I am looking at either Arch or Ubuntu for a development machine which also plays some games, but what is support like on arch with steam?
Is Arch useful as a development machine, stability wise? Ubuntu will be 14.04.3
Also what is the state of catalyst for the 290?
Don't start a flame war please, I am looking for facts.
Thanks
Arch or Ubuntu is not like for like comparison. Though both will meet your requirements, as will most Linux distros.
Arch aims to keep it simple, gives you a base to build the Linux system you want! No bloat. Not really for the Linux novice and can be hugely frustrating while learning, but equally tremendously satisfying too, when it all works out right. Maximum performance, no compromise, no nonsense. Arch is also a rolling release. You install it and just keep updating, no versions as such.
Link: http://www.itworld.com/article/2898189/five-reasons-i-roll-with-arch-linux-and-why-you-should-too.html
Link: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Beginners'_guide
Ubuntu aims to keep it simple too, but a different kind of simple. Works out of the box. You'll get software you don't want or need, because Canonical thinks you'll like it. Still requires some thought to use (if you've not used Linux before, think knowledgeable Windows user, ie not your Mom.), but essentially user friendly. If Ubuntu is not friendly enough, go Linux Mint (http://www.linuxmint.com). You'll need to install the latest version to stay up to date. Approximately every 6 months, though the LTS versions helps, kind of.
For steam it works just fine in arch. Works fine in any OS really. See the wiki if you have any problems. Sometimes you need to delete a couple of libraries steam bundles becuase they are to old.
For development, whatever os you like again is fine. Arch will have newer libraries than Ubuntu though you may not need any features of newer libraries anway. Ubuntu always has ppa's if you need newer packages.
For drivers, I wouldn't even bother with the catalyst drivers. Use the open source drivers instead. On arch add the mesagit repo, on Ubuntu add the xorg-edgers ppa. You can get the latest drivers with opengl 4.1 support.
Had to go with Ubuntu in the end, couldn't get GRUB2 working at all, shame, I have used Arch before and loved it, but never had much luck with GRUB, rather shitty bootloader when it comes to Arch I find.
Settled with Ubuntu, I think ill just force it to latest kernel and then add mesa-git to it and see if it breaks
Thanks!
Personally, I strongly recommend syslinui bootloader over grub. The configuration is super straightforward.
Linux mint is also a good option for linux newbies.
I realise you've already installed Ubuntu, just for reference though, I thought I'd comment on the stability part of your question:
With Ubuntu don't go LTS, while LTS may be slightly more stable, the libraries may be several versions old, meaning that once you upgrade, half your code may be invalid or deprecated.
NonLTS Ubuntu is perfectly stable in most cases, and will generally receive fixes within a reasonable time frame. Generally though an Ubuntu release is feature locked. So no new features until next release.
As for Arch: with Arch you get the newest features, the newest bugs, and the newest fixes. Stuff may suddenly break, though if you submit a bug report detailing the issue, generally they can fix it pretty quick, because they still have the changes fresh in memory.
I use Arch for developing, and despite occasional down times, i am pleasantly content with the experience.
PS. One thing that is worth mentioning though: Who is your target audience with your developings? If you use arch, and end up relying on newer libraries, you may find that it takes a while before people on Ubuntu or other distros are able to run your software, because they have to wait for their distros to catch up.
Arch has an LTS version of the kernel, maybe a compromise in this situation?
It depends....
Arch is loved by a lot of people(including myself btw) which speaks for the distro but it can be a problem whenever you need some information about it since Arch users often are a little bit too fanboyish to give you an objective answer.
Yes Arch is quite stable for every day usage, it really doesn't break often or something.
But if you really have increased demands regarding stability or reliability is your #1 priority, Arch shouldn't be your first choice.
If you have to avoid by all means to start your work 20 minutes later because you have to fix some little things after an update once in a while, if maybe somebody else could rely on data being uploaded from your machine at any given time, then there are simply better solutions than Arch Linux, because there are distros which have such an environment in mind, Arch isn't exactly one of them.
I'd rather point towards RHEL/CentOS, Debian or SLED/OpenSUSE.
When I've had "problems" the kernel has not been it. The issues I had were with linking against libraries, once a typo in a header file caused my project to not compile, most recently gcc would spit out a billion warnings (false alarm) about stuff being deprecated...
The Arch rule of thumb: don't update while you're in the middle of something important. Stick to that rule, and you'll avoid most urgent situations.