8 ms·

Show me the numbers. Show me an identical gaming PC running Windows 11 and then Linux, and show not just FPS - but things like frametime pacing, latency, etc.

Show me the numbers. Show me an identical gaming PC running Windows 11 and then Linux, and show not just FPS - but things like frametime pacing, latency, etc. This NTSync stuff is very impressive, but I haven't seen a lot of end-to-end numbers versus Windows. The last comparisons I saw showed pretty much every distribution on the order of 5-30% behind Windows, varying on the game. And Nvidia GPU support was still not great. I WANT to swap. Please give me cause to do so. I'm sitting here with my finger on the button waiting for it to finally get good enough to make sense.

jmalicki 5mo ago
A lot of the revolution is just getting within 5-30% of Windows! If you need every last bit of FPS maybe it is lagging, but 5-30% slower is roughly on par at a large sense, it's less than the difference of e.g. one NVidia GPU generation to the next, so it makes it playable.
- anonymousab 5mo ago
  One problem is that having better FPS stops mattering if the frame pacing and timing is bad, making the game feel like a juddery mess. Or if there is significant input delay differences. That's why all the data matters for all of these dimensions; game performance is much more than FPS per watt over time. When people see "linux gaming is great now, look at the fps" it comes across as potentially disengenuous because of all the other factors that matter and should be tested. Or rather, if a reviewer is talking entirely about framerate, then I just can't trust their opinion and expertise when it comes to the state of Linux gaming.
  - bisby 5mo ago
    Another problem is that having better frame pacing, or better timing stops mattering if the OS decides to reboot for updates mid game. Game experience is much more than just game performance. Part of the issue is that a large part of linux gamers are saying "linux gaming is great" and meaning "linux gaming is good enough now that it is better than putting up with microsoft and windows 11" Some people would rather put up with slightly worse frame pacing if it means no microsoft. Some linux folks are super gung-ho pro privacy, some are just super anti-microsoft but can't game on mac. There's a whole lot of reasons to wind up on linux, so the importance of specific performance details may vary depending on WHY you would be swapping. And some people are playing games on good enough hardware that there arent noticeable frame pacing issues, so good raw FPS numbers just reinforce their views, and they just genuinely mean they are having a good experience themselves.
  - jabroni_salad 5mo ago
    To tack onto this a big annoyance for me right now is the lack of knowledge in the community about frame pacing and how to configure the computer. The user will say 'it lags' but does not mention if they have tearing enabled in wayland, what are their 1% lows, have they set an fps cap, what vsync settings have they chosen in-game. On top of that there is an ecosystem failure as not every game supports arbitrary caps and you have to configure some mangohud thing. Linux is only a 'just click play' experience if you have no standards because I have never had this stuff be correct out of the box on a fresh install.
    - Dylan16807 5mo ago
      > Linux is only a 'just click play' experience if you have no standards because I have never had this stuff be correct out of the box on a fresh install. I'm not saying you're wrong, but the standard you've outlined excludes Windows too.
  - tormeh 5mo ago
    This is very personal. I don't particularly mind stutter. Input lag annoys me a lot, though.
harrisi 5mo ago
Depending on storage constraints, you could always dualboot. That would give you the exact same hardware to compare, and it's not a full commitment. Anecdotally, I find that getting Linux on somewhat older or underpowered hardware is always a massive positive. Better performance as well as battery life. I'm not as familiar with modern hardware's relationship to either OS ("OS vs. some flavor of OS based on a similar or same kernel" - I know) with modern hardware. Worth a shot though! Every supercomputer seems to do quite well with Linux kernels. Probably good enough for Crysis :)
helterskelter 5mo ago
If memory serves, Linux typically outperforms Windows with AMD and Intel graphics. Some of the gotchas are things like running games through Proton or anti-cheat/DRM stuff not getting the same attention that Windows does, but the raw performance is there. I wouldn't recommend using Nvidia on Linux though.
- dlivingston 5mo ago
  I run NVIDIA on my Bazzite box and I get excellent performance. I had to fiddle with a few things though that probably work out of the box on AMD (example: screen tearing in Steam Big Picture mode. Fix: enabling developer mode in Steam and setting "Force Composite" to true).
  - hedora 5mo ago
    In amd, you have to turn on TearFree in xorg.conf, but you can then avoid screen tearing with and without compositors. I have no idea why this is not turned on by default.
- QuaternionsBhop 5mo ago
  > I wouldn't recommend using Nvidia on Linux though. This was true 4 years ago, but is outdated knowledge now. Nvidia used to disallow distributing drivers with distro images, but they have since made agreements with some popular distros. If the distro image you download includes drivers or you know how to install them, the proprietary drivers work really well.
- eigenspace 5mo ago
  It typically will only outperform Windows *if* you are running lower-end hardware. The main thing here is that when running on Linux, your game is typically in less contention with the OS for getting access to CPU cores and RAM. If you have a beefy CPU and plentiful RAM, then typically one should expect Linux to be slightly behind Windows performance (though there are exceptions), because then Windows' bloat becomes a non-issue, and the impact of the translation layers start to become more significant.
worble 5mo ago
If you want to swap, then just do it right now? As far as gaming is concerned Linux just works, and reaches speeds that are more than good enough to do so, even if they're not exactly the same as windows - the steam deck is pretty much proof of this. If Linux was measurably 5% slower on all benchmarks, would that mean you wouldn't do it even if you wanted to? Is every single nanosecond of performance really that important to you? I switched 10 years ago when things were a lot rougher than this, and in the end everything still worked well enough that I never cared to swap back.
- BoxedEmpathy 5mo ago
  I gave it a try. Got a steam deck, tries steam os on my desktop. I kept running into issues that took me time to solve. I understand that the only reason it took me time to solve these issues is because I'm new to it and that people who have been gaming on Linux for years already know how to solve them all. But what would happen was is I would sit down to play a game spend maybe an hour or two fixing issues and then after that I ran out of time to play the game. I kept this up for a couple months but honestly at some point I just gave up. Now I'm playing games on Windows again. To be clear, I'm a huge proponent of Linux gaming. I just unfortunately am too busy these days to spend the time to get it to work.
  - BoxedEmpathy 5mo ago
    And I'll try again when I have more time.
    - kakacik 5mo ago
      Most folks are in this category. But most, including me, wont try anytime soon unless some very positive news come up. We have lives to live, kids to raise, work to do and so on. Gaming moved for a lot of us from 'now I have 5 hours or whole weekend to gaming if I want to' to mere blips here and there, which need to be as frictionless as poasible. Which is great - it means we are doing something actually meaningful and more worthy in our lives. But it also means I will never have enough time for such fiddling. I am fine with it, as much as I can be, but lets be honest to ourselves here.
braiamp 5mo ago
I think the actual answer you are looking for is this paragraph: > These old workarounds got subtle edge cases wrong in ways that produced occasional hitches, deadlocks, or weird behavior in specific games, which are bugs that don't show up on benchmark charts but can absolutely ruin individual experiences. NTSYNC fixes those at the source by matching Windows behavior exactly, and that means as soon as your favorite distro moves to the new kernel version, whether it be Bazzite, CachyOS, Fedora, or a flavor of Ubuntu, they all get this much-needed fix. That's the crux of the article. NTSYNC isn't faster, it's more "correct". Most games are around the same level of performance, with certain outliers both ways. Right now there isn't anything performance wise that Linux has to do that would impact all games. Just tweaks and additions to the different layers [1][2][3] in the same way driver vendors do. Much of the poor performance is for API violations and other shenanigans. 1: https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/mesa/mesa/-/blob/main/src/util/00-mesa-defaults.conf https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/mesa/mesa/-/blob/main/src/uti... 2: https://github.com/doitsujin/dxvk/blob/master/src/util/config/config.cpp https://github.com/doitsujin/dxvk/blob/master/src/util/confi... 3: https://github.com/HansKristian-Work/vkd3d-proton/blob/master/libs/vkd3d/device.c#L605 https://github.com/HansKristian-Work/vkd3d-proton/blob/maste...
- kelnos 5mo ago
  > NTSYNC isn't faster, it's more "correct". It depends on what you're using now, though. If you're just using a vanilla wine/proton install, then NTSYNC should indeed be a lot faster as well. If you're using fsync or... I forget the name of the other one... then you many not see much in the way of perf improvements.
  - mackal 5mo ago
    Esync was the other one. Basically either of those enabled (honestly probably both were) and it didn't hit a corner case with issues, NTSYNC is basically no benefit. (I personally would rather use NTSYNC)
xboxnolifes 5mo ago
Unless you're playing CS competitively and really need 720fps for your 360Hz monitor, is 5-30% fewer frames (all else equal) really a deal breaker? Is this hardware thats barly good enough or something else? I ask because I feel like I can frequently play games at, say, 150fps, and losing 30% would mean almost nothing to me to switch to Linux. I worry more about general capatibility and anticheat.
- jofzar 5mo ago
  100 fps to 95-70fps is definitely noticeable, 30% is way too much.
  - xboxnolifes 5mo ago
    I'm not saying it's not noticeable, I'm saying it's not a deal breaker. If my only holdout from switching to Linux from Windows is gaming, I'd take a 30% fps hit, assuming my fps is generally in the ~150 range, not the ~60 range.
    - unethical_ban 5mo ago
      If Linux dropped my frames from 80 to 50, it would be a deal breaker. Fortunately I haven't noticed performance impacts so I'm on the hype train.
- h4x0rr 5mo ago
  5-30% is what a sizable amount of people upgrade their hardware for
  - kQq9oHeAz6wLLS 5mo ago
    looks at ancient desktop rig still doing everything I ask of it Huh. I wonder if they're the same people who complain that they don't have enough money to live.
NamTaf 5mo ago
Your initial baseline was arbitrary. If the game had been 10% slower on Windows, would you have never enjoyed it? If not, how could switching with a 10% penalty be a deal-breaking downside? Just do it. Swap and let go of objectivity. Let your subjective experience guide you. For me, the subjective joy of not having to fuck around with Microsoft's bullshit was worth multiples of having to mess around with technical crap to get a game working (spoiler: I nearly never have to do that because I play single player games, Dota and CS). I couldn't give less of a damn if my FPS in some random title is 10% slower than it would be in Windows. So long as it's playable, I benefit in spades from the trade-off.
- NewsaHackO 5mo ago
  I mean, there are costs to swapping though. Going by just feels seems to be the wrong way to think about it.
  - ulbu 5mo ago
    it can’t really be a way to think about it when the recommendation is to not think about it and just do it. experience, observe, reach opinion. all in accordance with you and not some number that’s abstract to your perception.
    - lunatuna 5mo ago
      Yawman, being on Linux for everything else feels great. In a personal way (rather than technical) it’s like being back in my 20’s hacking Redhat and FreeBSD. I also find the community support is great when I’ve run into the odd issue. My FPS are good and I don’t think about it. I select games based on ProtonDB. There’s always constraints and I’m cool with the limitations that this brings. BF6 is a no-go due to its anticheat tool, no problem. Got lots of other choices.
      - OccamsMirror 5mo ago
        My son is really into soccer, so I wanted to get the latest ~~Fifa~~ FC game. Oh it has anticheat and doesn't run, at all. Frustrating because I wouldn't want to play online anyway. Happy to not give EA any money if they're so set on shoving online play and therefore anticheat down the players throats. Grateful that Steam allows easy refunds.
AlienRobot 5mo ago
It isn't saying it's faster than Windows. Just faster.
ActorNightly 5mo ago
Its never going to happen. Because console players by far dominate the gaming scene. Microsoft is going to push Xbox first, which will drive all development of the games, which is going to be windows focused. As such, all major release studios are going to target that. Until we get something like CoD titles being Steam Console first, linux is allways going to lag behind. That being said, I think we are on a precipice of AI being able to simply just rewrite games from concepts. Start with generic source code for an FPS or 3PS, then people can contribute changes in english language to tailor the game. So it won't be even copying source code, it would be copying concepts and then making a new game with it. There have been a lot of games that have very rudimentary graphics that people played in large numbers because the complexity and gameplay was quite good.
- as1mov 5mo ago
  Most major platforms already have enough asset flips cluttering their storefronts[1][2] -- generic games made from preexisting engine templates with some assets bought from the store. Using AI will just make producing the slop easier, it wouldn't make something that's worth playing. Anyone actually looking to make something genuinely fun will probably go the old fashioned way of spending countless hours honing their craft, which in turn gives them a good eye to make sure what they're making doesn't have the shovelware stink. [1] https://www.notebookcheck.net/Sony-delists-700-PS4-and-PS5-shovelware-games-from-PS-Store-with-many-using-generative-AI.1257171.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/Sony-delists-700-PS4-and-PS5-s... [2] https://www.gamesindustry.biz/shovelware-is-a-bigger-problem-than-ever-platform-holders-need-a-robust-response-opinion https://www.gamesindustry.biz/shovelware-is-a-bigger-problem...
encom 5mo ago
Just produce your own numbers. Install whatever flavour of Linux you like (all distrohopping leads to Debian) on a separate partition and benchmark it yourself. It isn't complicated. In the case of my machine, I haven't observed any difference. And by observe I mean with my eyes, I haven't bothered with actual benchmarks because it seems to work about the same, which is good enough for me. I haven't booted my Windows partition in months, and I'm probably just going to blow it away next time I need storage space.
- rlxwearer 5mo ago
  [dead]
- Night_Thastus 5mo ago
  >It isn't complicated Getting reliable, consistent, meaningful performance numbers is in fact, extremely complicated: * You need a consistent way to reproduce the exact same outputs - accounting for things like the game's RNG. You can't just walk around and snap the FPS counter in the corner of the screen and call that good. * For Windows (and occasionally Linux) you need to ensure nothing is running that will taint the results (updates, AV scans, etc) * Sometimes individual driver versions work very poorly with a specific game. Just because it ran badly doesn't mean you got good data, it may just be a bug in that specific driver version * You can't just run the benchmark once. You need to run it many times, establishing run-to-run variance * There are often a good dozen-to-hundred individual OS settings which can impact performance, and in some cases run-to-run variance. You need to know which to tweak, and which to leave alone. * Sometimes the result of individual in-game settings differs between driver versions. Just because setting X had a big impact once, doesn't mean it always did * FPS is not a great metric - it's an average. You need to check and see if there are huge frametime spikes. If there are, the game will have a 'good' FPS but feel horrible to play due to stuttering. * You need to decide if you're benchmarking more GPU-heavy or CPU-heavy - those types of benchmarks require drastically different settings. If you run a CPU-like benchmark you may see a wildly different gap in framerate compared to a GPU-heavy one for the same game. Benchmarking properly means accounting for thousands of tiny variables. Only a handful actually do it right.
dlivingston 5mo ago
Then swap! Partition and dual-boot into Bazzite. Or get an extra SSD and flash Bazzite there. It's an easy weekend side project, and any numbers people give you will be ballparks anyway - the performance of Linux drivers for YOUR specific GPU running YOUR specific Steam games are all that actually matter. Just take the two hours to do it. You won't regret it.
lynndotpy 5mo ago
I've been gaming on Linux since 2020 on an Nvidia GPU with no problems, including some AAA titles like Overwatch and Halo.
alprado50 5mo ago
I have not seen the numbers, but even a game running 10% faster does not replace the fact that many games wont even start in Linux (League of Legends for example).
Kholin 5mo ago
I've running the game Black Myth: Wukong on my dual boot PC systems. The OS are openSUSE Tumbleweed and Windows 10, hardware is AMD RX7800XT and intel i7. Turned out Linux is 10% faster than Windows, and more stable fps.
hedora 5mo ago
Here are some numbers: I bought a windows box with misconfigured dram timings (bios bug). I never would’ve been able to root cause it under windows (certainly not with builtin tools), but dmidecode on linux made the problem obvious. Fixing the timings fixed crashes in amdgpu that windows users widely reported (with no diagnosis), and increased frame rates by 30-50%. Anyway, if you really want to move, do yourself a favor and just go with straight AMD. Software support is better than intel and nvidia, HW blows intel out of the water. The only exception is if you need cuda for AI dev work.
zamalek 5mo ago
Windows and Linux trade punches in terms of overall experience. What I've seen around is that if Linux has worse FPS, it tends to have more consistent pacing (it generally has better pacing - but not always, I had to abandon Once Human). Gamer's Nexus has a pretty extensive benchmark video: https://youtu.be/ovOx4_8ajZ8?si=Cx5Q1a-lMMm14H4i https://youtu.be/ovOx4_8ajZ8?si=Cx5Q1a-lMMm14H4i . They refuse to compare to Windows, and it kinda makes sense: if it's satisfactory on Linux for your demands then who cares what Windows can do? Here's a less professional, but direct comparison https://youtu.be/Giois6VtLPM?si=XFaVUMbea3u0AmP https://youtu.be/Giois6VtLPM?si=XFaVUMbea3u0AmP. An extremely important thing to note: AMD GPU. I personally have no idea what NVIDIA is like, but it sounds like their drivers are still all over the place. And kernel-level anti-cheat doesn't work, though some (e.g. EAC) run in user mode if the developer allows it. Make sure to check ProtonDB for the games you care about. I have personally never had a good experience with Linux builds of games, so I just always use Proton now - but maybe I'm cursed because others have passionately disagreed with my experience. Either way, if a Linux game is broken/bad, try forcing it into Proton. I don't want to say, "switch now" because it still has rough edges in terms of gaming. Better for you to have a great experience and stick around, than hate it and leave for good. Only you can figure out if it needs more time to cook based on some very light (ProtonDB) research. I last used a Windows machine about a year ago, and I can say with confidence that the average desktop experience is significantly superior to the barrage of bullshit that Windows puts you through.
- IshKebab 5mo ago
  > if it's satisfactory on Linux for your demands then who cares what Windows can do? Pretty much everyone? If bread and water is satisfactory for your demands then who cares about Beef Wellington? If it was better than Windows they sure as hell would be comparing.
  - zamalek 5mo ago
    > they sure as hell would be comparing. You're implying that Gamers Nexus is some form of Linux outlet/content creator. They aren't, they only started doing Linux content this year/late last year (and only plan to do it rarely). You've taking a surprisingly hostile stance on the one (at the time of writing) pro-Linux comment that suggests that it might not be ready for everyone, and to wait if it's not a good fit. And it isn't beef wellington vs bread and water. It's 80% lean beef vs 82% lean beef, in the majority of cases (and in either direction). And "suitable for your purposes" also means that 160FPS is really fine if your screen is 144Hz - doesn't matter if Windows does 180FPS (unless you're doing something competitive or extremely latency sensitive). I think Microsoft can do fine without people tilting at windmills for them.
d0gwut 5mo ago
[dead]
utbabya 5mo ago
As others have said, try it yourself, it's very low effort nowadays. For me the lowest bandwidth option was to dual boot then load existing library with https://github.com/ValveSoftware/Proton/wiki/Using-a-NTFS-disk-with-Linux-and-Windows https://github.com/ValveSoftware/Proton/wiki/Using-a-NTFS-di... Got it running in less than an hour.
protocolture 5mo ago
Faster (than previously) not Faster (than windows). The title after the jump is "Linux gaming is getting faster because Windows APIs are becoming Linux kernel features" Getting faster. Not at parity yet.
kstenerud 5mo ago
> Show me the numbers. Show me an identical gaming PC running Windows 11 and then Linux, and show not just FPS - but things like frametime pacing, latency, etc. No. > I WANT to swap. Please give me cause to do so. If you won't put the work in, why should we help you? Just stay on Windows, and we'll enjoy our Linux gaming rigs.
emkoemko 5mo ago
they installed Linux on a PS5 and somehow the Windows games running through proton get same or sometimes a little bit more fps then the native ps5 game, its crazy
shdh 5mo ago
I actually got better FPS in CS2 using Linux
- avadodin 5mo ago
  I don't even know that FPS helps in that game, to be honest. In my experience, CS2 plays better at 150ms ping than 19ms ping. It's not even K/D ratio bias as the far away server has better players than the matches. 19ms and everyone else is just janky-warping around. 150ms and maybe there is a rollback where yeah that whole thing 5s ago didn't happen but otherwise it is very smooth.
Andrex 5mo ago
You want excuses to stay, not reasons to leave. There is zero cost to trying for yourself.

jmalicki 5mo ago

A lot of the revolution is just getting within 5-30% of Windows! If you need every last bit of FPS maybe it is lagging, but 5-30% slower is roughly on par at a large sense, it's less than the difference of e.g. one NVidia GPU generation to the next, so it makes it playable.

anonymousab 5mo ago
One problem is that having better FPS stops mattering if the frame pacing and timing is bad, making the game feel like a juddery mess. Or if there is significant input delay differences. That's why all the data matters for all of these dimensions; game performance is much more than FPS per watt over time. When people see "linux gaming is great now, look at the fps" it comes across as potentially disengenuous because of all the other factors that matter and should be tested. Or rather, if a reviewer is talking entirely about framerate, then I just can't trust their opinion and expertise when it comes to the state of Linux gaming.
- bisby 5mo ago
  Another problem is that having better frame pacing, or better timing stops mattering if the OS decides to reboot for updates mid game. Game experience is much more than just game performance. Part of the issue is that a large part of linux gamers are saying "linux gaming is great" and meaning "linux gaming is good enough now that it is better than putting up with microsoft and windows 11" Some people would rather put up with slightly worse frame pacing if it means no microsoft. Some linux folks are super gung-ho pro privacy, some are just super anti-microsoft but can't game on mac. There's a whole lot of reasons to wind up on linux, so the importance of specific performance details may vary depending on WHY you would be swapping. And some people are playing games on good enough hardware that there arent noticeable frame pacing issues, so good raw FPS numbers just reinforce their views, and they just genuinely mean they are having a good experience themselves.
- jabroni_salad 5mo ago
  To tack onto this a big annoyance for me right now is the lack of knowledge in the community about frame pacing and how to configure the computer. The user will say 'it lags' but does not mention if they have tearing enabled in wayland, what are their 1% lows, have they set an fps cap, what vsync settings have they chosen in-game. On top of that there is an ecosystem failure as not every game supports arbitrary caps and you have to configure some mangohud thing. Linux is only a 'just click play' experience if you have no standards because I have never had this stuff be correct out of the box on a fresh install.
  - Dylan16807 5mo ago
    > Linux is only a 'just click play' experience if you have no standards because I have never had this stuff be correct out of the box on a fresh install. I'm not saying you're wrong, but the standard you've outlined excludes Windows too.
- tormeh 5mo ago
  This is very personal. I don't particularly mind stutter. Input lag annoys me a lot, though.

harrisi 5mo ago

Depending on storage constraints, you could always dualboot. That would give you the exact same hardware to compare, and it's not a full commitment. Anecdotally, I find that getting Linux on somewhat older or underpowered hardware is always a massive positive. Better performance as well as battery life. I'm not as familiar with modern hardware's relationship to either OS ("OS vs. some flavor of OS based on a similar or same kernel" - I know) with modern hardware. Worth a shot though! Every supercomputer seems to do quite well with Linux kernels. Probably good enough for Crysis :)

helterskelter 5mo ago

If memory serves, Linux typically outperforms Windows with AMD and Intel graphics. Some of the gotchas are things like running games through Proton or anti-cheat/DRM stuff not getting the same attention that Windows does, but the raw performance is there. I wouldn't recommend using Nvidia on Linux though.

dlivingston 5mo ago
I run NVIDIA on my Bazzite box and I get excellent performance. I had to fiddle with a few things though that probably work out of the box on AMD (example: screen tearing in Steam Big Picture mode. Fix: enabling developer mode in Steam and setting "Force Composite" to true).
- hedora 5mo ago
  In amd, you have to turn on TearFree in xorg.conf, but you can then avoid screen tearing with and without compositors. I have no idea why this is not turned on by default.
QuaternionsBhop 5mo ago
> I wouldn't recommend using Nvidia on Linux though. This was true 4 years ago, but is outdated knowledge now. Nvidia used to disallow distributing drivers with distro images, but they have since made agreements with some popular distros. If the distro image you download includes drivers or you know how to install them, the proprietary drivers work really well.
eigenspace 5mo ago
It typically will only outperform Windows *if* you are running lower-end hardware. The main thing here is that when running on Linux, your game is typically in less contention with the OS for getting access to CPU cores and RAM. If you have a beefy CPU and plentiful RAM, then typically one should expect Linux to be slightly behind Windows performance (though there are exceptions), because then Windows' bloat becomes a non-issue, and the impact of the translation layers start to become more significant.

worble 5mo ago

If you want to swap, then just do it right now? As far as gaming is concerned Linux just works, and reaches speeds that are more than good enough to do so, even if they're not exactly the same as windows - the steam deck is pretty much proof of this. If Linux was measurably 5% slower on all benchmarks, would that mean you wouldn't do it even if you wanted to? Is every single nanosecond of performance really that important to you? I switched 10 years ago when things were a lot rougher than this, and in the end everything still worked well enough that I never cared to swap back.

BoxedEmpathy 5mo ago
I gave it a try. Got a steam deck, tries steam os on my desktop. I kept running into issues that took me time to solve. I understand that the only reason it took me time to solve these issues is because I'm new to it and that people who have been gaming on Linux for years already know how to solve them all. But what would happen was is I would sit down to play a game spend maybe an hour or two fixing issues and then after that I ran out of time to play the game. I kept this up for a couple months but honestly at some point I just gave up. Now I'm playing games on Windows again. To be clear, I'm a huge proponent of Linux gaming. I just unfortunately am too busy these days to spend the time to get it to work.
- BoxedEmpathy 5mo ago
  And I'll try again when I have more time.
  - kakacik 5mo ago
    Most folks are in this category. But most, including me, wont try anytime soon unless some very positive news come up. We have lives to live, kids to raise, work to do and so on. Gaming moved for a lot of us from 'now I have 5 hours or whole weekend to gaming if I want to' to mere blips here and there, which need to be as frictionless as poasible. Which is great - it means we are doing something actually meaningful and more worthy in our lives. But it also means I will never have enough time for such fiddling. I am fine with it, as much as I can be, but lets be honest to ourselves here.

braiamp 5mo ago

I think the actual answer you are looking for is this paragraph: > These old workarounds got subtle edge cases wrong in ways that produced occasional hitches, deadlocks, or weird behavior in specific games, which are bugs that don't show up on benchmark charts but can absolutely ruin individual experiences. NTSYNC fixes those at the source by matching Windows behavior exactly, and that means as soon as your favorite distro moves to the new kernel version, whether it be Bazzite, CachyOS, Fedora, or a flavor of Ubuntu, they all get this much-needed fix. That's the crux of the article. NTSYNC isn't faster, it's more "correct". Most games are around the same level of performance, with certain outliers both ways. Right now there isn't anything performance wise that Linux has to do that would impact all games. Just tweaks and additions to the different layers [1][2][3] in the same way driver vendors do. Much of the poor performance is for API violations and other shenanigans. 1: https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/mesa/mesa/-/blob/main/src/util/00-mesa-defaults.conf https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/mesa/mesa/-/blob/main/src/uti... 2: https://github.com/doitsujin/dxvk/blob/master/src/util/config/config.cpp https://github.com/doitsujin/dxvk/blob/master/src/util/confi... 3: https://github.com/HansKristian-Work/vkd3d-proton/blob/master/libs/vkd3d/device.c#L605 https://github.com/HansKristian-Work/vkd3d-proton/blob/maste...

kelnos 5mo ago
> NTSYNC isn't faster, it's more "correct". It depends on what you're using now, though. If you're just using a vanilla wine/proton install, then NTSYNC should indeed be a lot faster as well. If you're using fsync or... I forget the name of the other one... then you many not see much in the way of perf improvements.
- mackal 5mo ago
  Esync was the other one. Basically either of those enabled (honestly probably both were) and it didn't hit a corner case with issues, NTSYNC is basically no benefit. (I personally would rather use NTSYNC)

xboxnolifes 5mo ago

Unless you're playing CS competitively and really need 720fps for your 360Hz monitor, is 5-30% fewer frames (all else equal) really a deal breaker? Is this hardware thats barly good enough or something else? I ask because I feel like I can frequently play games at, say, 150fps, and losing 30% would mean almost nothing to me to switch to Linux. I worry more about general capatibility and anticheat.

jofzar 5mo ago
100 fps to 95-70fps is definitely noticeable, 30% is way too much.
- xboxnolifes 5mo ago
  I'm not saying it's not noticeable, I'm saying it's not a deal breaker. If my only holdout from switching to Linux from Windows is gaming, I'd take a 30% fps hit, assuming my fps is generally in the ~150 range, not the ~60 range.
  - unethical_ban 5mo ago
    If Linux dropped my frames from 80 to 50, it would be a deal breaker. Fortunately I haven't noticed performance impacts so I'm on the hype train.
h4x0rr 5mo ago
5-30% is what a sizable amount of people upgrade their hardware for
- kQq9oHeAz6wLLS 5mo ago
  looks at ancient desktop rig still doing everything I ask of it Huh. I wonder if they're the same people who complain that they don't have enough money to live.

NamTaf 5mo ago

Your initial baseline was arbitrary. If the game had been 10% slower on Windows, would you have never enjoyed it? If not, how could switching with a 10% penalty be a deal-breaking downside? Just do it. Swap and let go of objectivity. Let your subjective experience guide you. For me, the subjective joy of not having to fuck around with Microsoft's bullshit was worth multiples of having to mess around with technical crap to get a game working (spoiler: I nearly never have to do that because I play single player games, Dota and CS). I couldn't give less of a damn if my FPS in some random title is 10% slower than it would be in Windows. So long as it's playable, I benefit in spades from the trade-off.

NewsaHackO 5mo ago
I mean, there are costs to swapping though. Going by just feels seems to be the wrong way to think about it.
- ulbu 5mo ago
  it can’t really be a way to think about it when the recommendation is to not think about it and just do it. experience, observe, reach opinion. all in accordance with you and not some number that’s abstract to your perception.
  - lunatuna 5mo ago
    Yawman, being on Linux for everything else feels great. In a personal way (rather than technical) it’s like being back in my 20’s hacking Redhat and FreeBSD. I also find the community support is great when I’ve run into the odd issue. My FPS are good and I don’t think about it. I select games based on ProtonDB. There’s always constraints and I’m cool with the limitations that this brings. BF6 is a no-go due to its anticheat tool, no problem. Got lots of other choices.
    - OccamsMirror 5mo ago
      My son is really into soccer, so I wanted to get the latest ~~Fifa~~ FC game. Oh it has anticheat and doesn't run, at all. Frustrating because I wouldn't want to play online anyway. Happy to not give EA any money if they're so set on shoving online play and therefore anticheat down the players throats. Grateful that Steam allows easy refunds.

AlienRobot 5mo ago

It isn't saying it's faster than Windows. Just faster.

ActorNightly 5mo ago

Its never going to happen. Because console players by far dominate the gaming scene. Microsoft is going to push Xbox first, which will drive all development of the games, which is going to be windows focused. As such, all major release studios are going to target that. Until we get something like CoD titles being Steam Console first, linux is allways going to lag behind. That being said, I think we are on a precipice of AI being able to simply just rewrite games from concepts. Start with generic source code for an FPS or 3PS, then people can contribute changes in english language to tailor the game. So it won't be even copying source code, it would be copying concepts and then making a new game with it. There have been a lot of games that have very rudimentary graphics that people played in large numbers because the complexity and gameplay was quite good.

as1mov 5mo ago
Most major platforms already have enough asset flips cluttering their storefronts[1][2] -- generic games made from preexisting engine templates with some assets bought from the store. Using AI will just make producing the slop easier, it wouldn't make something that's worth playing. Anyone actually looking to make something genuinely fun will probably go the old fashioned way of spending countless hours honing their craft, which in turn gives them a good eye to make sure what they're making doesn't have the shovelware stink. [1] https://www.notebookcheck.net/Sony-delists-700-PS4-and-PS5-shovelware-games-from-PS-Store-with-many-using-generative-AI.1257171.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/Sony-delists-700-PS4-and-PS5-s... [2] https://www.gamesindustry.biz/shovelware-is-a-bigger-problem-than-ever-platform-holders-need-a-robust-response-opinion https://www.gamesindustry.biz/shovelware-is-a-bigger-problem...

encom 5mo ago

Just produce your own numbers. Install whatever flavour of Linux you like (all distrohopping leads to Debian) on a separate partition and benchmark it yourself. It isn't complicated. In the case of my machine, I haven't observed any difference. And by observe I mean with my eyes, I haven't bothered with actual benchmarks because it seems to work about the same, which is good enough for me. I haven't booted my Windows partition in months, and I'm probably just going to blow it away next time I need storage space.

rlxwearer 5mo ago
[dead]
Night_Thastus 5mo ago
>It isn't complicated Getting reliable, consistent, meaningful performance numbers is in fact, extremely complicated: * You need a consistent way to reproduce the exact same outputs - accounting for things like the game's RNG. You can't just walk around and snap the FPS counter in the corner of the screen and call that good. * For Windows (and occasionally Linux) you need to ensure nothing is running that will taint the results (updates, AV scans, etc) * Sometimes individual driver versions work very poorly with a specific game. Just because it ran badly doesn't mean you got good data, it may just be a bug in that specific driver version * You can't just run the benchmark once. You need to run it many times, establishing run-to-run variance * There are often a good dozen-to-hundred individual OS settings which can impact performance, and in some cases run-to-run variance. You need to know which to tweak, and which to leave alone. * Sometimes the result of individual in-game settings differs between driver versions. Just because setting X had a big impact once, doesn't mean it always did * FPS is not a great metric - it's an average. You need to check and see if there are huge frametime spikes. If there are, the game will have a 'good' FPS but feel horrible to play due to stuttering. * You need to decide if you're benchmarking more GPU-heavy or CPU-heavy - those types of benchmarks require drastically different settings. If you run a CPU-like benchmark you may see a wildly different gap in framerate compared to a GPU-heavy one for the same game. Benchmarking properly means accounting for thousands of tiny variables. Only a handful actually do it right.

dlivingston 5mo ago

Then swap! Partition and dual-boot into Bazzite. Or get an extra SSD and flash Bazzite there. It's an easy weekend side project, and any numbers people give you will be ballparks anyway - the performance of Linux drivers for YOUR specific GPU running YOUR specific Steam games are all that actually matter. Just take the two hours to do it. You won't regret it.

lynndotpy 5mo ago

I've been gaming on Linux since 2020 on an Nvidia GPU with no problems, including some AAA titles like Overwatch and Halo.

alprado50 5mo ago

I have not seen the numbers, but even a game running 10% faster does not replace the fact that many games wont even start in Linux (League of Legends for example).

Kholin 5mo ago

I've running the game Black Myth: Wukong on my dual boot PC systems. The OS are openSUSE Tumbleweed and Windows 10, hardware is AMD RX7800XT and intel i7. Turned out Linux is 10% faster than Windows, and more stable fps.

hedora 5mo ago

Here are some numbers: I bought a windows box with misconfigured dram timings (bios bug). I never would’ve been able to root cause it under windows (certainly not with builtin tools), but dmidecode on linux made the problem obvious. Fixing the timings fixed crashes in amdgpu that windows users widely reported (with no diagnosis), and increased frame rates by 30-50%. Anyway, if you really want to move, do yourself a favor and just go with straight AMD. Software support is better than intel and nvidia, HW blows intel out of the water. The only exception is if you need cuda for AI dev work.

zamalek 5mo ago

Windows and Linux trade punches in terms of overall experience. What I've seen around is that if Linux has worse FPS, it tends to have more consistent pacing (it generally has better pacing - but not always, I had to abandon Once Human). Gamer's Nexus has a pretty extensive benchmark video: https://youtu.be/ovOx4_8ajZ8?si=Cx5Q1a-lMMm14H4i https://youtu.be/ovOx4_8ajZ8?si=Cx5Q1a-lMMm14H4i . They refuse to compare to Windows, and it kinda makes sense: if it's satisfactory on Linux for your demands then who cares what Windows can do? Here's a less professional, but direct comparison https://youtu.be/Giois6VtLPM?si=XFaVUMbea3u0AmP https://youtu.be/Giois6VtLPM?si=XFaVUMbea3u0AmP. An extremely important thing to note: AMD GPU. I personally have no idea what NVIDIA is like, but it sounds like their drivers are still all over the place. And kernel-level anti-cheat doesn't work, though some (e.g. EAC) run in user mode if the developer allows it. Make sure to check ProtonDB for the games you care about. I have personally never had a good experience with Linux builds of games, so I just always use Proton now - but maybe I'm cursed because others have passionately disagreed with my experience. Either way, if a Linux game is broken/bad, try forcing it into Proton. I don't want to say, "switch now" because it still has rough edges in terms of gaming. Better for you to have a great experience and stick around, than hate it and leave for good. Only you can figure out if it needs more time to cook based on some very light (ProtonDB) research. I last used a Windows machine about a year ago, and I can say with confidence that the average desktop experience is significantly superior to the barrage of bullshit that Windows puts you through.

IshKebab 5mo ago
> if it's satisfactory on Linux for your demands then who cares what Windows can do? Pretty much everyone? If bread and water is satisfactory for your demands then who cares about Beef Wellington? If it was better than Windows they sure as hell would be comparing.
- zamalek 5mo ago
  > they sure as hell would be comparing. You're implying that Gamers Nexus is some form of Linux outlet/content creator. They aren't, they only started doing Linux content this year/late last year (and only plan to do it rarely). You've taking a surprisingly hostile stance on the one (at the time of writing) pro-Linux comment that suggests that it might not be ready for everyone, and to wait if it's not a good fit. And it isn't beef wellington vs bread and water. It's 80% lean beef vs 82% lean beef, in the majority of cases (and in either direction). And "suitable for your purposes" also means that 160FPS is really fine if your screen is 144Hz - doesn't matter if Windows does 180FPS (unless you're doing something competitive or extremely latency sensitive). I think Microsoft can do fine without people tilting at windmills for them.

d0gwut 5mo ago

[dead]

utbabya 5mo ago

As others have said, try it yourself, it's very low effort nowadays. For me the lowest bandwidth option was to dual boot then load existing library with https://github.com/ValveSoftware/Proton/wiki/Using-a-NTFS-disk-with-Linux-and-Windows https://github.com/ValveSoftware/Proton/wiki/Using-a-NTFS-di... Got it running in less than an hour.

protocolture 5mo ago

Faster (than previously) not Faster (than windows). The title after the jump is "Linux gaming is getting faster because Windows APIs are becoming Linux kernel features" Getting faster. Not at parity yet.

kstenerud 5mo ago

> Show me the numbers. Show me an identical gaming PC running Windows 11 and then Linux, and show not just FPS - but things like frametime pacing, latency, etc. No. > I WANT to swap. Please give me cause to do so. If you won't put the work in, why should we help you? Just stay on Windows, and we'll enjoy our Linux gaming rigs.

emkoemko 5mo ago

they installed Linux on a PS5 and somehow the Windows games running through proton get same or sometimes a little bit more fps then the native ps5 game, its crazy

shdh 5mo ago

I actually got better FPS in CS2 using Linux

avadodin 5mo ago
I don't even know that FPS helps in that game, to be honest. In my experience, CS2 plays better at 150ms ping than 19ms ping. It's not even K/D ratio bias as the far away server has better players than the matches. 19ms and everyone else is just janky-warping around. 150ms and maybe there is a rollback where yeah that whole thing 5s ago didn't happen but otherwise it is very smooth.

Andrex 5mo ago

You want excuses to stay, not reasons to leave. There is zero cost to trying for yourself.