Get to Know Linux: File System Hierarchy

[Joe C]

You could try using Wine to play some Windows games. Wine is a Windows emulator

 

[Wallaby Dan]

I have both wine and Dosbox emulator and i am not having much fun. Funny that i can download the nix program of GOG files for nix, but am not able to make them work. I understand that KDE is supposed to be working on a different game program. I will wait and see if it comes to nix. I know that there are severall that are working on steam and games from GOG. It is a thing of patience! I wish i could do code to help them out. I just never got that good with older versions of linux. It will happen, just have to wait till someone gets lucky and finds the code to make them work.

 

[Wallaby Dan]

I have both wine and Dosbox emulator and i am not having much fun. Funny that i can download the nix program of GOG files for nix, but am not able to make them work. I understand that KDE is supposed to be working on a different game program. I will wait and see if it comes to nix. I know that there are severall that are working on steam and games from GOG. It is a thing of patience! I wish i could do code to help them out. I just never got that good with older versions of linux. It will happen, just have to wait till someone gets lucky and finds the code to make them work.

 

[Yael-S.]

I have both wine and Dosbox emulator and i am not having much fun. Funny that i can download the nix program of GOG files for nix, but am not able to make them work. I understand that KDE is supposed to be working on a different game program. I will wait and see if it comes to nix. I know that there are severall that are working on steam and games from GOG. It is a thing of patience! I wish i could do code to help them out. I just never got that good with older versions of linux. It will happen, just have to wait till someone gets lucky and finds the code to make them work.

Did you tell GOG that your specific game is not working in Mint? Please do that. I sometimes had GOG games where I had to make a little tweak to the command that starts the game, but I've always managed to get the games to run perfectly on Arch Linux, and they were lesser-known games like Kona.

You seem like the type of person who will be happy with Nobara Project, MX Linux, Devuan, and EndeavourOS. I like Artix Linux better than Manjaro but this may be above your skill level if you have never worked with Arch Linux.

Clear Linux is also something you can test out if you know how to install a 'dual boot system'. You will be amazed by the performance in games and also the overall performance in everything you do in Clear Linux. You will also be able to install this system very easily, and the software will automatically update itself without you having to do anything, with the default settings.

It also seems that you care about stability and robustness. There is currently no system more robust than FreeBSD. It also has the best audio stack of any system and is top notch in many other areas. This system is also something you can test. FreeBSD seems like something above your skill level, but helloSystem and GhostBSD are extremely easy to install and they are FreeBSD under the hood.

 

[Yael-S.]

I have been able to do everything but play my older games from windows. Working on that, they are doing right now. That don't make it a game changer. I can wait.

What specific games are you talking about? Do you know how Steam Proton and Lutris work?

Linux gaming is currently at an advanced stage, if you use an Intel or AMD GPU you can achieve higher FPS (performance) in most games than in windows via Clear Linux.

We also see that the best new AAA games that came out in 2023, such as Returnal and Hogwarts Legacy, worked on Linux right from day one of release. Hogwarts Legacy, which has broken sales records, is currently getting higher performance on Linux than on Windows on the Steam Deck, and the frame pacing in this game is also better on Linux.

If you want to stay well informed about the current developments in the Linux Gaming community, there are the following quality channels that you can follow:
https://boilingsteam.com/
https://www.reddit.com/r/linux_gaming/
https://www.gamingonlinux.com/

 

[Yael-S.]

I have been able to do everything but play my older games from windows. Working on that, they are doing right now. That don't make it a game changer. I can wait.

If you have a decent SSD, you can also solve it in another way. You can use VirtualBox or kvm or bhyve or other virtualization software to install windows7 in a virtual machine. Or maybe these old games also work through an old console emulator? Linux has many emulators for old game consoles that work well.

You can play the game in the virtual machine, provided the game does not have advanced graphics. You say they are old games so it should work.

I use FreeBSD myself and I have windows7 + some different Linux distros + TrueNAS installed in VIrtualBox. Specifically windows7 fully boots to the desktop environment on my FreeBSD system in 8 seconds. This FreeBSD system uses an EVO 850 500 GB SSD in combination with an 11 year old i3 dual core CPU, a GTX 650 and 4GB DDR3 single channel. So as you can see windows7 boots very quickly in this VM on FreeBSD, without me having any special hardware.

 

[Wallaby Dan]

alas i am not as skilled in the different programs for Linus. I have a newer motherboard (570) that won't let me go below windows 10 and would like me to use windows 11 thats when i said enough and switched to linux. Windows has just got to bossy about what you can run on your computer. I would love to go with a copy of XP and duel boot that with Linux. This board won't let me do it as it needs drivers that i haven't been able to find or not made. I can wait. if not maybe in my next life...

 

[Yael-S.]

alas i am not as skilled in the different programs for Linus. I have a newer motherboard (570) that won't let me go below windows 10 and would like me to use windows 11 thats when i said enough and switched to linux. Windows has just got to bossy about what you can run on your computer. I would love to go with a copy of XP and duel boot that with Linux. This board won't let me do it as it needs drivers that i haven't been able to find or not made. I can wait. if not maybe in my next life...

For inexperienced users, I would say MX Linux is the best distro right now. I would recommend giving this a try.

Virtualizing Windows in VirtualBox or VMware is really not that difficult, you can also try doing this.

Another option, 'permanently install' Linux on a USB and leave windows installed on the HDD/SDD.

 

[Wallaby Dan]

Just a bit of a update. Mint did a upgrade back in September and not sure what happened but it screwed up the Firefox Browser so bad it wouldn't let me type in any site. After trying to fix it myself, i said the hell with it and plugged my old hard drive in and formatted my M.2 drive and put a new copy of Ubuntu on it. Not sure why but i can't get any os other then Ubuntu to install on the drive and can't seem to get it to read the usb of a different os. So i am in learning mode to figure out what i am doing wrong...again.

 

[Yael-S.]

Just a bit of a update. Mint did a upgrade back in September and not sure what happened but it screwed up the Firefox Browser so bad it wouldn't let me type in any site. After trying to fix it myself, i said the hell with it and plugged my old hard drive in and formatted my M.2 drive and put a new copy of Ubuntu on it. Not sure why but i can't get any os other then Ubuntu to install on the drive and can't seem to get it to read the usb of a different os. So i am in learning mode to figure out what i am doing wrong...again.

PCLinuxOS doesn't install either?
https://www.pclinuxos.com/?page_id=3836

FAT32 (max 4GB file size) and exFAT (any file size) will work better than NTFS USB sticks.
You can reformat a USB stick with the 'gparted' app.

You need to install these tools for Ubuntu 22.04 and higher if you want to use exFAT:
sudo apt install exfat-fuse exfatprogs