If steam makes steam os proper desktop OS are you using it

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ballshitter900@reddit

steamos seems better positioned for people with 0 linux experience

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historianLA@reddit

Yes, and even then without prior Linux experience the desktop mode is not as simple as most people need.

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PsyOmega@reddit

SteamOS desktop mode is pretty simple.

You never have to open a command line.

You can find and install any app you really need from the app store (Discover). Not different from MS or Apple in that regard these days.

The browser, which is 99% of what people will be doing on desktop mode, is right there.

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Swizzel-Stixx@reddit

Yeah I can see people switching laptops to steam OS because it’s the Linux flavour that they’re used to. Would be good for steam deck owners who want to use desktop Linux

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Thats really not a good reason to do that though, the steamos desktop is just kde and you can get that with almost any distro. Other distros would have better driver support for non-valve hardware so unless you have a valve laptop its probably not a good idea.

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Swizzel-Stixx@reddit

Not a good reason to an experienced Linux user, no. But if a normie wanted to have the exact same experience then they likely would see about installing the exact same os. If someone comes along and says “arch KDE is 90% the same and with better hardware support” they might glaze over and go back to thinking linux is ‘too hard’, if you see what I mean

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ACaffeinatedBear@reddit

I do, but they are gonna think the same thing when their sound or wifi doesnt work because of driver issues.

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Particular-Poem-7085@reddit

Desktop steamOS "flavor" is just KDE. It's arch KDE with steam guaranteed to run out of the box.

I see the value in having a corporate backed OS from a company most gamers trust and sounds less scary than Ubuntu or Fedora. Just install SteamOS to play steam games, it has the potential to take it to the masses.

The masses who have never touched a steamdeck.

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CreativeGPX@reddit

It depends.

If the person with no experience is likely to remain a relatively casual user, yeah, it works fine out of the box and the immutable nature of the distro will provide a level of stability against accidentally messing things up.

However, if the person with no experience wants to start customizing things, then it's really easy for a person with no Linux experience to pick up a bunch of Linux guides and do things that they don't realize are going to get wiped out because it's an immutable distro. Most how-to guides on Linux aren't written with the expectation that you have an immutable distro. So, it can be a headache in that case.

So, I'd say it's more about how much a person plans to engage with the system-level stuff rather than how much experience they have.

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shogun77777777@reddit

Isn’t Bazzite the same?

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minilandl@reddit

yeah but silly windows users want valve TM Linux

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

Yeah okay now that I think about it that seems logical

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FattySnacks@reddit

Still Ubuntu

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gerowen@reddit

On my Deck? No. They made the hardware so I'll leave their OS on it unless I start having serious issues. My gaming desktop will probably stay on Bazzite as it gets more frequent updates than SteamOS.

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just_here_for_place@reddit

I don’t see any reason to switch. What would it provide me that can’t be found in any of their other mainstream distros?

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

Other than really good steam integration nothing

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edparadox@reddit

really good steam integration

What's that even supposed to mean?

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Particular-Poem-7085@reddit

It comes preinstalled

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themmousebehindyou@reddit

Taking 2 seconds to download the steam flatpak is soo hard...

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Particular-Poem-7085@reddit

people choose entire operating systems over running a few commands,
If you're a gamer choose GamingOS. Unless you have an nvidia card then install nGamingOS!!! I would rather choose a distro I like and install the video driver myself but go figure.

I wouldn't be surprised if steamOS can make it big just because people trust valve and "flawless steam integration"

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themmousebehindyou@reddit

That's what I'm thinking. And honestly if that's what they want to feel, IDC more people on Linux is overall better for the community I feel. More people means more people wanting to tinker around which means more people on forums or reddit or discord talking about stuff and maybe catching more people that give back. And even if not, more gaming companies would want to catch that growing Linux user base.

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

I just thought given steam is valves biggest thing the whole operating system would kind of be based on it

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lKrauzer@reddit

You are still not making any sense, there is no such thing as "good steam integration". Steam will work absolutely the same on any distro that you install. About the only real difference is the gaming mode option, which again, you can install on literally any other distro.

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Amazing_Meatballs@reddit

SteamOS is based on Arch.

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loozerr@reddit

Whatever they do likely isn't exclusive to their own OS.

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bombero_kmn@reddit

I think that's exactly where the big win will be, though.

I love games but I still kinda hate gaming in Linux. And I certainly don't want to take away from the amazing work that got us to where we are - I've been using Linux for over 30 years and I never thought we'd be here, so I'm extremely grateful.

But I work with computers ALL DAY. when I want to play a game I want it to load, install and run with no effort on my part. I don't want to adjust things, I don't want to debug, I don't want some kludge just to play fallout. I want to tune out, heat up my GPU and just chill.

Again, not knocking the great work of wine, proton etc, but if someone can deliver a 100% "game ready" distro I'd install it on at least one machine.

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Legitimate_Fig_4096@reddit

Is this not what steam already provides? I know not all games work flawlessly out of the box but I’ve literally never had to spend any time doing anything more than telling steam to download the game.

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bombero_kmn@reddit

I suppose it depends on the games, and most of them do work flawlessly. Again, everyone involved around this is doing great things - the fact we can play ANY windows games is amazing to me.

I'd say maybe a third of the games in my library have had issues, most minor but took time, and some are still unsolvable.

But coming back to the original comment, if steam shipped a distro and backed it up with "every steam game works 100% out of the box, and most of gog too" I'd give it a run on my gaming box.

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Calico_Shortcake@reddit

SteamOS just makes some tweaks for the SteamDeck, like adding a GUI to configure its hardware.

While on desktop mode, SteamOS is just like any other KDE environment.

And even for other handhelds, I believe other projects, like Bazzite, can offer more support, while replicating all good parts of the GUI of SteamOS.

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just_here_for_place@reddit

What is a really good Steam integration? What is missing from other distros in this regard?

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wiebel@reddit

If it stays similar to the steam deck version it will provide immutable root which is worth considering for many reasons. But it's of course not exclusive to steam but still to most mainstream distros.

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joeyb908@reddit

Immutable root? As in the base image you can download for any distro?

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wiebel@reddit

No it's more complicated, basically it operates with an read-only root and/or it restores that state on every reboot. Other distros with that feature are Fedora Silverblue or Nitrux. Even NixOS encourages to configure it immutable.

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signalno11@reddit

SteamOS is immutable, similar to Fedora Atomic, MicroOS, and NixOS (although NixOS is its own thing)

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signalno11@reddit

Fedora Atomic

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bobthebobbest@reddit

Why would I switch from Hannah Montana Linux to an inferior distro ?

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sparky8251@reddit

You are fundamentally misunderstanding what a distro is. Linux is not Windows or macOS and people need to stop conflating them. Distribution is the word used, not version or product, for a reason. The model of making an OS for Linux is entirely different.

The ONLY thing Valve can do that no one else can do is push an exact hardware config their distro is paired with. And even that can be copied by others technically once they push the hardware platform too.

Theres literally nothing unique Valve can bring to the table with their own distro.

And, going by Valves current actions around their distro, they are incredibly slow to patch and fix things so why would you even want to use their disto over an arch flavor (what Valve builds on top of) if you dont use their hardware? Youll be missing features and bug fixes and performing worse because many changes, even gaming specific, take a very long time to trickle into SteamOS.

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ImWaitingForIron@reddit

Nope

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-eschguy-@reddit

Why would I leave NixOS? I don't even run SteamOS on my Deck.

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PERISAKLARSSON@reddit

I’m using CachyOS for bleeding edge features and the AUR. SteamOS kinda just seems like a downgrade to me unless I’m using a product tailored to it.

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TooManyPenalties@reddit

No. For PC gaming I still want a regular desktop OS it’s the same reasons I don’t use Bazzite. I don’t want all this sandboxing etc, full OS where I can access and change whatever I want.

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ShadowFlarer@reddit

No, i see no reason to switch to it if i already can do what i want it on mine.

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IshYume@reddit

I like arch, other than official support it adds nothing but makes it more complicated if i run into issues due to lack of documentation

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INITMalcanis@reddit

It's not undocumented... https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Main_page

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IshYume@reddit

I don't know what changes valve made to arch though, whereas I know what I did to setup my system.

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INITMalcanis@reddit

Very fair comment.

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ColbieSterling@reddit

No

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PintekS@reddit

I mean I'm already using bazzite on a all amd build.

Everyone talks about desktop os and they forget something massive... One of the gpu manufacturers has not been playing nice with gamescope for a while now... Now if Linux gets mass adopted more that particular company might get off their ai drunk ass and fix all their particular glaring bugs on Linux to make none all amd builds functionaly on parity

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Kamikazepyro9@reddit

If they can solve the desktop app aspect, like include Libre office or what not, then I'd probably install it for my wife since she primarily games with it.

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MairusuPawa@reddit

Eternal September moment

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Livid-Assignment-260@reddit

No. If you already have steam installed, why would you reinstall everything or dual boot just for another Steam interface?

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Sixguns1977@reddit

They'd have to include something that makes me want to switch. I'm definitely not switching off is immutable I love their version of plans, but some stuff that's easy to do in Garuda is a pain in the ass on Steam Deck. And I don't want that console gui they have anywhere near my desktop computer.

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

What's Garuda sorry

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INITMalcanis@reddit

https://garudalinux.org/editions

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Sixguns1977@reddit

Arch based gaming distro. Been on it for 2 years or so.

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

Ahh okay

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Sixguns1977@reddit

I used Pop for about a year. When I got my Steam deck, I liked its desktop mode, and started searching for beginner friendly gaming distros that are arch based+kde. I've been on Garuda ever since.

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Rhosta@reddit

If Valve makes proper desktop OS then yes, but so far SteamOS is specialized OS for specific devices, that isn't meant for that and I doubt Valve wants to make one. There are other distros that are meant for that and you can have Steam there with its Big Picture mode. I mean, check Gabes interview with IGN on Steam Deck. There philosophy is well explained there, they essentially want you to use whatever you want and support you in that as long as you don't use some closed platform that would prevent them from doing that.

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INITMalcanis@reddit

No, but it's moot as I highly doubt that they will. Other distributions fill this niche very well, and Valve has no particular reason to dilute their focus on extracting the absolute most efficiency from their low-end hardware.

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ACaffeinatedBear@reddit

Unless you are running it on valve's hardware I dont think there is any benefit. They have already gotten most games working on linux in general and the few that dont because of anticheat are because of the games developers choosing not to support it and not any real technical limitation.

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

Hmm ok

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ACaffeinatedBear@reddit

I should add that steamos is an immutable distro which makes it more stable and harder to break but can cause issues running some software and tools.

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

Ahh ok

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Much_Dealer8865@reddit

No. Unless they decide to change to arch with a sick tiling wm I can't see myself wanting to install it besides maybe in a VM just to fool around with but even that feels pointless.

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daddy_schlong_legz@reddit

Wait how is it not already?

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

I don't know ask valve

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Other_Fly_4408@reddit

If somebody made a keyboard with proper punctuation keys, would you use it?

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IAmRasputin@reddit

I probably wouldn't switch, but I'd be cheering them on from over here in Gentoo-land.

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monolalia@reddit

No, I don’t see what for. Already got a desktop OS that does all the same things (and more, by not being immutable)

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ratcorporation@reddit

Don’t want to use KDE

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Liarus_@reddit

nah

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edparadox@reddit

I already have issues choosing between Arch, Debian, and NixOS, and I cannot justify having another machine at the same spot.

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

Ahhh Ok I spent like a straight hour good googling what just I should use and decided on Ubuntu for my PC and nobara for my laptop

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EJ_Drake@reddit

A.I. will help you decide something like this in like 5 min.

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L4mpshade@reddit

you could also flip a coin in less than 5 minutes

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Shap6@reddit

Those are such different distro for different use cases seems like the choice would be easy. Do you want bleeding edge? Arch. Do you want old slow and stable? Debian. Do you want an easily reproducible declarative system? NixOS.

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

Sorry is that directed at me or edparadox

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fellipec@reddit

Maybe, if I decide it is better to me than Linux Mint, I would switch.

But being more realistic, I doubt will have any difference big enough to be worthy the hassle of switching.

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Wheatleytron@reddit

Nah, CachyOS is just SteamOS but better

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TakeshiRyze@reddit

Except its not

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Wheatleytron@reddit

It is, minus the immutability. Which, to be fair, is more of a negative than a positive.

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TakeshiRyze@reddit

And we are totally gonna ignore that they are a small team of unknown people who might be compromising your OS with no consequences. Or might stop all os maintenance at any point.

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Wheatleytron@reddit

It's Arch-based. So worst comes to worst, just switch to the standard Arch packages, or switch to Arch entirely.

It's one of the most pophlar distros at the moment, though, so I don't see it going anywhere for a good while.

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

Hmm okay I'll look into that

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Marasuchus@reddit

Immutable... nope.

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arthursucks@reddit

I almost never play games so I just don't see a benefit.

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hesapmakinesi@reddit

It is a pretty decent desktop OS. During one family visit I was without my laptop, but a set of keyboard, mouse, and a TV connected to my Steam Deck was useful enough for my browsing, discord, video editing needs.

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iveseenthisonebefore@reddit

Yes.

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degoba@reddit

I use it as my main desktop OS just fine.

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captainstormy@reddit

It would never replace Fedora or Debian on my machines that are running those. I do have a PC I use as a gaming console in the Living room running Bazzite. It might replace that one at most but honestly I've got no issue with Bazzite either.

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ibeerianhamhock@reddit

Brazzite is pretty much as close as I need to that.

Really slick steam integration and I use distro box for any of my dev stuff so I can just install stuff and have it work without dealing with an immutable kernel directly.

It's so nice already I feel like I couldn't ask for more

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MelioraXI@reddit

Probably not. I'm already using Arch.

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UnfilteredCatharsis@reddit

I would be happy to check it out but I highly doubt it would offer any significant benefits over Arch/Artix, CachyOS, or other popular Distros.

Have they announced they're working on that? And if so, why?

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cig-nature@reddit

Everything already works fine. I would be willing to try it, but I'm not sure there's much need.

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DoubleOwl7777@reddit

dont see any reason. debian works fine.

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CartographerProper60@reddit

No, I wouldn't switch. But that's the beauty of Linux, there are so many distributions!

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Entropy1991@reddit

Only if it actually offers something I can't already get with CachyOS.

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

Ok nice

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toolschism@reddit

If hardware prices ever come back down from orbit I plan on either A) buying a steam machine, or B) building my own mini PC for my living room.

If I go the mini PC route, I'll definitely give steamos a try for a bit.

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

Ok cool I hope the prices come down soon too (satire) let's go torch some datacenters

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Longjumping-Prior919@reddit

Knowing Valve, it'll probably just get stuck at version 2 wink wink

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

Nice you have the elite ball knowledge

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sleepingonmoon@reddit

Depends on what "Proper Desktop OS" is. If it's just current SteamOS I don't see any reason aside from maybe a better scheduler.

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

Ok nice to know

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doc_willis@reddit

using Bazzite now on my 3 desktop gaming systems, I also have two steam decks.

Bazzite works so well I would be very impressed if SteamOS ever worked as well on my desktops.

I have not yet put Bazzite on my steam decks

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

Sorry steam DECKS damm lucky I haven't even gotten one yet

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doc_willis@reddit

I had to do the whole waiting list thing when they first released years ago, the got lucky and there was the OLED-LE still available when I wanted to upgrade to the OLED.

I am amazed the Original LCD deck is still working.

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

Noice hope the LCD keeps going for years to come

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eviley4@reddit

If Valve officially supports a general purpose computing OS, with devs supporting Anti-cheat exclusively for it, I would switch my gaming distro to it (I use Debian for work and Endeavor OS for gaming currently). This is conditional on there being NO kernel level anti-cheat on this Steam OS.

However, if the support is the same on all distros for games with Anti-cheat, or Steam OS starts to have kernel-level anti-cheat then I will just use Endeavor OS like I currently do.

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

Ok nice that sounds valid

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lKrauzer@reddit

No because I don't want to use containers for development.

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GodderDam@reddit

There's nothing it can offer that we can't get without it, so no

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Less_Party@reddit

No, my desktop PC is basically a glorified Xbox so Win11 doesn't bug me that much and everything just works without messing around. For work I use a Macbook.

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Resident-Cricket-710@reddit

the steam machine is coming with KDE Plasma. They're not making their own DE from scratch, but Ill be curious to see what its like as it ships from valve.

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

Oh I didn't know that will be interesting

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Resident-Cricket-710@reddit

i believe this is how desktop mode on the steam deck already works.

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tbdbubblesthedog@reddit (OP)

Oh didn't know that thanks

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SoNuclear@reddit

There is not much reason for SteamOS to release to the public or for people to want it. It is a highly specialised distro for a handful of devices. Other than that it does nothing special.

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