this post was submitted on 12 Nov 2025
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I've kept a windows machine around for gaming for decades, and always built it myself. Next time it gets tired I will be checking out whatever iteration the steam machine is...
Shame that the controller is coming out next year, I need a new one.
When it gets tired (or now) just slap steamOS or Nobara or Mint or PopOS or insert distro here on it and keep using the same comp for another 5 years with the extra overhead reclaimed
Not gonna try and deal with Nvidia drivers on Linux if I don't have to. Having to reinstall all games would itself be annoying.
Nothing to deal with, either use a distro that comes with them or download them during install.
You will have to reinstall with your other solution.
Though if you have it on a separate drive you can add them to lutris or steam and use the existing install.
The other commenter was suggesting I replace my perfectly writing setup right now. And you don't need to reinstall applications when you replace hardware - but windows binaries will not run directly on Linux hence they'll need reinstalling in that case.
Create a wine prefix, point it to the binary.
On Lutris this is “add already installed game”
On Steam this is “add non-steam game”
Though if you point your steam library to the location of the games it will detect them as already installed, then you can go to properties and tell it to use proton or set all non-linux games to use proton. (Proton is a wine wrapper with a steam dependency)
Oh, I didn't realise I wanted to run all the games with native Linux versions through WINE.
Tell me, what problem is it that you think you are trying to solve? Because I have a working system already so I know there isn't a problem.
If you're using a win10 version that's EOL, that's not a safe long term solution. But I guess that was inferred rather than asked by the other commentor.
There are notable performance improvements running games under Linux compared to Windows, however.
Yeah I just upgraded to win11 when 10 went eol. It's no big deal.
I mean win11 is still spyware garbage, but it's your pc.
I can't recommend anyone buy a Steam Machine, honestly. I'm glad it exists for those who think they need it but you have a giant choice of hardware otherwise that you can simply slap SteamOS or a number of other distros with "Handheld/Game Mode" on them.
That is, unless it comes with console-like features like HDMI-CEC, updates while "off", etc.
Eh, if it has decent hardware then there is an advantage, just like with deck, of having games tested on that hardware.
That is the most important bit here. Valve, effectively, launched a new gaming console that just so happens to be compatible with more games than any console out there. If they can use the install base of this platform to force developers to build compatibility like what they've done for the steam deck, this is going to be huge.
I've never seen games that run on Steam Deck that don't run on any other Linux device, unless the devs specifically made it that way, in which case you give it the ol' steamdeck=0
You've never found a game that runs ok on some hardware but other hardware??
Of course I have. Because one of them is more powerful than the other.