying windows is inherently bad, but I personally would rather have a device running SteamOS on first boot up because more people using SteamOS incentivizes Valve to keep working on Proton. If anyone out there feels like windows is better for them, that’s fine since that’s their choice.
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Honestly if it runs steamOS, I don’t even think it could be considered competition. They’re on the same team.
Because of how good Proton has become, I’m considering dropping Windows and switching to Arch for gaming at my next upgrade.
Two players developing improvements to Steam OS and Proton can only make things better.
I was thinking of using Bazzite. I use Arch for my work install and have been using Arch for personal use since 2015 with Windows dual boot for gaming. Bazzite/UBlue has really surprised me and if I didn’t have an Nvidia GPU I think I would’ve already migrated completely away from Windows with Bazzite. Container based OSes with immutable root are the future IMO.
Bazzite is great, I’ve used it for a good while and it’s never let me down. Have it on my deck right now, in fact!
I’m tempted to switch to my deck to Bazzite, but I also have everything set up exactly how I want it right now and it seems like a huge pain to set everything up again.
I also know that anytime valve announces a new deck feature update I’ll immediately want to check it out.
Totally fair. On the updates, it’s a fedora based rolling release of sorts so you get kernel updates way earlier and steam updates just as regularly as vanilla on top, pretty sure it follows the preview branch by default. I remember back when I installed it I had the new color vibrancy slider months before 3.5 hit and the new mesa with smaller shader cache sizes and whatnot too.
Oo, this is the first I’ve heard of Bazzite. I’ll have to go check it out!
Lmk if you happen to need any help with it, I’m no expert but would love to lend a hand!
If I may ask, what was your motivation to run Bazzite on your deck? I’m familiar with why you’d use it on your PC (ended up having to turn back from it on my PC, as I couldn’t figure out how to disable the upscaling the desktop had), or maybe a HTPC, but I haven’t seen anyone mention why they install it on their deck so I am a bit interested now after seeing multiple people mention it.
Honestly, the short answer is because I think it’s cool and because I can haha.
The long answer is because several features I appreciate would be either impossible or extremely painful to pull off on the stock OS. In no particular order, off the top of my head:
- I like the idea of having a fedora based OS that’s stable but still as close to bleeding edge as it gets when it comes to the kernel, mesa and whatnot while retaining the steam niceties and getting easy rollbacks on top
- Easier to customize, I have my own fork with a couple of tweaks on top of mainline Bazzite
- Trying out new desktop environments comes as easy as rebasing to another image
- Btrfs with compression and deduplication on by default does wonders for space savings on proton prefixes
- It optionally installs Nix and it’s my preferred package manager (and OS!)
For a more practical example on why I appreciate the more recent packages, I remember getting that new mesa release with considerably smaller shader caches months ago, I’m not even sure vanilla Steam OS already has it.
With all that said, it really does mostly boil down to my just feeling like tinkering a little anyway. There are cool advantages but they’re pretty niche at the end of the day, I’m just the kind of nerd who loves experimenting. Hell, I’m considering test driving NixOS for the heck of it.
Plenty fair enough, thanks! That does remind me that I do need to look into Nix{OS} again, SteamOS does have built in support for Nix (or at least, I see there’s a
/nixfolder by default now). Had some issues with daily driving NixOS on my desktop a while back ago, but I suppose that doesn’t mean I can’t use it as a package manager!
If you want to switch I really recommend looking up what apps you need and if there’s a cross-platform alternative try using it before switching OS. It makes it so much easier if you’re used to the applications.
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That’s partially true, but Valve’s long term goal with SteamOS is to break their reliance on windows.
Windows previously had plans to require all new software to be installed through their Windows store, which would have destroyed Steam. Thankfully Windows backed off from this plan, but they are instead pushing windows S mode for new computers. If you buy a budget PC it will probably come locked down where it can only install Windows apps. This can be disabled, but requires you to have administrative privileges on the computer (which many kids/etc won’t have). It also requires you to log into the windows store with a Microsoft account to disable it, so they require you to take all the steps to install windows store content before you can choose to not use their store.
It’s not going to happen overnight, but I suspect the long term windows plan is to force more people (especially kids) into getting software and games through the Microsoft store. People like to buy games from the same place, so if you get kids started building their PC gaming library in the Windows store they’ll be more likely to stick with it even once they have other options.
So companies selling windows handhelds will still help valve out short term, but their long term goal (and the reason they invest so much into Linux) is to no longer be dependent on Microsoft windows to sell games. It’s also why they’re pushing for Steam on Chromebooks, to both get young users invested in steam and as another windows alternative.
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https://ayaneo.com/article/806
Here is from their website which also says “AYANEO NEXT LITE comes pre-installed with the SteamOS gaming system for the first time”.
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Of all the things I would upgrade on the deck, resolution isn’t one of them. I have never seen a game look blury on that tiny screen. That said, a lot of them are using higher res panels probably because it is what they can find in bulk.
Text intensive games are hard to read at times on the deck. Magnifier helps, but not ideal. Games like Against the Storm or some digital board games would benefit from higher resolution.
I always felt that was down to screen size more than resolution.
A digital board game is almost always going to feel claustrophobic and difficult to read/take in on a small screen tbh. They have to be designed with that audience in mind, like Civ Revolution 1/2. The information has to be more separated out (meaning way more clicking/tapping/swiping/etc.) or extremely pared down (simplifying the game).
Sweet. It will be a great opportunity to see what SteamOS can do on non-valve hardware.
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But honestly, I kind of hope Valve is involved, beating windows at this part of the market is going to do great for Linux and maybe set a precedent for other handheld makers.
They definitely should be cooperating just for the sake of ensuring updates to drivers, etc, are pushed upstream and maintained properly. It makes OS updates much easier for them when they don’t need to recompile and tweak stuff every single time they pull Valve’s most recent kernel updates and whatnot
Was about time! 😆
Except it’s not. It’s been clarified that it’s using HoloISO.
Close enough.
Interesting choice to include Aperture Desk Job onscreen in this shot
Why do you say that? It works on PCs. All you need is a controller. The game adapts to the controls you have and the ones you lack.
For example, on my Steam Controller, when it asks you to press the four buttons on the back, pressing the two paddles on the SC emulates the Deck’s two on one side and two on the other.
Finally a Deck rival I might actually be interested in.
heck yeah
What happens to AyaneoOS then?
From what I heard, they decided to use SteamOS instead. They wanted to avoid “fragmentation”, although I’m not sure that would really be a concern for Linux.
I imagine steamOS is going to be a more polished experience than AyaneoOS would have been, and hopefully have better support/updates.
what likely happened is they l9oked at the work they would need to do, then looked at the outcome they would get, compared that against SteamOS and concluded that slightly rebranding it would be the better option (think custom boot splash, maybe more launchers pre-installed)
Great news and I’m sure that more will follow.
Fantastic. One of the weirdest things I’ve heard from people casually interested in Steam Deck is: can I put Windows on it? Things like this at least suggest to those people that, in fact, not everyone using the Deck is wrong when they say the SteamOS/Linux experience is great, after years of work.
Of course the competition is good too!
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Every handheld outside of the Steam Deck, like the ROG Ally, Legion Go, and MSI Claw all use Windows, which can make the experience crippling for non-technically minded users.
Clearly this games journalist has never used Linux because despite the monumental efforts Valve have made to make thousands of games run on SteamOS and improve the UX through Proton, it is still an inferior experience to Windows for anybody that isn’t incredibly tech savvy and the kind of person that lives and breathes command lines.
But then again, what did I expect from an industry where people are genuinely paid to talk out of their butts about games.
Speaking as a Steam Deck owner, SteamOS works a lot of the time and that’s perfectly acceptable. But there has been the occasional ‘Steam Deck Verified’ game like Cthulhu Saves The World which soft locks on a black screen after battles.
Also, Linux is ideal for the kind of people that buy budget handheld devices like these. They are phenomenal emulation devices.
it is still an inferior experience to Windows for anybody that isn’t incredibly tech savvy and the kind of person that lives and breathes command lines.
Since when do you have to live and breathe command lines to use SteamOS?
But then again, what did I expect from an industry where people are genuinely paid to talk out of their butts about games.
Yeah, there’s only one person talking out of their butt here.
But there has been the occasional ‘Steam Deck Verified’ game like Cthulhu Saves The World which soft locks on a black screen after battles.
Oh well, I guess if you have a problem with one verified game then we should all write off the entire platform then.
I agree, for the lay person the steamos experience in the deck is great and has no issues it installs things it plays things, most people won’t need to open the desktop experience at all
I have installed heroic (Epic Games games) and many other things without touching the terminal (also it’s read-only so…)
What is read-only?
My Windows friends and even normie friends are using Steam Deck with SteamOS just fine. You don’t have to be a Linux expert to use SteamOS.
I agree that these are phenomenal emulation devices, you are right about that.
