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Comment by xnickb | Hacker News Reader

Nothing is stopping you from switching right away. It's not as hard. You can check whether the games you are interested in are supported on protondb

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I’m sick of Microsofts shameless embrace of dark patterns as well but I’m waiting for more game and mod compatibility. I’d love to jump ship though and fully support Valve in their efforts. I’m keeping an eye on it for now.

I know, I have a Steam Deck and enjoy Steam OS on that, but what I want is as close to a console like experience (which is what Windows is not giving me). Right now it seems that DIY installs of Steam OS are not yet as simple as I want for that sort of experience, and I'm not looking for another Linux sysadmin hobby machine, I've got enough of those.

I'm waiting until there's a big download button on a Valve page, and ideally a supported upgrade path from an existing Windows install.

Bazzite is what you’re asking for.

Thanks, I wasn't aware of Bazzite. It does look like it might be the solution. I'm skeptical given my experience with Linux distros, even very well supported ones, but I may give it a go.

There is nothing Steam OS will give you that isn't available right now.

Use any low maintenance Linux distro and install Steam through flatpak and you got the exact experience you want. There is no difference. You are waiting for something which might never come out so that installing might be 10 minutes faster. That is totally absurd.

Steam OS ist not more maintenance than any other low maintenance distro.

I've used low maintenance Linux distros, and they're not comparable to Steam OS in my experience. It's not about a 10 minute install, it's about the hour here and there to update, to fix, to browse the Arch wiki to figure out why my bluetooth mouse doesn't work today. Linux is a lot better than it was 10+ years ago, but to say it's as low maintenance as a game console (which is what my Steam Deck is to me), is actually absurd.

Exactly. Linux is great but never actually 'low maintenance'. I personally felt like my OS needed frequent attention.

Nope, do not fall into the hype, i did this and a lot of games did not work. Driver issues, random crashes not to mention games from big studios straight up do not work and are not supported due to anti-cheat software or another layer of sign-in. Yes, some games work but can also stop working with the next driver/kernel update. I also want to completely stop using Windows but it is still very hard for a gaming PC.

That's why they suggested checking protondb, it really depends on the type of games you play. All the games I play work fine on Linux, but if you want to play Fortnite or League of legends then you're out of luck.

As I have learned from experience, ProtonDb means nothing. You can have slightly different hardware from SteamDeck and the game may not work for you. I am not talking theory, I am talking from real experience using latest hardware and multiple retires with CachyOS, Bazzite etc.

Protondb includes reports from all sorts of hardware.

> anti-cheat software or another layer of sign-in

Kernel level anti-cheat is unethical and dangerous. The sign-ins are mostly spyware.

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