Most probably have heard by now that the Lenovo Legion Go S with SteamOS got announced. Looking at the reactions, I can see two fractions:

  • This is the year of the Linux Desktop
  • It’s not that big of a deal. It’s easy to install Linux.

I wanted to address both of those. Let’s start with:

This is the year of the Linux Desktop#

I doubt it. Mostly because SteamOS isn’t a desktop OS, but a console OS. Yes, you can switch to a desktop. This will be interesting for a lot of people, but mainly for one two things: Modding and Cheats.

Let me first address cheats. I don’t mind cheats when it comes to single player games. I bought the game. I want to experience it how I want to. If something is too difficult for me, then why shouldn’t I use a cheat to get past that? I got a game to enjoy myself, not to throw it in a corner and be frustrated.

The other big thing is Modding. Boy is that fun. Adding content or mechanics to games to experience them over and over in different ways? Look at Skyrim and XCOM2. How much extra life got put into those games by the community.

But modding and cheats are also the problem. Cheats are usually written for Windows, which makes it really hard for someone to install them on SteamOS. The situation is better with mods, if there is a Steam Workshop for a game. If not, then it can get pretty difficult to mod. I wrote a howto that describes how to mod Baldurs Gate 3 with the mod manager. How you install it. It’s not a easy process.

So no, I don’t think it will be the year of the Linux Desktop. It might be the year of the Linux console and that might bring the Linux desktop to the masses.

It’s easy to install Linux#

Installing an operating system is easy? Not even Windows is easy. Most people wouldn’t even know how to boot a recovery image and wipe their laptop. They barely know Windows and even less anything outside of it. No, installing an OS isn’t easy. What is a partition? A file system? I need a driver, how do I get it?

What is easy, is getting a piece of hardware that has the operating system already installed. That’s why it is so important that laptops, desktops and handheld gaming devices get shipped with Linux preinstalled. That it simply works. As much as I am not a Apple fan, that is what Apple does well. At least from what I hear. It simply works.

Even if you are ‘brave’ enough to install Linux yourself, there is a good chance that some things don’t work. Especially with laptops. Strange network cards. Strange power saving issues. Something weird with the BIOS. I have my laptop for a few years now and some things still don’t work. I don’t try to fix those because I don’t care about them. For instance, if I put a SD card in the reader, the whole system freezes. If I remember correct, I had that issue before and it was some power saving state issue. I don’t use that slot so I don’t care.

It might be easy for a good amount of people to install any Linux and game on it, but for the majority of people, it is not. They also do not want to learn it. They want it to simply work.

Conclusion#

Yes, SteamOS is important, but it will only be successful if enough manufacturers sell hardware with it installed (or at least certified) and enough people buy it. If we are lucky, people don’t know better and buy the one with SteamOS. If we are really lucky, those people don’t get too upset when certain games do not work.

There, I had my rant.

I wish you well,

Andy