I was a long time Windows user, starting with XP. I only tried Linux a few years ago, and while I loved it, at the time I had to dual boot for a couple specific Windows only things (VR and flight/racing sim hardware).

A couple months ago though, I got sick of it. I figured if I really wanted to do those things, I could boot up a VM, or just force myself to be patient and wait for a proper Linux solution. So, I wiped all my drives and installed Arch. Around this time, I also got an AMD RX 7600XT, so that was a nice performance boost, plus it waranted a switch to Wayland.

Let me tell you, I have been so pleasantly surprised by basically everything I’ve tried. Cyberpunk 2077 through Heroic Launcher, for example, with 15 odd mods. Runs at a solid 80fps at 1440p on high settings, the only graphical issue I noticed was flickering volumetric clouds. This game ate my old card (the venerable GTX 1080) alive even on Windows.

Just last night, I found my joystick, an old VKB Gladiator + Kosmosima grip, plugged it in and it worked perfectly.

What has really, really impressed me though is VR. I have a Quest 2 that I used to use via Steam link to play my PC wirelessly. Obviously that isn’t an option on Linux (yet) but that’s where ALVR comes in. Sideload the client on the quest, run the streamer on the desktop, start SteamVR, and bam, it works. The first game I tried was Elite Dangerous, one of my all time favourite games and easily my favourite VR epxerience. Now, I won’t go ahead and claim it’s perfect, hence the 99% in the title. After fiddling with the settings and making sure I had hardware encoding/decoding set up right, I had very good clarity, up to 120hz refresh rate, but occasional blockiness and artifacting, especially in heavier graphical scenes, like during docking. However, out in open space, it felt just like the ED I know and love.

At this point, I’m just going to look at fiddling with some settings and hopefully smoothing out the stream, but the fact that I can play my favourite games, with my favourite hardware, with great performance and in VR, and the amount of setup is really comparable to what it is on Windows is just kind of wrinkling my brain. Plus, only a couple months ago, this wasn’t the case. Support for things that were once doomed to be dual boot material for the foreseeable future is coming along rapidly. This is a great time to be a Linux gamer.

  • capital@lemmy.worldEnglish
    1·
    7 months ago

    AMD being preferred was my sense of the situation so it’s good to have that confirmed. Looks like I need to get more familiar with that family of cards.

    • bigmclargehuge@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
      2·
      7 months ago

      AMD’s naming scheme is honestly similar to Nvidias. They have X600, X700, etc (the “X” being the generation of card, the second digit being the model).

      So for example, the current gen is the 7000 series, with the 7600 being the lowest, and roughly analogous to the 4060, and the 7900 to the 4090. There are also XT versions which is AMD’s version of the Ti line. They have more VRAM, higher clocks, overclocking, etc.

      I’d look at the 6700XT, or the one I have which is the 7600XT. Both have similar specs, the 7600XT is more recent with better performance in a couple areas, but the 6700XT is tried and true, and you’ll be more likely to find a good deal on it. The 7600XT only came out a couple months ago and isn’t anywhere near as well established, but IMO it performs excellent at good temps without any tweaks. Both are great for 1080p or 1440p with modern games.