Distro: spoilt of choice

[Suleiman]

Hi,

I was watching some vids of Wendell and got fascinated how far Linux has come with gaming.
Now I am consider to remove dual boot and the Microsoft money sink completely.

I use Debian since 2001 but I missing some up to date Software (like video editing tools, mysql, …) .
And don’t get me to explain the problems I run into when tried to get some Windows-Games to work with in Debian
ATM I can run Guild Wars 2 and EVE Online, both w/ 32Bit only and it is stammering.
On Windows I can run many AAA Games at 64Bit at low/med settings but on Debian I get CTDs and Games freeze when using 64Bit with any settings.
Its probably because of the lack of up to date software/drivers Debian uses.

My system looks like this…

• Debian 9.5
• wine-3.0.1 (Debian 3.0.1-2~bpo9+1)
• PlayOnLinux 4.2.10
• Lutris 0.4.18.1
• GTX 770 w/ Driver Version: 384.130
• 16GB of RAM at 1600MHz
• AMD FX™-8350 Eight-Core Processor

Things that also bug me …

• Gnome-Keyring and DM w/ Auto-Connect enabled: every time I lock into Gnome I have to enter a Password to get Evolution (EMail) to work.

• Gnome w/ Firefox and Rosegarden: there seems to be a problem with Audio because Rosegarden wants Audio Jack and Gnome + Firefox wants to use Pulse Audio.

• Gnome-Session: after a reboot/shutdown I have to arrange all programms again. I know there is an Auto-Start Method but still I need to arrange things.

• Gnome-Boxes: when loading X11 into VM it stutter

• Screen arrangements: I have dual Monitors as a workspace and a TV that should clone/copy the left screen. But I cant get Gnome to do so and need to tweak nvidia-settings after every reboot.

Now I am thinking of switching to the dark side and wipe all data.
Then I can do a fresh install of a new distro and try to get some games installed.

Should I leave Gnome behind, or try to fix things again and again ?
I had read about XFCE will make gaming performance better cause of some DM issues with Wine/Drivers.
Is this still accurate or even true ?

I am not a fan of ppa’s, but it seems Ubuntu is the way to go for the best gaming support.
Maybe Manjaro I should try, the rolling releases looks appealing to me.
Or I would not mind to compile all myself and try Gentoo.
I was quite amazed by the stuff I have learned already while using stage 1 to install Gentoo into VM.
Still I have not reached a working DE but I will get there.
I hope Gentoo will give me a bit more know-how while learning/study IT-Security for Linux,
or will I fool myself and just make things complicate ?

Hope this community can give me some advice to proceed

[risk]

Not sure what’s the latest on Nvidia and Wayland support, last I heard they weren’t interested in it.

It sounds like all your issues are cross-team cross organizational cross library problems. Can you backup / use another drive and try to upgrade to Debian testing (basically a rolling release/more up to date Debian) instead of stable and maybe try reporting bugs and see what pans out?

[as96]

I am not a fan of ppa’s, but it seems Ubuntu is the way to go for the best gaming support.
Maybe Manjaro I should try, the rolling releases looks appealing to me.
Or I would not mind to compile all myself and try Gentoo.
I was quite amazed by the stuff I have learned already while using stage 1 to install Gentoo into VM.
Still I have not reached a working DE but I will get there.
I hope Gentoo will give me a bit more know-how while learning/study IT-Security for Linux,
or will I fool myself and just make things complicate ?

If you want to use Gentoo as a learning experience then go for it but for any other purpose it’s just not worth it.

[Diffident]

I was quite amazed by the stuff I have learned already while using stage 1 to install Gentoo into VM.

Gentoo installs with Stage 3 now, no need to compile the toolchain for the install. Gentoo is easy once you get it installed, which really isn’t that bad. The Gentoo Handbook is easy to follow.

[Goalkeeper]

How does one even do a stage one install anymore. I thought their was no more documentation on that.

[Diffident]

How does one even do a stage one install anymore. I thought their was no more documentation on that.

I don’t know. It’s probably been at least 10 years since Stage 3 became the default install method.

[Suleiman]

Can you backup / use another drive and try to upgrade to Debian testing (basically a rolling release/more up to date Debian) instead of stable and maybe try reporting bugs and see what pans out?

Done it.
Thanks for the advice it works well with games.
Now I can play at 64 Bit with no complains at all.

My system looks much better now …

• Linux debian 4.17.0-3-amd64 #1 SMP Debian 4.17.17-1 (2018-08-18) x86_64 GNU/Linux
• NVidia Driver 390.77
• wine-3.0.2 (Debian 3.0.2-3)
• PlayOnLinux 4.2.12
• Lutris 0.4.18.1

If you want to use Gentoo as a learning experience then go for it but for any other purpose it’s just not worth it.

Yeah, I thought so. I should stay with Debian then and maybe do some more Gentoo experiments in VM only.

Gentoo installs with Stage 3 now, no need to compile the toolchain for the install.

At least I cant complain by the stuff I have learned. It was worth the few hours I took into it (besides compiling over night).

Now I am quite happy with the tip risk gave me, and I dont need to switch sides