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Best Configuration for Linux Gaming?
werjman asks: "I'm interested in switching completely to Linux but the only thing holding me back is the gaming. What I really want to know is what distro, graphical environment, Window Manager, and so forth are low on the system resources and play games great (and by games, I mean 3D accelerated memory hogs). Does anyone out there actually use Linux as a gaming platform?"
If it's a fullscreen 3D game that you want to devote as much of your resources as you can, you can change your runlevel so that you login on the console. Then just use xinit. I personally use fluxbox on Slack 10 though, on an older P4 2.0GHz and a Geforce3 Ti200, and I get decent play with most settings between medium and low on UT2k4.
First set your system up without graphical login, which most distributions configure by default. /etc/inittab and change the default runlevel to 3, this means find the line /usr/local/games/doom3/doom3
To do this edit
id:3:initdefault:
which will normally read 5 and change it to 3 (like mine is), Fedora inittab files are well commented and explain what to do, others are probably similar.
To go into X (the windowing system) you type startx after logging in, this gives you your regular desktop, gnome, kde, xfce, whatever.
When you are bored with email quit out of X and run your game with (I think)
xinit
I read that here
Well, there is supposed to be an xbox port of HL2. Unfortuneatly its all TBA, with 0 screens released.
Don't give your hopes up on a console port happening. ever.Two Roommates and a Boyfriend, updates Monday, Wednesday, and Friday
How about a windows machine configured right next to your linux box. Seriously, it has the pro over a dual-boot at least in that you don't have to reboot to switch operating systems. I recommend a monitor switch to let you use the same monitor for both computers (and of course, allows you to instantly switch). Make sure you get a good one though or your will have some funky artifacts on your screen...
"It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance." - Thomas Sowell
I feel sorry when people let recursive acronyms tell them what to believe about software. Nevermind that every dictionary definition of emulator clearly applies to WINE and its progeny. We'll trust the stupid name that was clearly picked because any recursive algorithm resulting in the word WINE has to end in E!
It doesn't even matter if WINE is an emulator or not, in the first place. I'm continually mystified by the myriad of people who feel the need to "correct" anyone that refers to it as such.
That's just my little nitpick. Other than that the parent post is accurate and helpful.
Personally, I play games on a PC not because its my only option, but because it adds an extra level of depth and complexity that you can't find in certain genres on console games. In the same way that image manipulation software lets you go above and beyond what you could do on paper/canvas (for the most part), gaming on a general purpose computer allows much more flexibility than on a static console. Personally I play my PC games in parallel with the console games, but you cant build sophisticated 3d levels for your favorite games on a console, nor can you become part of a sophisticated community based on the modification and extension of a game.
As to the original question - Linux for me for the id games, all the others on the XP partition.
This isn't particular to you, because you didn't come across as crazy, but what is the deal with XFCe anyway? Why does everyone love it so much? I would even compare many of its proponents to Gentoo users in terms of zealotry.
:|
I use its taskbar (better than gnome's, imo) but its window manager leaves something to be desired. That something is configurability, particularly in terms of key bindings. Sawfish has almost 200 WM actions that can be bound to key or mouse shortcuts. Things like toggling maximization or shading on a window, running a command/program, popping up a menu to edit window features (titlebar style, stickyness, appears on window cycle, etc), deleting a window group, etc. Pretty much anything the WM can do can be bound to a key or mouse shortcut.
XFCe, on the other hand, says "use xbindkeys". Well xbindkeys can't do most of that WM stuff, but thanks anyway. When I was trying out XFCe and trying to find docs on setting shortcuts to whatever I wanted, I ran across an email on the dev list saying something to the effect of "We will never give built-in shortcut support for many WM actions because of such-and-such standard." Sounds like a project very concerned with its users
Anyway, that's my XFCe rant. I guess it's pretty looking, but Sawfish let's me configure hundreds of things I couldn't in XFCe. I'll stick with what let's me use it rather than feel like I'm being (ab)used.
--
Promoting critical thinking since 1994.
"Stop making excuses for your Windows partition. You don't need it, remove it."
Whoever modded this as 'insightful' was being incredibly short-sighted. The simple fact of the mnatter is that Windows is the best OS for PC gaming. If you want to play games only available on PC, and you want to play on-line, then having a Windows partition is not an 'excuse'. A PS2 or GameCube is an alternative, but not always an ideal one.
Do yourself a favor and quit kidding yourself. If you're avoiding games because you hate Microsoft, you really are taking things way too seriously.
"Derp de derp."
To those of you suggesting that a lightweight window manager is the way to go, I have to ask, what exactly is the point? The last time I did this was back in the early G400 days, when things like CPU meters updating add significant X server context-switch overhead (far more than the under 1% of CPU time such apps might take). It saves some RAM, sure, but think about it:
1) RAM costs next to nothing these days - 512MB goes for under AU$100 locally.
2) Even without enough real RAM, this is a classic example of what virtual memory is for. After a quick game, is logging back in to your desktop, reloading all your apps and then getting back to your work really quicker than just leaving the OS to swap your apps back in?
For me, one of the joys of Linux is the ability to have my desktop and applications open 24/7 for weeks on end. If you're going to log out every time you play a game, you might as well just hit the reboot button in your login manager and go play in XP.
To answer the topic, I'd suggest an NVIDIA video card (the 6600GT is, by all indications, awesome, and NVIDIA's Linux drivers are better than ATI's), a Creative SB Live! or Audigy card (no need to knock yourself out - an older OEM Live! card will do fine), and an Athlon 64 CPU. There's no Linux-specific reason to go for the Athlon 64 over the P4 (though playing with 64-bit Linux can be fun), but they just seem to be a better chip for the money overall, and a better gaming chip in particular.
Any distro, LILO, Windows XP and a spare drive.
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"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge"
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2. this means find the line id:3:initdefault: which will normally read 5 and change it to 3 (like mine is), Fedora inittab files are well commented and explain what to do, others are probably similar.
3. To go into X (the windowing system) you type startx after logging in, this gives you your regular desktop, gnome, kde, xfce, whatever.
4. When you are bored with email quit out of X and run your game with (I think) xinit
You expect Joe Sixpack to do all that to play a game? Not a chance. You might as well be speaking Mandarin.