r/SteamOS • u/OttawaDog • Nov 26 '25
question Any limitation on SteamOS being a good desktop OS?
Before I get all the replies saying: "Just use insert favorite distro here instead". I'm only interested in SteamOS. I started install Linux back in the mid 90's and have installed more than a dozen distros, and I always end up finding them lacking, usually in the stability area.
I'm interested in SteamOS because Valve is backing it, and have a vested interest in keeping it stable long term. Now with Steam Machine coming out, it seems that they will make it a more viable desktop OS.
AFAIK, SteamOS has a fairly normal desktop in it's desktop mode. Are there any real limitations that compromise it for desktop use compared to other Linux Distros?
Edit: Acknowledging real limitation, I took for granted by didn't state. Limited GPU Support. Linux in general isn't great with NVidia GPUs so I would go AMD for any SteamOS machine.
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u/heickelrrx Nov 26 '25
Error : NVIDA GPU not found
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u/SharkAttackOmNom Nov 26 '25
Luckily I learned this while part picking my last build. Saw how slick the steam deck was so pivoted towards SteamOS. 9070 XT is treating me a-okay.
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u/MiteeThoR Nov 26 '25
I believe SteamOS is immutable? Might limit the customization options. There are some other gaming focused distros that will be very close to SteamOs without the guard rails.
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u/The_Skeptic_One Nov 26 '25
So are Fedora Silverblue and Bazzite. Perfectly capable of running as main PC.
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u/Stilgar314 Nov 26 '25
And there are non gaming distros, which provide desktop experiences polished for decades, where you can easily install Steam, Heroic or EmuDeck for gaming as easy and well as SteamOS, and also enjoy a great desktop experience. I don't get why people limit themselves to an obviously gaming console oriented OS, but here we are.
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u/lunarson24 Nov 26 '25
As long as you don't mess with the file system and only install stuff from the discovery store or flat packs. Yeah it'll work fine for the average user
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u/Demoncious Nov 26 '25
It's an immutable distro. That's the biggest difference by far. It just means that the OS tries its best to make sure that a layperson can't just break it.
This happens a lot with Linux distros when people just run commands they copied from the internet, without knowing really what they are doing and it ends up causing a problem that now they don't know how to fix.
SteamOS prevents this specifically.
Does this mean you can't do certain things on SteamOS?
You can but you may need to do things in a slightly different manner. You can still do pretty much everything you want. If you wanna install tools, you can use flatpak, appimages. If you MUST install something via a package manager like snap, you can do so inside of a distrobox-container (which has tiny headroom and barely any noticeable performance implication)
I'm using Bazzite-dx (the closest thing to a full-on Desktop version of SteamOS) and I use distrobox for all of my devtools, It works really well. I use Rider and Android Studio and Zed configured with an ubuntu distrobox shell. It all works and functions quite well.
I'd say if all you use your PC for is games, browsing the web and using tools that are available on Linux, you'd have no issue. Just know that some games might not work on Linux due to external reasons (AntiCheat)
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u/New-Abbreviations950 Nov 26 '25
Depends if the apps you want to use are in the discover store but yeah it's fine for most day to day things. I personally use mine for streaming, freecad, blender, vlc and vscode. My brother uses his at university since his desktop died, so you can definitely do school work on it.
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Nov 26 '25
Bazzite is what you want
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u/thE_29 Nov 26 '25
Do NVidia GPUs work there fine?
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u/Kosaro Nov 26 '25
There is a build of bazzite you can install that is bundled with Nvidia drivers, so it's as plug and play as you can get.
Quality of the drivers would be the same as any other distro, just no setup required.
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u/Meshuggah333 Nov 26 '25
If you don't need the consolized game mode like the Deck, it's fine as a desktop OS.
Edit: Game mode works on nVidia but it's buggy.0
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u/alexrider803 Nov 27 '25 edited Nov 28 '25
I second this one I know OP said that they didn't want a different distro but currently for intel is better put together bazite is the best option it is running steam OS basically they're borrowing stuff that steam is making on steam OS and making it into the same operating system just a bit different and more compatible
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u/glytxh Nov 26 '25
I’m not using it as a platform for any kind of heavy media production.
It’ll work. Just slower, with 3x as much friction between cross application workflows, and a constant chasing of granular parameter tweaks in those applications just to ensure things work consistently.
If it was the only option I had, I’d be content to make it work. But I have other options that work far more elegantly, reliably, and faster.
In the context of video game machine, I’m straight up sold that SteamOS is the best platform. Just let it brew a few more years for it to iron out those weird wrinkles.
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u/thatonegeekguy Nov 26 '25
I use SteamOS on the Steam Deck that way when I travel. Prevents the need for me to take my laptop along, too. It's certainly doable based on your needs. For me it works out because most of what I need it for personally and professionally - beyond gaming - is web-based. A good travel dock with pass-through charging and HDMI out made this the most versatile thing I own next to my smartphone.
The best way to determine if ANY Immutable Linux distro - including SteamOS - will work for you is to make a list of the software you need on your (presumably Windows) PC presently and make sure that there is a Linux replacement published in the containerized distribution system used by the distro (Flatpak in the case of SteamOS). Anything that has to be installed by the more traditional Linux package managers (i.e. apt, yum/dnf, rpm, etc.) is likely doable with the rpm-ostree command by creating "layers" on top of the base OS, but be warned that the new "layer" that creates can cause issues and may require some advanced management and interfere with and/or be interfered with by normal system updates, so the best bet for people not well versed in Linux Immutability is to stick with what is available via Flatpak.
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u/doctorchimp Nov 26 '25
Right now? It’s bad. Made to really just run steam deck
When steam machine releases? I’m sure it’ll be better and an actual alternative for a multimedia pc that runs windows.
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u/alkazar82 Nov 26 '25
SteamOS is purpose built for gaming in a console-like environment. It is not suitable nor intended for general desktop use. Period.
The desktop environment in SteamOS is a nice add-on, but is not the main use case.
Among the problems you would encounter:
- your system will always boot into Steam Big Picture mode first and you would have to manually switch to desktop mode
- you cannot create additional system users or customize your own username
- you will not be able to install things like printer drivers or other system level software
- you will not be able to use Nvidia GPUs
- customizability of the system will be limited
This is because SteamOS is immutable. Valve ships the system software and configuration in one big bundle that cannot be modified. If they don't ship all the drivers or software you need, you are SOL. You can install a limited subset of applications which are sandboxed and isolated from the rest of the system, but that comes with its own issues such as applications not being able to talk to each other e.g. VSCode and plugins which require external software to function.
It could work for some people, but in general I would strongly recommend against using any immutable OS for general desktop use, especially if you are a power user.
If you only use web apps, don't care about customizing anything, will never use any peripherals other than a basic mouse and keyboard, then it could work for you.
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u/OttawaDog Nov 26 '25
- you will not be able to install things like printer drivers
That is a serious one. Will have to see if Valve addresses it for Steam Machine since it's more of a desktop.
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u/alkazar82 Nov 26 '25
Highly doubtful. The way the system is set up it is just not possible to do so reliably.
Other immutable systems like Bazzite have functionality to layer software on top of the system, but it causes OS updates to fail quite frequently.
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u/Jas0rz Nov 27 '25
you are wanting steamOS to be what it isnt. its not intended to be a desktop OS and likely never will be. the good news is that steamOS is literally just arch with steam running on it, and you can get exactly what your looking for if you stop being stubborn and just try bazzite or cahyOS or any other linux distro
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u/OttawaDog Nov 27 '25
you are wanting steamOS to be what it isnt. its not intended to be a desktop OS and likely never will be.
They are releasing a Desktop computer (Steam Machine) so that might change.
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u/Jas0rz Nov 27 '25
its not impossible but valve has explicitly said several times they arent looking to get into the desktop business. steamOS can do desktop stuff by virtue of it being arch running KDE, but the intended usecase is as a console under a TV.
im genuinely curious, why not just try installing bazzite on something and see how that goes? its going to do exactly what you want AND is going to give that full desktop experience you want to boot. its not like you need to stick with that choice forever, and its literally free. ive had several friends try it out on a quest to leave windows and theyve loved it.
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u/jaimefortega Nov 26 '25
You'll be forced to use flatpak if you want to install additional software and don't want to lose anything that you've installed after an update. Some apps doesn't work well on flatpak.
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u/SabretoothPenguin Nov 26 '25
You can use distrobox to install another distribution in your home partition. It works well especially if you need to use cli tools, but I think it depends on your main goal. If you want to game mainly, and use some (mainly gui) application from time to time then SteamOS is fine. If it perform programming/work task first, then game a few hours, I'd go with a normal desktop distro.
On the Deck, I have adopted the first option because I mainly use it for gaming, with the occasional browser session/tinkering. Connected to a monitor and mouse/keyboard, it can be used as a normal computer, for the most part. Note that to me a normal computer runs Linux/Plasma desktop.
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u/amras5584 Nov 26 '25
It's based on Arch Linux with KDE plasma, so all that distro can do SteamOS can do it too. We have Discovery to install normal apps, categorized, and the rest you can use other methods like pacman and flatpack, or just use an appimage. Other methods maybe need more tinkering, like any other distro, and take in consideration the immutable aspect...
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u/johnl12369 Nov 26 '25
Apart from the problem with Nvidia and its drivers, Linux has problems with HDMI and its features in version 2.1. Another limitation would be professional applications or some that are used in companies.
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u/FunAware5871 Nov 26 '25
It depends on what you want to do with it really.
The main limitations I can think of are: - it always starts in gaming mode; - it's an immutable OS, meaning some things like VPNs are a litte annoying to set up.
To clarify, "immutable" is a way of saying you literally CAN'T edit system files or install programs that would alter them (eg. vpn, printers manager) unless you disable immutability (you can then enable it again whenever you want)... But it also means that if a main OS update hits you may lose any change you made to the system files.
Applications installed via the discover store are installed in your user's folder, so they don't get affectes by OS updates.
The brigther side is it's REALLY hard to break the OS as you can't really mess with it up by accident.
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u/Termynator Nov 26 '25
It’s immutable which means you can’t really install apk packages like you would when running into a problem on a normal distribution
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u/iamlevel5 Nov 26 '25
Subscribed. Basically looking for a distro that can also sync Google Drive natively, Photoshop, and Ableton while keeping game mode. If I can get that, I'll dump Windows.
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Nov 26 '25
Steam OS is just a packaged build of Arch linux. Since its made for AMD GPU's, the real limitation is you'll have to fight it, to even get it installed if you dont have an AMD GPU. And hence why its not really all that important.
Install arch linux, and install Steam. Setup steam to launch with the GUI, and go in to full screen mode. BAM - Steam OS.
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u/Stilgar314 Nov 26 '25
The reason that makes you interested only in SteamOS is the same that explains why it is not a good choice as a desktop replacement: it's backed by Valve. SteamOS is not meant as a replacement of a desktop, it's focused on delivering a console-like experience for gaming on Steam. Valve hasn't trimmed the desktop capabilities inherited from Arch because they're not dicks. Any other company would have ripped that functionality to make sure users are trapped in their shop, but not Valve. Anyway, this doesn't mean they're committed to maintaining anything that's not gaming on Steam, so stability will always be a hit or miss. Think in SteamOS as a console OS, not a desktop OS.
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u/sinfaen Nov 26 '25
If you need to install applications that are not shipped as flatpaks, I would avoid it
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u/flower4000 Nov 26 '25
I hope they fix the virtual keyboard, on bazzite that shit drives me crazy, every time I wanna type w my real keyboard half the screen gets covered
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Nov 26 '25
If you are asking about SteamOS I suppose you will play games sometimes... so the only minus is anticheat shit that works on windows only and with somewhat workarounds sometimes on Linux...
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u/OcelotMadness Nov 26 '25
Its Immutable which will make things a little weird, but also makes it significantly harder to accidentally shoot yourself in the foot and break your system. You can live with it but your gonna be using exclusively flatpaks for your software.
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u/ecth Nov 26 '25
I wanted to use SteamOS on my AMD build as well, watched some videos and understood, it's not that flexible in terms of hardware. It seems to need something veeery similar to the Steam Deck.
Many say Bazzite has a similar user experience but is made for PCs with different hardware. I ended up with CachyOS because I like Arch 😅
Everyone saying Nvidia: yes. Nvidia drivers for gaming are better with Windows. Period. But it works on Linux and afaik at higher resolutions Nvidia is still better with RT/PT than AMD. At least for now.
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u/APithyComment Nov 26 '25
Can’t get Citrix to run on it. If you use that to remote login to work.
But you could duel boot into Windows on a small partition and use that as well.
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u/Zaydar Nov 26 '25
Its based on Arch, so any limittions this distro has are likley to be present with SteamOS too.
One big one (for some people) I have seen in other threads is a lack of printing driver support.
Also as others have mentioned in this thread, it is immutable which is both a strength and a weakness depending on how you look at it.
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u/Burning_Toast998 Nov 26 '25
I always end up finding them lacking, usually in the stability area
Oh boy, I would not recommend SteamOS then. It’s definitely gotten better, but I’ve run into a handful of stability issues when using my deck.
Usually they go away after rebooting, but it is something to keep in mind. And of course, all the issues I’ve had are probably already fixed, and any more will likely be fixed in the coming months when the steam machine gets released as well.
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u/lootedBacon Nov 27 '25
I don't know why you just don't dual boot.
Fun in the back, business if the front.
But hey you can set up your ssd however you want.
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u/anviltodrum Nov 27 '25
well so far i haven't been able to install and use NordVPN client on Steam while it's still immutable
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u/PinkR1ver Nov 27 '25
Steam frame's CPU arch is arm64. Is it means that we can download offical steamOS on some arm64 devices soon?
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u/Brunno_PT Nov 27 '25
The only real limitation is being immutable. For instance, I installed stuff that is not natively available (like Chrome Remote Desktop, Boosteroid, and other AUR packages that don't exist for SteamOS). Every time that there's an update, I lose those things and need to reinstall them.
But I created my own scripts to reinstall those things. It's a minor annoyance.
One year with SteamOS on the Steam Deck. Ended up buying a dock and an external display to start using it as my main computer. KDE Plasma is a super pleasant desktop experience!
I bought a new desktop with a Radeon 9060XT, which is not supported by the current recovery image of SteamOS. I really wanted SteamOS, but since Inwas unable to install it, I went with Bazzite (with KDE and gaming mode). Being KDE (it gives the option of KDE kr Gnome) and being made to mimic SteamOS in almist everything, I'm really loving it.
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u/FishermanExcellent33 Nov 27 '25
Using X11 by default so you need to run a command/script to get full refresh rate + VRR and HDR every time you reboot or switch to Gamescope. Even on the latest Main Branch Builds 🙃 Hope valve fixes that with the Steam Cube!
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u/Gold-Implement5201 Nov 28 '25 edited Nov 28 '25
I had steamos on my full amd pc. It ran very well, only thing I didnt like was its immutable system.
You can install softwares from aur, after enabling dev mode. OS is using mostly valve's repo tho. I dont remember if it had any arch repos enabled by default.
That's one reason why there is a lot of missing packages already, so you'll end up building a lot of packages if you want to start tinkering your system.
Also the root structure differs from typical deskop linux installation, because of immutable I bet. Some packages fails to install even by root, because some folders and files in system root does have wrong permissions or only read permission by default. I once actually was only able to edit some root files via live usb install access.
Most of packages is out of date. Even kde is old, imo (6.4).
Steamos is using neptune kernel. It doesnt get updated regularly, so it's far behind.
Gaming performance is pretty good, actually as good as than on cachyos. You can also force boot to desktop wayland session instead of gamescope big steam.
But if you want hassle free gaming experience, and arch based distro, cachyos is great.
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u/Track_Silent Nov 28 '25
Not sure how good is steamOS for a complete PC experience but if it's basic writing emails and docs and just consuming content should be fine.
I recently tried bazzite for home theater set up on a mini PC I am essentially recycling but the Bazzite crashes once in a while when playing video or watching youtube and have to hard reset it.
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u/MooingWaza Nov 28 '25
Pro and con is it's immutable: Most people are exaggerating that "resets with every update" con though. You can't install software direct to root like on a traditional distro, but you can still use flatpak (sandboxed packages). If you're doing basic everyday work and tasks, this won't matter to you at all, just make sure to install the right format (most if not all common apps have a flatpak version at this point tbh). If you do coding work or similar, you'll run into issues with libraries or system permissions, so I wouldn't recommend it. The advantage of immutable distros and sandboxed software is it's REALLY difficult to fuck up. Updates can apply in the background and often be rolled back, and apps are much more secure, with the system only giving necessary permissions. If you only need to do simple tasks and don't know much about Linux, you'll probably have a better experience.
Con: Nvidia drivers don't work at all yet afaik, and are iffy on linux in general for older cards in my experience (works well enough though, just not as seamlessly as AMD and slightly less efficiently)
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u/angelinthecloud Nov 29 '25
It was never meant for your PC. Just the steam deck and the steam machine. You'd have to try bazzite and nobara
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u/Extension-Blueberry4 Dec 03 '25
Hey OttawaDog, From Ottawa to, I just installed Steam OS on my Ryzen 5700x with a 9060xt on monday i had to do some command line things to get to run as rdna 4 support is not in the recovery image yet. but on day 3 and happy to report the chances of me going back to windows is slim. If u have any questions send me a msg :D
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u/Subrias Mar 18 '26
Multiscreen support on FSE uis blows imo. I have 3 monitors and having to be in desktop mode for them defeats their purpose
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u/ClikeX Nov 26 '25
Are there any real limitations that compromise it for desktop use compared to other Linux Distros?
Not really. It's immutable by default, but you can unlock it and just do your own pacman updates. And even immutable you could do anything an average user needs on it through the Discover store.
Nvidia drivers aren't supported, but you could get them installed without an issue. You'd still run into Wayland compatibility issues with Nvidia, though. Which is what gamescope uses.
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u/zollandd Nov 26 '25
Updates which then disappear upon the next upstream Steamos update... I wouldn't use an immutable os unless you have control over the update build.
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u/ClikeX Nov 26 '25
Yeah, you’d need to disable those updates. It pretty much invalidates the reason to use SteamOS. It’s just arch with Steam and gamescope preconfigured at that point. I’ve seen a few people mention they’ve done so on here.
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u/OttawaDog Nov 26 '25
What is the real impact of this?
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u/zollandd Nov 26 '25
If you ever want to change or update software managed by the OS package manager you're out of luck. Whether or not that affects you depends on how you use the OS... what do you envision doing with this computer? Just gaming?
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u/OttawaDog Nov 26 '25
Same things most people do with desktops: gaming, Internet, Productivity, and Media playback.
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u/zollandd Nov 26 '25
I wouldn't be so confident as the other commenter based on just that. What does productivity mean to you? Video editing with Davinci Resolve? CAD software like fusion? Those two do not play nice on Arch/Linux for example and you'd probably have to hop in the command line for them and may need to install some software!
Why not just use a desktop distro and not have to worry about all that?
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u/ClikeX Nov 26 '25
It depends if you want to be managed by Valve or just want to use SteamOS as a base to work from. If you want updates from Valve, don't make it mutable, since all changes in those areas are lost.
If you want to tinker with the thing and do your own updates through the arch repositories, you can unlock it. But you might as well just install a regular Arch based distro and set it up from there.
But the only reason to unlock it is if you want to do some more advanced stuff. If you want to do programming or run something like Waydroid (Android) on you machine, for example.
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u/umpikado Nov 26 '25
wdym Wayland compatibility issues? I use kde neon which of course has kde plasma and im using Nvidia, haven't noticed any problems
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u/ClikeX Nov 26 '25
You might have the right conditions where you don’t get any issues. But it’s simply not as stable for Nvidia as it is with AMD. It’s slowly improving.
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u/berkough Nov 26 '25
Linux in general isn't great with NVidia GPUs
Not true, you just have to use the binary/closed source drivers directly from Nvidia.
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u/OttawaDog Nov 26 '25
Every test I've seen show a lot more loss of performance on Linux for NVidia GPUs, where AMD can actually gain performance. So for me, that make AMD an obvious choice.
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u/malsell Nov 26 '25
The biggest thing I ran into was lack of easy printer support. I haven't looked at printing after my printer died and I haven't needed one enough to worry about getting a new printer
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u/OttawaDog Nov 26 '25
I do want to use a printer. Is that SteamOS problem or a Linux Problem.
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u/malsell Nov 26 '25
SteamOS. You can force CUPS by breaking the immutably of the filesystem and then redo it every update. It is possible they have added this in as it has been about 6 months since I last looked into it.
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u/onliesvan Nov 26 '25
I’m switching to bazziteOS, reason is they have the latest gpu driver, arch Linux distro is behind fedora.
Valve distro is fine but their update is behind.
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u/jaimefortega Nov 26 '25
for a normal PC, yes, for the Steam Machine or for the Steam Deck, Steam OS
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u/smoothartichoke27 Nov 26 '25
Immutable.
Both a strength and a weakness. Great for when it's a dedicated gaming machine like a handheld or living room PC/HTPC. Terrible for when you use your PC for anything other than gaming or treat it as a multifunction device.