I finally nuked Windows

IsoSpandy@lemm.ee to Linux Gaming@lemmy.ml – 117 points –

I have been daily driving a dual booted laptop for the past two years. After a year of distro hopping I settled with fedora + kde and never looked back. I really liked the auto nvidia driver config and it made everything so pleasant to work. Since the last 8 or 9 months I decided to do gaming using bottles and proton ge. I cannot afford to buy games and bottles is a God send at that. Now I realized that I had not logged into my windows partition in over 6 months. So I logged in to check and it told me it needs to download 8 gigs of updates. That sent me into rage and so clean installed everything to be fedora. I have 250 gb of storage locked in limbo because of windows( I have a 512 gb ssd so it was a lot) and today after everything was setup, the os took only around 20gb minus the games. Never felt happier.

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I am happy for you. Windows really is a piece of shit lately, and given how easy it is to switch to Linux nowadays, it is pretty amazing to me that more people haven't done it.

I know. Plus it's OUR operating system.

I have a new motherboard, RAM, and CPU to install and I think I will just take that as a good time to leave Windows behind. My Steam Deck convinced me it's viable.

I'm in the same spot. I just need to look into my "must have" items for work before I switch. Windows is increasingly terrible, and the Steam Deck I got a month ago has proven to me that Linux is good for games now, too.

I'm tempted to try Linux again, finally, after some failed experiments in the mid 00s. I'm so sick of Microsoft's shit sandwich, between bloat and spyware.

I haven't "nuked" Windows yet, but I have resized the drive it currently resides on. Instead of taking up the whole 1TB, it now only takes up 256GB, which means I can no longer play on it.

You are basically me a few months back. Just give it enough time and Microsoft will get on your nerves.

BTW, do you know Microsoft tries to decrypt and index all your data on one drive using the info it already knows about you and on win11 all your documents pictures etc folders are on one drive? Food for thought.

I’m proud of you! I recently bought a new laptop and it came with Windows 11. I heard all sorts of crap about it but I wanted to see for myself.

So many basic settings changes (that I’d use fairly often) went from 1-2 clicks to 3-5. They tried so hard to make it look like a mobile OS that they lowered its usability for anyone who doesn’t just use it as an express lane to Google Chrome.

Anyways rocking Ubuntu with Wayland and am happier to troubleshoot little bugs every now and then than put up with spyware.

Exactly. I would rather have to work a little and full control rather than non being able to work on problems they shove on me because I have no control

I just hate all the distractions and news clickbait stuff in the start menu. I use a computer to do tasks and browse media at my own discretion. Get the actual hell out of my face with forced infotainment consumption.

I’m just trying to get out before using an LLM-based OS is no longer optional with Microsoft. No game or software is worth dealing with that.

LLMs are seriously dope and the technology behind AI is incredible, but using it for everything isn’t appropriate. I’d like a place to ask a chatbot stuff. I don’t wanna be surrounded in it.

Exactly how I feel. Just keep it in my browser or maybe my IDEs. I don’t need my desktop pinging a corporation with all my data to occasionally use a chatbot.

Just goes to show how valuable data is. They’ll do anything to siphon it off you.

There are a few things missing from my Linux distros of choice that I really need in a computer experience, so I'm waiting til M$ ends support for Win10 before switching. Hopefully by that time the four things I use my computer for the most will be more practically achievable.

What do you need?

Three(-ish) things, and I apologize in advance for the length.

 

TL;DR Version

  1. NAS management via LAN
  2. Non-Steam PC gaming, preferably via offline installers
  3. A less-shitty GUI client for ProtonVPN

 

Full Explanation

  1. Being able to connect to my NAS through my local area network—I can do like that on Windows, but a few months ago I switched over to Pop!_OS and couldn't for the life of me get it to work. At one point, it worked for like FIVE MINUTES (not exaggerating) and then suddenly stopped for no (apparent) reason. I have an Emby server and I like to be able to just copy and paste new files from my computer to the NAS without the use of a direct connection. (I say direct because they're all connected my router through Ethernet.)

 

  1. Gaming without using Steam—I mainly save backup installers on my external HDD and then install them when I want to play them. I use Playnite as a launcher. Unfortunately, Playnite is not available on Linux; my only other options would be GameHub or Lutris, neither one of which in my past experience is nearly as polished as Playnite has proven to be. Additionally, sure the development of Proton for Steam and SteamDeck has boosted development of other avenues like Wine or Lutris's methods and stuff, but it's not quite as reliable as I would hope compared to the former. On top of that, when I last tried Pop!_OS a few months ago, I installed the GOG version of Dragon Age: Origins, first straight-up through the backup installer, and then via Lutris. Neither even got to the launch screen due to Windows-based dependencies, which is surprising considering the WineDB page for the game listed the GOG version as Platinum. Yeah, that was bullshit; clearly it's outdated.

 

  1. A less-shitty-in-general GUI client for ProtonVPN for Linux—I use ProtonVPN quite a lot, and despite them claiming on their website that their Linux GUI client is "full-featured", it is hardly even a semblance of that. It doesn't launch on boot-up (despite I believe having a setting for that), doesn't have profiles, and doesn't have port-forwarding. The Windows GUI client has all of these and then some.

 

Edit:

I forgot to mention a critical fact: I have an Nvidia GPU.

I don't know if it's changed much, but a few months ago when I attempted the switch, I had a nightmare with the Nvidia drivers. I don't remember what the version numbers were, but there were two of them, one of which was ended with like .35 or something. Anyway, I upgraded to one, my monitor wouldn't display anything but a black screen; I upgraded to the other, my screen would flicker incessantly; if I downgraded, it would flicker incessantly but worse.

The other two points have been addressed, but proton just remade their Linux VPN client from scratch, and it is quite nice now!

Really?? That's awesome! :D

Does it have profiles? And port-forwarding enabled? ^_^

 

Edit: And a permanent kill switch option?

Idk I don't use proton vpn, I'll reply again if I end up testing it with the free plan (I am not at home ATM)

  1. I built my own NAS (OpenSUSE Leap running BTRFS), so I know nothing about Emby. I use Samba for network shares (wife uses Windows), DLNA to stream to my TV, and SSH to manage everything from my other Linux systems.
  2. I just ended up buying everything through Steam. I wish GOG Galaxy worked on Linux and had proper support for Windows games (e.g. do something like Steam does with Proton). If Steam is good enough, you can add Lutris/Heroic/etc games to Steam. I'll have to poke around a bunch and find a good workflow for Windows installers (I just used WINE directly in the past, but that experience kind of sucks)
  3. I've only used it with a manual WireGuard configuration (goal was to configure it on my router). I'll try playing with their GUI and CLI though, maybe I can figure out what's going on. Best guess is that it's trying to start up on boot, but your Wi-Fi connects on login, so ProtonVPN fails and doesn't retry.

That said, I'm an old hat Linux user (been primarily on Linux for ~15 years), so I generally prefer CLI solutions to user-friendly GUIs. I probably won't reply here, but I will look into it so I can be of more help to the next person.

  1. I built my own NAS (OpenSUSE Leap running BTRFS), so I know nothing about Emby. I use Samba for network shares (wife uses Windows), DLNA to stream to my TV, and SSH to manage everything from my other Linux systems.

That's really incredible! Yeah, I just bought a Qnap TS-something and used the software made for it. It was my very first NAS and I didn't wanna go too crazy since I was still a beginner at everything NAS-wise (I still am, but not as much).

And Emby is just basically a personally streaming plaform—you install Emby through the Qnap operating system installed on your NAS, which then acts as a front-end for streaming the files stored in the attached hard drives as well as organizing said files with images, metadata & nfo files, etc. Think of it like a personal Netflix. Similar options are Jellyfin and Plex.

  1. I just ended up buying everything through Steam. I wish GOG Galaxy worked on Linux and had proper support for Windows games (e.g. do something like Steam does with Proton). If Steam is good enough, you can add Lutris/Heroic/etc games to Steam. I'll have to poke around a bunch and find a good workflow for Windows installers (I just used WINE directly in the past, but that experience kind of sucks)

I have some games on Steam, but by and large I buy my games on GOG since I prefer to own my games. (No insult to you; I'm just saying how I do things.)

  1. I've only used it with a manual WireGuard configuration (goal was to configure it on my router). I'll try playing with their GUI and CLI though, maybe I can figure out what's going on. Best guess is that it's trying to start up on boot, but your Wi-Fi connects on login, so ProtonVPN fails and doesn't retry.

I'm kind of thinking the same thing, though to be honest I'm still very much a Linux newb. As a general principle, I try not to fuck with things I'm unfamilar with. Lol, I learned that the hard way way back when.

That said, I'm an old hat Linux user (been primarily on Linux for ~15 years), so I generally prefer CLI solutions to user-friendly GUIs. I probably won't reply here, but I will look into it so I can be of more help to the next person.

That's fine! I love hearing about the experiences of the "old guard" users! I think it's fascinating learning from their wisdom!

A NAS is pretty simple, it's just some drives linked together with some services on top. Mine is super simple:

  • 2 8TB drives in a mirror RAID, on an old computer
  • Samba configured to act as a Windows network drive
  • minidlna configured so my TV sees it as a source for content - there no "app," I just go to "Videos and Pictures" and find my network share
  • SSH enabled for my Linux devices to login and push/pull files

That's it. You could probably get the same thing done with a Windows machine (but replace SSH with remote desktop).

There's no GUI for it like you'd get with Plex/Jellyfin or a commercial NAS, just a machine that streams files over the network. It has no access outside my network, so I'd have to configure something if I wanted someone else to access it.

I threw it together over a weekend looking at the Arch Wiki. It does the job.

GOG

If you mostly use GOG, have you considered Heroic? It's a launcher that can run games from Epic and GOG (and maybe others?), and it integrates WINE/Proton with it, so most of the time you just push play and it works. I've tried a few games with it and it seems to work well.

It's not the one you mentioned, but it has a decent interface.

Linux newb

No worries. I think most distros have a GUI interface to configure WireGuard. Look in the network settings to put in your keys and whatnot. If you do it that way, everything will probably work better together. Likewise for adding a network share to your NAS, though it'll probably be in the file picker.

Then again, maybe it's something else. I remember being new to Linux and things not working until I reinstalled. It's easy to forget a step, especially if you're not really sure what you're doing.

Anyway, good luck!

A NAS is pretty simple, it's just some drives linked together with some services on top. Mine is super simple:

⋮

I threw it together over a weekend looking at the Arch Wiki. It does the job.

I...really really appreciate you going out of your way like that to help me. Really, I do. But I...really like having a service like Emby, Plex, or Jellyfin. I like seeing the posters and backdrops and other organizational aspects.

Really, the only thing I want in this case is the ability to connect to my NAS through the local network within the file manager and transfer files between it and my computer.

If you mostly use GOG, have you considered Heroic? It's a launcher that can run games from Epic and GOG (and maybe others?), and it integrates WINE/Proton with it, so most of the time you just push play and it works. I've tried a few games with it and it seems to work well.

It's not the one you mentioned, but it has a decent interface.

I have not actually! I may actually try that! Does it allow me to install games via offline backup installers? That's how I generally install my GOG games.

No worries. I think most distros have a GUI interface to configure WireGuard. Look in the network settings to put in your keys and whatnot. If you do it that way, everything will probably work better together. Likewise for adding a network share to your NAS, though it'll probably be in the file picker.

Then again, maybe it's something else. I remember being new to Linux and things not working until I reinstalled. It's easy to forget a step, especially if you're not really sure what you're doing.

Yeah, I understand how VPNs work, and yet I don't know what the hell WireGuard even does or how it works. Then, again, I've never looked it up....

..................I should probably do that.

Anyway, good luck!

Thanks!

I really like having a service like Emby

And that's totally fine. Linux should work just fine for that setup, I'm just not very familiar with it.

Next time you're booted into Linux, try the network drive thing again, maybe it'll work better. I'm guessing you missed a checkbox or something to reconnect after a reboot.

If you still have issues, I can try the GUI with my NAS, which should be similar enough to help. Just let me know what distro and desktop environment you're running and what didn't work.

Does it allow me to install games via offline backup installers?

I think so? I know there's a way to import games, which I think works with an installer. Give it a shot!

WireGuard

WireGuard is just the built-in Linux kernel support for VPNs. The main alternative is OpenVPN, which runs as a regular program and generally has worse performance and VPN providers can be finicky about which clients work properly.

So if a VPN service offers WireGuard, prefer that and things will probably work more smoothly.

Next time you're booted into Linux, try the network drive thing again, maybe it'll work better. I'm guessing you missed a checkbox or something to reconnect after a reboot.

Perhaps...

Problem is I don't have Linux installed anymore. After my switching attempt catastrophically failed last time, I (reluctantly) reinstalled Windows.

WireGuard is just the built-in Linux kernel support for VPNs. The main alternative is OpenVPN, which runs as a regular program and generally has worse performance and VPN providers can be finicky about which clients work properly.

So if a VPN service offers WireGuard, prefer that and things will probably work more smoothly.

Oh! That makes sense. I can't remember if ProtonVPN offers WireGuard support for Linux... I know it does for Windows.

Linux has been my main system since 2016. Still haven't nuked windows because I need it for removing DRM with calibre from ebooks. That is literally the only reason anymore.

Sadly I have to use it for work because Altium doesn't run on linux, but it's always nice to come home to a system that isn't a buggy piece of shit like win11 😅

I thought Calibre was available for Linux. It isn't?

I've been windows-free for about 8 months as well. I'm a more casual gamer so i haven't had to venture out of steam proton yet (but i've got bottles on hand to experiment anyway) A few of the games i tend to return to every few years will definitely need bottles.

I built a beefy system, and I was initially planning on running windows (or one of the de-microsofted builds) on a vm with pass-through GPU (shunting my linux over to the on-cpu gpu when im running it) but so far i've had no need to continue setting that up. I proactively placed all my steam games on an ntfs filesystem just in case i do in the future.

Either way, i'm glad to have the flexibility to make windows work without dual boot, but so far it looks like i was being overly cautious. Probably cant play some games with anti-cheat right now... but i so rarely play those types of game.

I also have thought that in case I need a windows install later on I can just create a vm with network access cut off.

I you like Fedora, you might want to look at Nobara. Super optimized for gaming and AV work.

I would advise against Nobara. Why?

  • Only one maintainer. If he quits the project, it will leave many many users without maintenance updates
  • Slow updates. Maintaining a distro is a lot of work, and especially major updates can take many many months.
  • Very insecure. It disables SELinux for example.
  • Many tweaks that might make the OS less reliable.
  • And much more... I absolutely respect GE's work, but for one person, it's just impossible/ hard to keep it secure and well working.

What else would I recommend? Bazzite (if you use your PC only for gaming) or the various other images from universal-blue.org

Why?

  • They also come with QoL changes by default, just like Nobara
  • They are actually secure because they maintain themselves automatically without any input. If a update comes from Fedora, it takes less than a few hours to also land on uBlue
  • It's reproducible. Every Bazzite install for example is the exact same. If one user has a bug due to a modification from Bazzite, the dev will have it too and can just fix it easily.
  • And much more.

Well it works perfectly to me. I dont need updates every 24h , I just wants all codecs preinstalled for Davinci and Reaper, and games to work out of the box, and I get all that with Nobara. If the dev abandon it I'll switch to something else but its currently up to date with fedora and well maintained.

I didn't know about no bara until today. Maybe I will check it out. But i am really comfortable in fedora now, so if something borks, I will check it.

Yep of course if your system works dont bother switching. Nobara is basically Fedora for gaming. It's developped by a Proton guy and follows Fedora update cycles with a few months delay.

I like what glorious eggroll is doing and would love to try it. But it's a no go for me since it has no selinux.