I was using Linux Mint when I made the switch and it was great cause everything was just working, no tinkering needed. I want to mention https://nobaraproject.org/ though, cause it's a modified Fedora version that works very well for gaming too.
this post was submitted on 08 Jun 2023
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I've had Nobara running on my gaming PC for over a year and it's worked fantastic. I was using Fedora previously but was having some issues figuring out how to get Blender to properly utilize the GPU for rendering. It worked seamlessly once I made the switch to Nobara.
I use Endeavour. It's not necessarily easy and not necessarily hard but there's a Calamares installer and the website has really good instructional articles and forums. Comes with Dracut now which is super fast compared to mkinitcpio. Everything runs great for me and I have similar hardware (same GPU, AMD 7800X3D proc). Tbh I would just recommend rolling release for gaming.
I'd recommend going back to PopOS first as that has worked well for you before. If you want to, you can always distro hop later. PopOS is still a very good distro and, in my opinion, having a smooth and sustainable transition back from Windows is more important than trying out new distros right now.
Maybe this is a dumb question, but why not install SteamOS?
Put simply, currently Steam OS doesn't have the hardware support of your average distro
The posted install instructions say its just Debian. I would assume it would have Debian's hardware support?
Ahhhhh, so not SteamOS 3, an older version
Modern SteamOS is based on Arch
There's no official installer for steamos, only a recovery image for the steam deck. Then, some people in their free time hacked that image to allow installing on other hardware (except Nvidia GPUs) but imho not very easy
Huh? the first thing that comes up when I google SteamOS is DIY install instructions.
Is that perhaps HoloISO? A community made version of SteamOS
Nope, first party SteamOS
This is an old version which was for SteamOS devices, the Steamdeck has a completely revamped OS which has not that much in common with the old one.
That SteamOS used Debian as base, the new SteamOS 3 Arch with countless of adjustments to make the usage of the Steamdeck a joy.
I really wouldn't install the old SteamOS as of now, there won't be an upgradepath because they use different bases, there are countless of better alternatives out there and maybe they will release SteamOS 3 for custom devices in the future.
Got it, that makes a lot of sense. Thanks for the information!
endeavourOS! It’s pretty much Archlinux with a gui installer and some helpful things for new users. I recently installed it on a spare drive on my gaming PC with AMD/nvidia and everything just worked after installing steam.
I will have to check this on out too! Thank you.
If you're newer to Linux I recommend Garuda as a beginner distro. It's very similar to Endeavor as an Arch base, but has some friendly GUI options like Snapper bootable backups for easily undoing bad updates and an update script that takes care of mirror list and orphan notifications. People complain about bloat in Garuda and while there is some it's also helpful bloat, still less than Windows, and has negligible impact on modern hardware
Pop_OS is good, I've been using it for a bit on my laptop. On my main gaming computer, I have been using Nobara for over a year and it's been great. Very stable, only a few small bugs. Games run great on it and it's optimized for gaming specifically. It's part of the Fedora family and developed by the same person who created the Glorius Eggroll version of Proton for Linux.
If you want to stick with something more fully mainstream, then Fedora Vanilla is fantastic also. Just know that the default Wayland desktop will be a little buggy depending on the game/app. I still use X11 personally and will stick with it for another year or so while Wayland gets a bit more ironed out.
Overall, you won't go wrong with Pop_OS or Fedora for mainstream Distros. If you want a little more freedom and customization, go with Fedora and their Plasma desktop version. If you want something a little more power-user but still very friendly and slightly more optimized for pure gaming, Nobara with the Plasma desktop.
If you want total no muss/fuss vanilla, plug n' play, go with Pop_OS.
Links for you:
Fedora KDE Plasma - https://spins.fedoraproject.org/kde/ Nobara All versions - https://nobaraproject.org/download-nobara/ Pop_OS - You already know it lol.
Good luck and welcome back to the full Linux experience!
Keep in mind that Nobara uses Wayland by default and you will have some issues with streaming. Nothing you can't configure and work around, it's just Wayland has some privacy "features" that prevents apps from listening to each other unless you give them explicit permission.
Yeah, that's why I mentioned switching over to X11. Wayland is so close, but just a little too buggy still for me. I am planning on switching to Wayland 100% at the end of this year.
By then it should be where I'm comfortable with.
I stuck with Wayland because literally streaming is the only thing that's screwy for me, it still largely works. I have 4 monitors and x11 don't like that so much..
PopOS is shit. Use anything else.
PopOS isn't shit
PopOS is a good introduction, but frustrating if you want to go outside their sandbox.
Manjaro is shit.
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