Big screen gaming distribution GamerOS continues picking up the SteamOS slack

when was the last time SteamOS was updated by Valve? Does anyone still use it?

when was the last time SteamOS was updated by Valve? Does anyone still use it?

If I were Gaben I wouldn't spend resources into SteamOs until Big Picture and Proton are polished. After all the deficiencies in those areas were the cause of failure of the Steam Machine initiative.

It will be interesting though to see if Valve will try another time to push SteamOs when the time comes or if they just leave it to community projects like this one. The advantage of community projects is that they might have less legal and commercial issues in integrating third party stores into their distro. Assuming any store other than Steam start supporting linux ofc.

when was the last time SteamOS was updated by Valve? Does anyone still use it?

I am still using SteamOS, was very happy with it in the beginning, but the last time it has been updated was almost three years ago, so to me it looks like Valve abandoned it completely. Lots of libraries are completely outdated now so that many games won't launch anymore...

Would like to switch to GamerOS, but the last time I tried it, it was incapable to use more than one hard disk. Does anymore know if this has been fixed already? (my system has a small SSD to boot from plus a huge HDD to install games on it.)


Last edited by lessster on 5 May 2021 at 10:11 am UTC

Would like to switch to GamerOS, but the last time I tried it, it was incapable to use more than one hard disk. Does anymore know if this has been fixed already? (my system has a small SSD to boot from plus a huge HDD to install games on it.)

There has been no developments yet in this area. It is not impossible to set this up though. You would need to install the OS and then modify `/etc/fstab` manually.

There has been no developments yet in this area. It is not impossible to set this up though. You would need to install the OS and then modify `/etc/fstab` manually.

Modifying /etc/fstab is one thing, I guess I am able to handle that. But would that alone be sufficient? I fear there's more to do than that. Somehow Steam must be made aware of the additional filesystem to be able to use it as a game library folder. It is possible in Steam BPM (Big Picture Mode) to switch between several library folders, though, but somehow they need to be set up (created by making a couple of entries in some .vdf files) first, and as far as I know this is only possible in desktop mode, not in BPM, and this information should be persistent, even after performing any GamerOS related upgrades...


Last edited by lessster on 5 May 2021 at 12:02 pm UTC

The other solution is to use a vanilla Ubuntu and slap SteamOS-Compositor, Steamos-Compositor+ on top of it. That's what I do, atm, I'm waiting for the GamerOS installer to be updated so that it recognizes my ethernet card (Asus TUF Gaming B550m requires Linux 5.11).

when was the last time SteamOS was updated by Valve? Does anyone still use it?

I am still using SteamOS, was very happy with it in the beginning, but the last time it has been updated was almost three years ago, so to me it looks like Valve abandoned it completely. Lots of libraries are completely outdated now so that many games won't launch anymore...

Would like to switch to GamerOS, but the last time I tried it, it was incapable to use more than one hard disk. Does anymore know if this has been fixed already? (my system has a small SSD to boot from plus a huge HDD to install games on it.)

I was in *exactly* the same boat, but eventually I had to switch because some newer games just didn't work and kids wouldn't get off me... so I installed GamerOS and it was a painful experience but eventually got everything set up (fstab and all), fixed audio numerous times until it stopped breaking (for now) installed minecraft from flathub (though apparently I need to uninstall and reinstall it after every update), and even installed chromium after an even more painful experience (for GeForceNow - Fortnite... controller doesn't work though). All in all, it's noticeably worse than SteamOS (at least in terms of installing and configuring) but it's as good as it gets while we wait for SteamOS 3 4.

when was the last time SteamOS was updated by Valve? Does anyone still use it?

There is an acceptable solution, even quite good in my opinion.
Take a close look at this Internet-Address:
------------
https://github.com/ShadowApex/steamos-ubuntu/blob/master/install.sh
--------
After that you can install the Steamos-Compositor Plus from GamerOS
----------------
https://github.com/gamer-os/steamos-compositor-plus
-------------------

e-voila ...

..yours ..iVAN..

while we wait for SteamOS 3 4.

You surely meant to say SteamOS 2 Episode One, or I dunno...SteamOS 2 Lost Coast.

while we wait for SteamOS 3 4.

You surely meant to say SteamOS 2 Episode One, or I dunno...SteamOS 2 Lost Coast.

SteamOS 2.99

I use SteamOS awhile back for my HTPC but dropped it as I left Steam and began to retire games that I no longer play.

Is GamerOS great for someone that has a large GOG/itch.io library? All of my games are controller based and we use our HTPCs as consoles-like machines.

There is an acceptable solution, even quite good in my opinion.
Take a close look at this Internet-Address:
------------
https://github.com/ShadowApex/steamos-ubuntu/blob/master/install.sh
--------
After that you can install the Steamos-Compositor Plus from GamerOS
----------------
https://github.com/gamer-os/steamos-compositor-plus
-------------------

e-voila ...

..yours ..iVAN..

This does in fact look truely promising, thanks a lot for that! I really have to give it a try eventually (soon).


Last edited by lessster on 5 May 2021 at 7:31 pm UTC

while we wait for SteamOS 3 4.

You surely meant to say SteamOS 2 Episode One, or I dunno...SteamOS 2 Lost Coast.

SteamOS 2 Lost Cause?

How dare I!


Last edited by Mohandevir on 5 May 2021 at 8:23 pm UTC

installed minecraft from flathub (though apparently I need to uninstall and reinstall it after every update)

this is probably solvable by running:
 
flatpak update

Is GamerOS great for someone that has a large GOG/itch.io library?

Itch.io has an opensource store/intaller/launcher/updater app so if you get it installed and added as 3rd-party app to Steam on GamerOS it's probably all gonna work fine afterwards

For GOG there are a couple 3rd-party apps for the same purpose, despite their sad insistency ignoring linux users (eg: MiniGalaxy)

when was the last time SteamOS was updated by Valve? Does anyone still use it?

If I were Gaben I wouldn't spend resources into SteamOs until Big Picture and Proton are polished. After all the deficiencies in those areas were the cause of failure of the Steam Machine initiative.

It will be interesting though to see if Valve will try another time to push SteamOs when the time comes or if they just leave it to community projects like this one. The advantage of community projects is that they might have less legal and commercial issues in integrating third party stores into their distro. Assuming any store other than Steam start supporting linux ofc.

GamerOS already supports Steam, GOG, Epic, Itchi.io and Humble Bundle with open source programs out there.
https://github.com/sharkwouter/minigalaxy
https://lutris.net/
https://github.com/Heroic-Games-Launcher/HeroicGamesLauncher
https://github.com/itchio/itch
https://github.com/tkashkin/GameHub

Really there are only a few stores left without Linux client support:
EA Origin
Ubisoft UPlay
Rockstar (Still available via Steam & Epic)
Bethesda.Net (Not sure how this will play out with Microsoft buy out)
Blizzard Battle.net
Guild Wars (Coming to Steam)

There has been no developments yet in this area. It is not impossible to set this up though. You would need to install the OS and then modify `/etc/fstab` manually.

Modifying /etc/fstab is one thing, I guess I am able to handle that. But would that alone be sufficient? I fear there's more to do than that. Somehow Steam must be made aware of the additional filesystem to be able to use it as a game library folder. It is possible in Steam BPM (Big Picture Mode) to switch between several library folders, though, but somehow they need to be set up (created by making a couple of entries in some .vdf files) first, and as far as I know this is only possible in desktop mode, not in BPM, and this information should be persistent, even after performing any GamerOS related upgrades...

Why not use something like MergerFS or ZFS or BTRFS something with drive pooling and just put the mount point as the game directory for game installs.

Why not use something like MergerFS or ZFS or BTRFS something with drive pooling and just put the mount point as the game directory for game installs.

Thanks for the hint. Although, I am not sure if GamerOS supports something like that. Problem might be that GamerOS has only Big Picture Mode (BPM) of Steam enabled, currently there seems to be no way to run Steam in Desktop Mode on GamerOS. And only in Desktop Mode it is possible to specify a game directory...

(Well, SteamOS is also BPM only by default, but there exists an easy workaround to make SteamOS boot into Desktop Mode temporarily. But that doesn't work on GamerOS, I have yet to find such a workaround for GamerOS)

There is an acceptable solution, even quite good in my opinion.
Take a close look at this Internet-Address:
------------
https://github.com/ShadowApex/steamos-ubuntu/blob/master/install.sh
--------
After that you can install the Steamos-Compositor Plus from GamerOS
----------------
https://github.com/gamer-os/steamos-compositor-plus
-------------------

e-voila ...

..yours ..iVAN..

This does in fact look truely promising, thanks a lot for that! I really have to give it a try eventually (soon).

Not only promising, this works very good, first I was a bit sceptic to have always the latest mesa/vulkan git installed, but in practice the system and the Games (native and proton) are performing very well..!

There is an acceptable solution, even quite good in my opinion.
Take a close look at this Internet-Address:
------------
https://github.com/ShadowApex/steamos-ubuntu/blob/master/install.sh
--------
After that you can install the Steamos-Compositor Plus from GamerOS
----------------
https://github.com/gamer-os/steamos-compositor-plus
-------------------

e-voila ...

..yours ..iVAN..

This does in fact look truely promising, thanks a lot for that! I really have to give it a try eventually (soon).

Not only promising, this works very good, first I was a bit sceptic to have always the latest mesa/vulkan git installed, but in practice the system and the Games (native and proton) are performing very well..!

... And go figure why, if you replace the GDM3 greeter with Lightdm (probably a permission issue with GDM3), then add a user account named "desktop" and add user "desktop" to the nopasswdlogin group, the BPM "switch to desktop" option will work exactly like in SteamOS. Personnally I like/prefer that option, when I have issues with BPM's bluetooth or sound setup (personnal experience).


Last edited by Mohandevir on 6 May 2021 at 6:19 pm UTC