recently i just finished building a new pc. mostly for gaming since my only exposure to linux is steam os and i heard its uses arch with kde plasma so i try to emulate it as close as i can. however soon i realized how different it is and it requires more setup than i initially thought. i spent a whole day or two setting it up and i read now im responsible on maintaining it, what does it mean? is it just finding and testing drivers? or system update? what is the easiest way to do it? and what i getting myself into?
when i was about to install steam i found a tutorial on it with 3 - 4 pages full of text and was a bit overwhelmed, i decided just set it up using discover with flatpak, the problem is when i was about to find out how to do that i read mostly people really hate when you ask how to enable it in arch, is it really bad? should i just use konsole instead?
im not very tech savvy and at first I was really reluctant to use konsole but since i decided to use arch its inevitable that i have to use konsole and so far its not that bad, yet.
I’m just wondering for the long term, should i just change distro? or i should just powertrough arch and see where it goes.
thank you for your time.
edit:
thank you for all the kind words, support and information everyone. i decided that i’ll stick with arch until it breaks and ill see either i retry arch or try different linux flavors. i never feels so excited about os since i was messing around in win 2000
Arch Linux’s whole claim to fame is Some Assembly Required. Go with something like Mint or Fedora (the latter of which is available with the KDE desktop, source: am typing this on a gaming computer running Fedora KDE) and they’re much more complete out of the box.
If you’re willing to learn Arch it really isn’t that difficult. I wouldn’t reccommend it to a noob but seeing as you’re already using it why not give it a try? I wouldn’t reccommend the Steam flatpak as Valve reccommends against it and it doesn’t work as well. Feel free to DM for advice from someone who uses it daily.
I second this. The initial setup is the hard part. Give it a couple days. The arch wiki is the best resource in the whole Linux ecosystem in my opinion. If that’s the long manual you were looking at for installing steam, know that 90% of it is info on strange edge cases and all a typical user will need to do is
sudo pacman -Syuthensudo pacman -S steam(I forgot you have to enable the multilib repository if you haven’t already. You seem smart, you’ll find the info in the wiki)A couple times a year or so something will break after an update. When that happens
- Google if anyone else has posted your exact problem
- See if chatgpt knows anything
- Humbly post in the arch user forum
One of those will solve it. Good luck!
i see. thank you for the info. i dont exactly remember if i have enabled multilib, it does sound familiar. maybe i alr enabled it when i tried a bunch of random things…
WHOA. Please be VERY HESITANT to use anything ChatGPT outputs. Sanity check any commands it gives you from other places first.
thank you for the kind offer. ill try to use arch as long as possible. i hope i am a fast learner because I’m a bit lazy to setup a new distro and reconfig everything again
I’m the laziest fuck there is man. You’re in good company lol.
Cachyos bro, installing all gaming related things is one click or installed by default on Bazzite
oh my, thank you
It’s the best. I put it on my Windows machines too. It even updates WSL as it does it’s thing.
You’re probably better off with Fedora, Mint, or Bazzite to be honest
Seconding Bazzite, it’s great for gaming.
Third
ford
Seconding Fedora.
deleted by creator
i knew a fair amount about linux cli since ive used ubuntu and debian for servers for like 15 years so i was someone knowledgeable but when i decided to wipe away windows on my desktops i picked linuz mint because it was ubuntu based but also it was recommended for beginners. for the most part it works great, i can use steam and heroic. i cant get warcraft classic working but i just need to dig in more.
the one problem i had was when i first started and it wouldnt boot up but i just command line restored using timeshift and it fixed it and i havent had a problem since.
i havent once had issues with drivers or anything. i even installed it on an old computer for my dads church who mostly use it for powerpoint (now libreoffice) and projecting. they know nothing about computers and theyve been fine. i do want to enable auto updates for them though so they dont have to do that.
sudo pacman -SyuAnd done, usually. Lol
Looks like you have an extra space
Good call lol. Fixed.
when i was about to install steam i found a tutorial on it with 3 - 4 pages full of text and was a bit overwhelmed
Here is my tutorial:
- enable multilib repo by editing pacman config
sudo pacman -Syu steam
It’s as easy as that. Thats how I run it.
and i read now im responsible on maintaining it, what does it mean? is it just finding and testing drivers? or system update? what is the easiest way to do it? and what i getting myself into?
When I started my Linux journey, I went with Ubuntu and kept breaking it every year for a couple of years, which taught me a lot. Then eventually I hopped to Arch and I’ve been running the same setup since. For over 6 years now. I am very lazy, so I don’t do anythjng special unless it breaks.
My setup has automatic btrfs snapshots and manual offsite backups with borg.
My workflow is:
-
every friday evening after work, I do an update and reboot.
-
If everything works, I do a borg backup. Most update fridays are like this and end here.
-
If it’s broken (this year it’s been 2 times so far, last year iirc 3 times) I read the journal log, find the cause, fix it by live booting an arch usb stick and chrooting into mt system and following the archlinux forum or reddit or news. (For example recently, there was a kernel bug with btrfs, someone on reddit posted a mailing list link with a command that solved it)
-
Sometimes there is an issue with an app I have, especially if it’s from the AUR. Often a reinstall fixes it, otherwise I fix the PKGBUILD and let the maintainer know what was broken.
-
After it is broken, I go through all the .pacnew files and merge them (The wiki says you should do it after every update, but I’m lazy)
-
After I fixed it, I do a borg backup.
-
If it takes too long to fix or I am especially lazy, I restore a btrfs snapshot and try next week. Usually the issue is resolved by then or somebody solved it on reddit.
So yeah it’s quite involved, but I got better at it with time and again, most of the time everything just works and I can enjoy weekly improvements or new features to play with.
I am a bit on the fence which advice to give you. Either keep it and run with it for a while longer or install a simpler gaming focused distro. It’s up tp you really.
thank you for telling me your workflow. with bit of time i think i can follow your workflow as its quite simple (at least sound like it)
Here is my tutorial:
- enable multilib repo by editing pacman config
sudo pacman -Syu steam
It’s as easy as that. Thats how I run it.
yeah, about that. it seems i mixed wiki as tutorial and was but intimidated when i saw how to do manual terminal config for controller setup, graphic driver, and other stuffs. in my mind that just getting the base app is not enough, you need to find the specific perquisite and getting them one by one.
i decided that ill keep playing with arch until it breaks then ill see if i want to give it another go or try bazzite. i love tinkering but software tinker is a bit out of my depth
cachyos, post install click install gaming packages, in steam goto compotability switch it to proton cachyos, done, there is no struggle, it grabs heroic and lutris too for non steam stuff
The only tweaking I’ve ever needed to do was for Helldivers 2. I had to swap from cachy’s proton to the actual proton which was literally just a menu in Steam. (Multiplayer wouldn’t work otherwise. Everything else was fine.)
Highly recommend this for you OP. This would be the easiest course of action. Do you have to use Konsole, yes but for a few commands and once done you can do everything you need via GUI and not have to touch shell again for daily operations.
Catchy have a very powerful script that attaches all their pacman.conf (list of places where arch will look for it’s software)
Here’s a link to the section Adding CachyOS to existing Arch Install
Once that’s done you only need one more command
sudo pacman -Syu octopiOctopi will let you manage all your software and kernel updates without having to touch terminal or having to use flatpaks.
I would recommend packages:
- cachyos-hooks
- linux-cachyos
- linux-cachyos-header
- cachyos-kernel-manager
- proton-cachyos
- wine-cachyos
- cachyos-gaming-meta
This will have you fully set up and ready to seamlessly game on your machine without having to reinstall a OS.
thank you for the kind recommendation, ill give it a look. im ankle deep in arch now. ill see where it goes and when it broke ill try different distros.
If you’re the type of new user that likes to go balls deep straight away, then Arch is arguably one of the better options thanks to its excellent Wiki. However, please don’t blatantly overestimate yourself for the heck of it. Consider checking out ArchWiki’s own entries on this matter:
- Why would I not want to use Arch?
- I am a complete GNU/Linux beginner. Should I use Arch?
- System maintenance
i found a tutorial on it with 3 - 4 pages full of text and was a bit overwhelmed
I don’t think this attitude is helpful for conquering Arch, but YMMV.
recently i just finished building a new pc. mostly for gaming since my only exposure to linux is steam os and i heard its uses arch with kde plasma so i try to emulate it as close as i can.
FWIW, if you just want to emulate SteamOS, perhaps consider Bazzite instead. It’s not based on Arch, but it arguably is the closest to SteamOS (but better). More so than any Arch-based distro*.
after looking at it more i realized its more of a wiki than a tutorial. my initial thought is if i use pacman to install steam i had to find and get the dependencies by myself so thats why i went with flatpak route.
few people recommend bazzite too. ill try to give it a look
had to find and get the dependencies by myself
Luckily, Linux has evolved in the past 30 years. A package manager (one usually comes with your system, like apt, dnf, pacman) will handle almost all direct dependencies for you. When installing Steam, you may be asked which 32-bit Vulkan library you want to install, but aside from that it should get everything automatically. (Hint: vulkan-radeon on AMD, otherwise pick the one for your GPU brand)
Managing and “maintaining” (updating, sometimes cleaning) an Arch Linux installation is definitely more involved than what you are used to on Windows or the Steam Deck. Some people prefer this workflow, as it offers more control over their system. Others prefer an already set up and maintained environment.
Bazzite is a very SteamOS-like experience. You click update once in a while, and shouldn’t have to touch anything else internal to the system. You get Steam and Flatpaks out of the box.
Since Linux gives everyone the freedom to do things the way they want, there will always be people shitting on a specific way to do things. There are definitely good reasons to dislike certain software, but generally you should be just fine. Just because someone thinks their way of doing things is better doesn’t mean you should immediately switch to that.
That being said, the main downside of Steam in a flatpak is the sandboxing possibly getting in the way of modding your games, or games that use unique hardware (like steering wheels or so).
steam(pacman package) does not have those specific issues, but it lacks sandboxing (aside from Steam’s pressure vessel for games).
You can continue with Arch if you want, and there’s certainly good resources to learn (like the wiki) or get help (like the IRC or Matrix rooms). It will require you to learn about how to actually set up and configure your Linux installation the way you prefer. Other distros (usually marketed as “user friendly”), like Fedora, Bazzite, Mint, will automatically perform or set up some of the maintenance you’d have to do manually on Arch.
thank you for the insight. glad that its not as hard as people used to do back in the day. i hope wont break it sooner than i hoped so im going to stick with arch for a bit. honestly its been a pretty fun experience so far.
few people recommend bazzite too. ill try to give it a look
If you want the system to be out of your way while you get to enjoy your games, then that’s exactly what Bazzite is for.
If, instead, you’re interested in getting to know how the traditional model of Linux desktop works, then I’d look elsewhere.
Once your computer’s working to your satisfaction, pretty much all you’ll need to do is alias
sudo packman -Syuand try to remember to run that every so often. The arch Linux wiki is second to none, and if you stick with the distro you should find it all feels very familiar in no time.🤞🏿 I just found out about ricing. so satisfactory is probably an illusive state…
You’re not screwed. Depends on how much you enjoy tinkering and troubleshooting.
My main advice would be to keep your data backed up and completely disconnected from the PC. And make sure your machine is not critical (i.e. for working from home or something). Other than that you do what you want. If you want to dive deep in Arch then that’s fine.
One thing to know is that the important part relevant to you is: the desktop environment (KDE) and the Linux distro (Arch) are different things. The far more important thing for you is to have KDE… the distro underneath just needs to not get in the way.
If you’ve got Arch up and running then stick with it until it gives you trouble. I naturally ended up distro hopping in the beginning because I would catastrophically break something I couldn’t repair and could change distros naturally when reinstalling.
Good options for easy distros with KDE would be:
-
Tuxedo OS (or Kubuntu) - easiest and there’s lots of support online.
-
Fredora - rock solid and highly recommend. Although I would recommend OpenSUSE Tumbleweed instead, this got me hooked on Linux and was the least problematic for a bleeding edge updated distro, where I happily used Discover for installing and updating.
-
CachyOS - good option for sticking with Arch.
this pc is mostly for gaming and entertainment so not much is lost if its wiped or broke.
i do love tinkering, just that software tinker is a bit out of my depth
thank you for your input. after a lot of other input and consideration i’ll keep playing with arch until it broke then ill decide later if i want to retry it or go with bazzite. or maybe see other enticing distro too. there is so much…
-
As a completely new user who’s self-described as “not very tech savvy”, Arch is probably a terrible idea, and you should switch distros.
I really like Debian, but something like Linux Mint or Fedora might be wiser for you; all three hold your hand more, which would be very important in your case. Fedora and Debian specifically are designed to work well with KDE, although Fedora will have newer versions.
You certainly seem willing to learn (you got through the Arch install process), and I think you still have a great opportunity to enjoy Linux, but considering you’re calling the terminal emulator “Konsole”, your self-description is probably apt. FYI Konsole is just one application to access the terminal, kind of like how Firefox and Chrome are both web browsers, but you don’t use “Chrome” to refer to web browsers.
anything that have good implementation of kde is worth a look for me. i love kde.
thank you for your info
Go with Bazzite, it tries to mimic SteamOS out of the box. Very easy install/setup process (easier than windows).
Bazzite is Fedora Kinoite with some extra stuff, Kinoite might be better for a desktop setup but either one is totally useable for gaming and desktop so don’t overthink it.
Welcome to Linux where you maintain your own os… You are literally the owner of this ship you want to destroy your system to ahead you want to do whatever cause windows pissed you off go ahead… evening can be fixed usually… try all the distros till you like some and use those.
How does it feel to be in control and not have to listen to the Man ?
You are 90% of the way there.
Just keep your system up to date (update packages weekly maybe) and you will be fine. The system mostly manages itself.
I recommend installing both the current kernel and an LTS kernel. If you ever have a problem with a driver or a filesystem or something after an update, just boot into LTS and you are back up and running.
