Patreon Logo Support us on Patreon to keep GamingOnLinux alive. This ensures all of our main content remains free for everyone. Just good, fresh content! Alternatively, you can donate through PayPal Logo PayPal. You can also buy games using our partner links for GOG and Humble Store.
Latest Comments by tuubi
Get a free copy of Bomber Crew during the Humble Winter Sale
16 Jan 2021 at 8:11 pm UTC

Quoting: thoughtfulhippo
Quoting: tuubiI think the game only activates on the account you link.
No, they give you the key directly and a convenient 'Redeem' button that just links to the Steam register key page.
So they just want your data. Nah, not worth it to me.

Get a free copy of Bomber Crew during the Humble Winter Sale
15 Jan 2021 at 5:13 pm UTC

Quoting: g000h
Quoting: tuubiI think I'll skip future giveaways on Humble unless they're something on my wishlist. Last time I linked my Steam account, unlinking it required two emails to their support and more than a week (and proof that I own the account) for them to actually get it done. Not worth the hassle, and I don't want to leave the accounts linked.
You could also create a 'spare' Steam account, link that to Humble (and leave it connected), claim the giveaway, and use the Steam key with your official account.
I think the game only activates on the account you link. That's how they make sure people don't simply resell the keys. And I'm not desperate enough for free games to bother with multiple accounts.

Get a free copy of Bomber Crew during the Humble Winter Sale
15 Jan 2021 at 6:07 am UTC

I think I'll skip future giveaways on Humble unless they're something on my wishlist. Last time I linked my Steam account, unlinking it required two emails to their support and more than a week (and proof that I own the account) for them to actually get it done. Not worth the hassle, and I don't want to leave the accounts linked.

Valve's review of 2020 shows off pretty big numbers - 120 million monthly active users
14 Jan 2021 at 3:37 pm UTC Likes: 2

Quoting: KimyrielleBut many countries in Europe and elsewhere would be happy to have JUST 7% unemployment even WITHOUT a pandemic going on, so there is that.
This comparison is almost meaningless if you ignore relative living standards. An unemployed person in one country might be better off (and contribute more to the economy) than someone working a full time job in another.

Epic Games has acquired RAD Game Tools so they now own Bink video and more
11 Jan 2021 at 2:11 pm UTC

Quoting: Guest
Quoting: einherjarEveryone knows what companies like this do, when they have enough power/marketshare. They lock up things to erase competition.
Yeah Google is giving Mozilla money so they won't be a monopoly with Chrome/Chromium.
Much cheaper than paying the (EU) penalties for forcing competition off the platform I guess. Maybe they've learned their lesson. If this is true that is.

Update your NVIDIA drivers due to multiple security issues found
11 Jan 2021 at 6:59 am UTC Likes: 1

Quoting: slaapliedje
Quoting: tuubi
Quoting: TheRiddickI've found updating GPU drivers and MESA to be much easier under Arch based Linux, AUR is a godsend also! The whole PPA Ubuntu random packages method was rather clunky to deal with!
A Mesa update is just as simple to install as any other update, isn't it?

Are the packages in AUR less "random" than ones in a PPA?
Well mesa being a library that a lot of things depend upon, and PPAs basically being a wild west and not officially supported by Ubuntu...
A wild west just like AUR then. I use a grand total of three PPAs on my gaming/entertainment box currently BTW, one owned and updated by a Valve employee, and the other two by the teams who develop the software I download from those PPAs. Do you always check who wrote the pkgbuilds you download from AUR?

And with Arch they are core libraries and so things that need to be rebuilt on those are rebuilt at the same time the libraries are. It is one of the 'pros' of running a Rolling release.
Having to build a bunch of stuff yourself is a pro?

I was a Gentoo user for a couple of years so I see what you're trying to say, but for most users that really isn't a pro.

If you are someone who always needs bleeding edge drivers / libraries, Arch is fantastic at keeping things up to date. If I ran AMD stuff, I would probably just stick to Arch.
I don't see why I would, and I actually run AMD stuff. If you mainly use your computer for gaming, you're best off running something close to what game developers test against, with just your graphics drivers updated to the latest and greatest.

There are good reasons to prefer a rolling distro but gaming isn't one. If you just want to play your games, you don't really care about most libraries being bleeding edge as much as you care about having a supported system. That's why we have steam runtimes and whatnot.

Snaps were created to try and stop the many PPAs from being needed.
I doubt that was even in the top five reasons.

I guess this discussion is a bit off topic here.

Update your NVIDIA drivers due to multiple security issues found
10 Jan 2021 at 10:19 pm UTC

Quoting: TheRiddickI've found updating GPU drivers and MESA to be much easier under Arch based Linux, AUR is a godsend also! The whole PPA Ubuntu random packages method was rather clunky to deal with!
A Mesa update is just as simple to install as any other update, isn't it?

Are the packages in AUR less "random" than ones in a PPA?

AMD make switching between Vulkan drivers AMDVLK and RADV easier
9 Jan 2021 at 9:22 am UTC Likes: 3

Quoting: mylka
Quoting: fagnerlnAMD and Valve are two of most helpful companies and must be supported from us.
meehhh they kicked the AMD sensor thingy (k10temp) out of kernel 5.10 because a lack of documentation. now some values are useless and i have to stick with kernel 5.9
Well that's not quite the whole truth. The module exists and still reports temperatures, but the reason it doesn't report voltage and current any more is not just about the documentation. Here's the relevant commit message:

Voltages and current are reported by Zen CPUs. However, the means
to do so is undocumented, changes from CPU to CPU, and the raw data
is not calibrated. Calibration information is available, but again
not documented. This results in less than perfect user experience,
up to concerns that loading the driver might possibly damage
the hardware (by reporting out-of range voltages). Effectively
support for reporting voltages and current is not maintainable.
Drop it.
If there's code in the kernel that might risk damaging your hardware (or simply provides unreliable data), I'd say removing it is a good decision.

The Linux distribution I was most thankful for in 2020 - EndeavourOS
7 Jan 2021 at 4:05 pm UTC Likes: 1

Quoting: dibz
Quoting: scaineThat's really interesting. I only use about 3 or 4 PPAs (Mesa, Wine, Chrome/Dropbox and OBS), but I've found the Mint upgrade to be a real train wreck. It refused to upgrade unless I downgraded all my packages first, which took ages. Then finally upgraded, then I had to restore all my PPAs, and so on. It was painful stuff. To be fair, Ubuntu isn't hugely better - but it automates a lot of the process for you.

But just look at these instructions... holy cow. https://community.linuxmint.com/tutorial/view/2 [External Link]
You're not kidding about holy cow there, wow. Looks extremely verbose, and almost all of it seems to be about taking backups and such. That's also...not quite the right instructions, they should probably be more clear about that...

https://linuxmint-user-guide.readthedocs.io/en/latest/upgrade-to-mint-20.html [External Link]

I guess I was wrong about it being in upgrade manager, could've sworn it was. Uses the "mintupgrade" tool. I've taken backups like the doc suggests, but I've never bothered to downgrade any PPAs or anything; but then I don't use any PPAs that would interfere with system packages to begin with (that's "looking for trouble"). I will say this though, if you use any PPAs for newer graphics drivers it would be wise to downgrade and remove _that_ PPA in advance.
The instructions do look scary, but even my wife had no trouble using the upgrade tool, and she's no power user. But I did help her find good sources for her graphics software afterwards.

Personally I use every upgrade as an opportunity to do some system maintenance and clearing of inevitable cruft. An hour every couple of years is hardly a lot of effort.

Heroic Games Launcher is a new unofficial Epic Games Store for Linux
6 Jan 2021 at 3:57 pm UTC

Quoting: mylkathe appimage finally shows me my games
it would be sooo awesome if we could download native linux versions from epic through this launcher

i just went over all the free games i collected, looking for native linux games and IT....IS.... A.... LOT!!!!!!!!!!
A launcher can do nothing about the fact that none of those Linux versions are available in Epic's store. There's nothing to download. But maybe that's what you meant.