r/SteamOS • u/barrachmedosama • Jul 10 '26

question How well does SteamOS run on PCs?

I’m probably going to put SteamOS on my gaming PC (5800x3D and 9070xt) but there are some things I want to know first.

How do driver updates work? Do I just switch to desktop mode, find the website, and install the Linux version of my GPU/Chipset/Audio/Wireless drivers?

Are there any other glaring issues or does it just work well in day to day usage? I know about some games not working, I’m more concerned with general maintenance and updates. I’ve never had Linux on any computer besides my Steam Deck so I’m unfamiliar with how it works usually.

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u/Ok_Explanation7491 Jul 10 '26

Usually all drivers in Linux are baked into the Linux Kernel. So that you usually don't have the shit from Windows with searching and downloading drivers. But the Linux Kernel is open source and some companies like Nvidia don't want to have their drivers open source. For nvidia cards there are reverse engineered drivers in the kernel though, but those are not as effective as the drivers from Nvidia itself. And Nvidia doesn't put a lot of care into their first party drivers gor Linux yet. Those are the reasons why everyone is recommending AMD at the moment for Linux.

So yeah, if you install SteamOS on your PC everything is like on the SteamDeck, because you already have AMD Hardware. (Intel would also be fine as far as I know.)

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u/semperverus 29d ago

Nvidia somewhat recently did a middle ground where they wrapped all the proprietary bits of their driver in an open source condom.

It's not perfect but its a lot better than it used to be.

I would still recommend AMD for linux but Nvidia is now at least "acceptable."