So I’ve been hearing the buzz about Linux and gaming and how it’s finally fixed everything and is a perfect replacement for windows. My windows install has definitely accumulated some bloat, so blasting it and trying some Linux for a bit sounds like a solid plan.
Last time I tried this was early Ubuntu days, so I know there’s some… hurtles especially with Nvidia. But at least they’re releasing official drivers now!
So after some research I settled on trying out Fedora. Loaded up a USB, selected live mode… and blank screen. Guess it doesn’t like Nvidia 3080s much. Rebooted, used troubleshooting mode with basic graphics. It loads 1024x768 on my ultra wide which looks about right for Linux.
So I do some digging and find Nobara Linux which is Fedora but all set up for Nvidia and gaming! Perfect! Made a USB, tried to boot live and… Kernel error, could not get further.
So back to base fedora and…
Off to install Nvidia drivers!
After some googling I found RPMfusion is the route to go, and I set down to decipher the cryptic text that is their god awful and confusing how to. After almost 2 hours I managed to get the fucking thing installed and figured out how to UFI disable safe mode on my ASUS ROG, which also was not straightforward. Fuck whatever key process he was trying to describe.
Next up is getting my media server, which is a basic NAS on a SAMBA server up and running. On windows you open up your file explorer, right click under your drives, select “map network drive”, enter username and password and you’re gravy. Or you can find it via network discovery.
So first thing is first, open up file explorer and try to browse via GUI. It sees the workgroup and the server but when I try to open it or click mount it gives the cryptic message “software refuses connection”. After an hour or so of cryptic tutorials involving command line and confusing bullshit I admit defeat, and connected to it as an FTP server. Which worked relatively smoothly.
First thing is first downloaded VLC and played The Expanse Season 5 EP 3 where I’d left off. Success, but some noticable choppiness. Then I tried to jump to a random point in the episode. File crashes. I want to note that FTP streaming over the Internet to my phone using the same damn VLC player doesn’t react like that, nor does Windows. Tried tweaking some settings in VLC to do with performance and the screen is blank when I try to play again, audio works great. Try to reset the settings, still blank. Try rebooting, still blank. Full reinstall of VLC and we’re back in business.
So 3 hours have passed. I barely got my graphics card working and can’t mount a network drive. Plus now I can’t play my media and skip to any point of it meaning I can’t pick up where I left off or jump around the episode to see if I’ve seen it before.
I haven’t even tried gaming.
I’m going to try again tomorrow, but y’all are dirty liars. Linux is still bullshit and has been since I first installed it over 20 years ago. What the hell has the community even accomplished if it still sucks this much dick to use?
Couple of things that might have tampered your experience:
- Nvidia. This should come to no one as a surprise, but unfortunately the experience still leaves a lot to desire. Unfortunately, even changing to Nobara didn’t help you out there. If you’re still dead set on Fedora, I would recommend the Nvidia Images of uBlue which are also mentioned in the Troubleshooting part of Fedora’s documentation.
- Using Fedora as a new user. Before people start shitting on me, I’m a proud Fedora user and it has been my daily driver ever since the day I’ve switched to Linux. But -like Debian- Fedora’s strict stance on FOSS requires one to take additional steps during initial setup/configuration after installation. The aforementioned images from uBlue (once again) help to solve that.
- I assume you just did the thing on Windows and straight up downloaded VLC off the internet and thought it would work out like that. I wonder if you do the same on your Android/iOS/macOS device. If I’m mistaken, then please feel free to skip the rest of this paragraph. If not, then please consider to read on. So, while it is possible to download software directly off the internet through your browser, this is in 99% of the cases simply inferior to grabbing your software the intended way; through the installed package manager(s). On Fedora, that would have been
dnfand/orflatpak. As VLC isn’t even found in Fedora’s repos (though it is found in RPM Fusion’s repos), your best bet would have been installing it as a flatpak. Which in this case, could have been through the built-in ‘storefront’ with a GUI (it’s called Software on GNOME) or through the terminal with theflatpak install org.videolan.VLC -ycommand. - Regarding Media Server, I simply have no experience setting that up. Therefore I hope that others could chime in to offer their support.
but y’all are dirty liars. Linux is still bullshit and has been since I first installed it over 20 years ago. What the hell has the community even accomplished if it still sucks this much dick to use?
This doesn’t help your cause. Please refrain from saying such things in the future.
Edit: I just noticed this thread. It might simply be the case that Fedora 39 isn’t playing nice (yet). Consider installing Fedora 38 for the time being instead.
Great response! 💯
Thanks for an actual response.
Nope I downloaded VLC through the software manager.
I actually first started using Linux back in 2005 on Ubuntu. I force myself to try Linux about every 5 years praying to god that the community has pulled its collective head out of it’s ass and done anything at all to make it easier to use. Almost 20 years and that hope is obviously a god-damned pipe dream.
I’m going to do this for one week, doing daily updates and trying my god-damned best to get this shit software to do what the community says it can do. I managed the get Nvidia working on 39, which looks like an accomplishment given the other post linked about Nvidia and issues with 39.
Btw mounting a NAS is basic, basic office environment functionality. I don’t know how Linux ever expects to take over in the office if mounting a NAS drive is this stupid and difficult.
Nope I downloaded VLC through the software manager.
Interesting to hear that it caused so many issues then 🤔. FWIW, I’ve personally been using MPV since I’m on Linux. I don’t remember the exact reason, but if my memory serves me right; support for it on Linux somehow seemed superior compared to VLC. Related; e.g. it’s actually found in Fedora’s repos.
I’m going to do this for one week, doing daily updates and trying my god-damned best to get this shit software to do what the community says it can do.
Kudos for sticking with it for a bit longer! Please feel free to seek help from the community; though be mindful of your language if possible, I’m sure it will contribute to more people reaching out.
I managed the get Nvidia working on 39, which looks like an accomplishment given the other post linked about Nvidia and issues with 39.
Well done! Please note that a random update related to Nvidia might break your system in the future. If you don’t want to deal with that in the future, running one of those Nvidia Images from uBlue ensures that from happening in the first place. This offers some explanation to what it achieves and how. TL;DR:
"We’ve slipstreamed the Nvidia drivers right onto the operating system image. Steps that once took place on your local laptop are now done in a continuous integration system in GitHub. Once they are complete, the system stamps out an image which then makes it’s way to your PC.
No more building drivers on your laptop, dealing with signing, akmods, third party repo conflicts, or any of that. We’ve fully automated it so that if there’s an issue, we fix it in GitHub, for everyone.
But it’s not just installation and configuration: We provide Nvidia driver versions 525, 520, and 470 for each of these. You can atomically switch between any of these, so if your driver worked perfectly on a certain day and you find a regression you just rebase to that image."
Btw mounting a NAS is basic, basic office environment functionality. I don’t know how Linux ever expects to take over in the office if mounting a NAS drive is this stupid and difficult.
I
hopeam sure there’s an easy way, we just have to figure out what that is. Wish you the best of luck, though!Btw, if the idea of Nobara did interest you, perhaps you should consider Bazzite; which is a project related to uBlue, but which -like Nobara- tries to be properly setup for gaming from the get-go.
I hope am sure there’s an easy way, we just have to figure out what that is. Wish you the best of luck, though!
there’s not.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Fedora/comments/mkdld1/how_do_i_permanently_mount_a_network_drive/
Most forums and places I’ve searched agree this is how you do it. But try as I might it will NOT work. Unfortunately this is something that must work for Linux to be a viable replacement for windows for me, so it’s something I have to either solve or just… put Linux down again for another 5 years and pray that the community one day realizes that it MUST solve these kind of headaches without command line intervention.
And here I am, installed KDE Neon nightly (ALPHA!) on my PC with a Nvidia 2080Ti and all went buttery smooth. Sometimes it’s just bad luck :(
Or, and hear me out here, Linux is just terrible and will never be user friendly
It always depends on your motivation and resources. If you don’t want to use it just don’t. I couldn’t care any less.
So I think your problem is that you’re expecting and treating things like Windows.
Linux, just like MacOS, isn’t Windows.
There’s going to be a learning process on the right way to do things. Same as if you were trying to switch to MacOS. Also Linux isn’t a unified thing. There’s a lot of different flavors that all do things differently for different uses.
For example raspberry pi uses a version (distro) that works best for its uses. That wouldn’t necessarily be the best use for something else.
Servers use different distros than a desktop. Not that you couldn’t use it on a desktop, it’s just not optimized for it.
Since Linux is not a unified experience like Windows, MacOS, BSD, etc. you’re going to have more of a learning curve. That’s not a bad thing it just puts more responsibility on you to make choices.
With that being said there are A LOT of beginner distros that provide a curated experience where pretty much everything just works out of the box.
Fedora can be a good choice but like everything in life there’s going to be a lot of things that you don’t know that you don’t know. Other people provided great resources to help get it working.
So if you go into this with the expectation that things will be exactly the way it is on windows you’re setting yourself up for failure.
You can totally have a system that performs better for gaming than anything you can get on Windows. You just have to accept the responsibility and reality you are going to have to learn how to do things differently than Windows.
If that’s not your cup of tea that’s completely fine! There’s nothing wrong with staying with things you already know and are comfortable with. Change isn’t for everyone. 😉
Oh right it’s my fault for expecting Linux to work lol. This response is why people will NEVER switch to Linux. The outright refusal of the community to make Linux in any way user friendly.
So in what ways would you like to see it more user friendly? Can you provide some details on what that looks like for/to you?
Is there a new user experience that happens on Windows that you would like to see? For example, if someone has never used Windows before what kind of resources/support are available to make it user friendly out of the box?
Sure.
Off the rip I can say trying to map a network drive is exactly what the issue with Linux has on user friendliness.
In MS you open up “computer” right click and select “add network drive”. Then a series of prompts has you enter server and username and you’re done. Drive mapped and mapped permanently. Oh and it’s been this easy to do since windows 2000.
How’s that done in Linux?
That seems to be the guide but I can’t get it to work. You have to do everything 100% manually through command line, which I know is the Linux way. Ultimately I kept getting errors and never got it to work.
Mapping a network drive is semi-advanced I know. The fact that I even know what that is should tell you I’m not a beginner with PCs. The fact that I cannot make this simple process work despite being a tech professional (thank God in a windows environment) should tell you more.
I"m not sure what you mean by that? Most of the time you’ll see it in your file manager just like on Windows. In Windows it’s called Network Places, in Gnome it’s called Other Locations and in Plasma it is called Remote/Network. If for some reason it doesn’t show up like it does on Windows too, you still totally could enter the URI smb://file.server/share_name if you wanted. I could be completely wrong, but that’s fairly user friendly IMO since it’s pretty much the same as doing it on Windows, macOS, etc. The steps are different because it’s not Windows, but the end result is the same.
As for that link, that’s how you map it from that version of software running that application. That’s actually a old method too that does not really work that well. I’m sure it works well for their applications and software but that’s highly specific for them. So unless you’re running an Edgeverve Edge Assist that guide doesn’t apply to you.
A better way is to not think of it as “Linux” think of it as Ubuntu 20.04, or Fedora 38, etc. Just like Windows is more like Windows 11, Windows Server 2018, Windows 7, etc. While it has most of the same kind of stuff it’s different in how it does things. Sometimes those differences are more obvious than other.
You do not have to do everything though the command line either, yes it can be a lot faster if you know what you’re doing (same for Windows), but it’s not a requirement. It’s completely possible to install applications, do gaming, etc. without ever touching the terminal. I think this video explains it pretty well. Obviously things have improved in the past two years but the core of it is still true.
Okay so I’ve done some detailed responses elsewhere.
Other network places shows it maybe1/3 of the time. It throws an error when trying to open it.
smb://file.server/share_name does not work. It also throws its own unique error.
So I can’t get smb to work at all. I know it is working because I’m also testing it on a Mac. For some reason Linux will just not work.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
I think this video explains it pretty well
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
I don’t care about your video, like at all.
All I care about is mapping a network drive. If I can’t do that Linux is useless to me. I’ve jumped to PopOS, which out of the gate is working better than Fedora did, but I still CANNOT access my network drive. I’m downloading windows again as we speak, this is a nightmare.
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Guess again if it’s a samba v1 share.
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All ASUS routers that have USB file sharing use Samba v1, and only Samba v1. And that’s not the only NAS devices that are still sold with Samba v1 only.
On a current default Windows installation, you can’t connect to Samba v1 at all, you have to manually activate it first.
Also true with linux. The difference is I have to check one box in Windows. In linux I had to edit what are essentially the registry keys for 2 different programs (packages), then add a manual argument in fstab for mounting it. Oh and there was no encompassing tutorial for that task that was easily googlable, me figuring that out was the result of combining like 3 different random bits I got off of forums after almost 8 solid hours of exhaustively searching the subject.
With windows ‘enable samba v1 share’ pulls up result one how to do it, you open one program, check one box, and you’re done.
It’s different from windows is no excuse for the absolute lack of ease and support doing anything. I’ll believe Linux is better for gaming when I see it which will probably be never if the elitist community can’t get off it’s high horse and make an actual easy to use and friendly experience that Linux has been missing since day 1.
Can you be more specific in what you’re looking for?
For example how does Windows make an easy & friendly experience from day 1 for someone who hasn’t ever used Windows?
Lots of tooltips and pop ups from what I remember last time.
There’s also the fact that windows is the default, and that can’t be ignored. People have been taught windows since they were in school. There’s less of a need for a ton of tutorials because the vast majority of at least the US have been using windows since elementary school.
Linux does not have that advantage and it is explicitly user unfriendly in most cases. Having to use the terminal to do things should not be required at all. Most users should never need to know it exists, let alone use it.
Linux does not have that advantage and it is explicitly user unfriendly in most cases
Are you saying that it’s unfriendly because it’s different and not the default?
Gnome, Pop_OS!, Elementary, etc is pretty user friendly, sure it’s not perfect, but it does have a new user experience that tells you how to do things, how to find help, etc. The UX includes a lot of helpful tool tips too.
As for the terminal, it’s completely possible to use most popular distros without touching the terminal at all.
It’s not possible to use popular distros without the terminal. Anyone saying that is lying. Within an hour of a fresh install there’s normally 5-10 things I’ve had to use the terminal for because a GUI didn’t work or didn’t exist.
I’m saying it’s unfriendly because it has 0 protections for the user to prevent them from bricking their own system. I know that’s a positive to Linux purists, but it’s a huge problem for everyone else.
Windows can get away with a certain level of expecting people to know how their OS works. Linux can’t. With the different defaults it makes it a very unfriendly move from windows
I’m saying it’s unfriendly because it has 0 protections for the user to prevent them from bricking their own system. I know that’s a positive to Linux purists, but it’s a huge problem for everyone else.
True, to an extent. It does warn you when you’re doing something obviously dumb for the most part though. Most of that is mitigated by keeping everything in a user context and sandboxing. For example it will allow you to mess up your own account, just like windows will, but it will make you enter a password to do anything outside of your user that could create problems system wide. Windows does similar things too.
Windows can get away with a certain level of expecting people to know how their OS works. Linux can’t. With the different defaults it makes it a very unfriendly move from windows
Different does not equal user unfriendly, IMHO.
Would you say that macOS is not user friendly because it has different defaults than Windows? Would you say that Samsung’s version of Android is not user friendly because it does things different than Google’s version? Would you say that all smart phones are not user friendly because they do things differently than iPhone (IOS)? What about Chrome and Firefox? Which one would you said is user unfriendly because it does things differently? Would you say that Gmail is unfriendly because it has different defaults than Outlook?
It’s not possible to use popular distros without the terminal. Anyone saying that is lying. Within an hour of a fresh install there’s normally 5-10 things I’ve had to use the terminal for because a GUI didn’t work or didn’t exist.
As with all things it just depends on what you’re doing and how you’re doing it. If someone is handed a system that has something like Fedora setup on it. They could just install steam, install some games, install chrome, or whatever else they want without touching the terminal.
Now the process of setting up, installing packages to make hardware work eg Nvidia, tweaking things, etc. Yeah that part in some instances does need the terminal. If you have hardware and a distro where everything just works, then you could actually not have to use the terminal at all. System76, Dell, etc has shown this with their laptops, Valve showed this with the steamdeck, etc.
I’ve had some weird issues with the Fedora file explorer not liking windows shares in the past. A few things to try: Down at the bottom left, click the “+ other locations”, and where it says “enter server address” I use: smb://perplex.local/mediabay/ Perplex is the name of the computer with the share. Mediabay is the shared drive. If I don’t put in the .local, Nada. If I don’t put in the slash, again Nada. Then, it asks me to log in. I put in my username and password, and if I forget to change the domain in the popup from SAMBA to WORKGROUP, again I get nothing. Also, the WORKGROUP has to be in all caps.
Then I hit connect. Then, I can browse. Also, literally everything has to be in the correct case. smb://Perplex.local isn’t the same as smb://perplex.local.
Agreed, it’s a pain. However…! Linux has much choice. The file explorer in Fedora isn’t my favorite. (It’s called nautilus, by the way.) I prefer a file explorer called thunar.
Thunar, for some reason, buries accessing shares in the “Go” menu under “Open Location…”, but seems to work better than nautilus for mounting shares.Once you have it mounted via Thunar, it just shows up on the list in nautilus as well, and once it’s mounted, I use VLC to play shares all the time with no trouble.
I could get into how to use mount points and stuff, but baby steps… It’s just different. Not ‘ass’, just odd. I’ve been Linux-ing for a few years now, and find myself back in Windows for school, and there’s all kinds of Windows bullshit that makes me want to scream, it’s just that it’s different bullshit than the Linux bullshit.
So, I actually did try what you suggested earlier. The share isn’t actually on a windows PC it’s on a ASUS AC-3200 router that has Samba sharing capabilities. Gives me the ability to set up an FTP server on my router and access my 22tb NAS from anywhere. Also allows me to easily (when using windows or android) access my media from any PC locally.
The goal is to mount it permanently instead of having to repeat this process each time, hence the tutorial I posted.
But I’d settle for it fucking working.
In ‘other locations’ it actually pulls up the ‘windows network’ and shows ‘workgroup’ and ‘Alexandria_Library’ (my share server). Well… it’s more accurate to say it does that maybe 1/3 of the time, most times it says ‘folder is empty’ on the windows network.
I can actually type
smb://Alexandria_library and it pulls up, but from there ‘vault’ is the folder which everything is in. Clicking that and I get an error that says ‘unable to access file location: Failed to mount windows share: software caused connection to abort’.
For giggles I tried what you suggested. smb://alexandria.local/Vault/. I got excited for a second when it prompted for username and password. But after trying it throws a different error ‘unable to access location: failed to mount windows share: invalid argument’.
For giggles I tried different variations and capitalization of all that, but no go. My windows domain is WORKGROUP as well, I was able to confirm that.
So still no go sadly.
Hmm… Shot in the dark here… smb://username:password@ipaddress/sharename/ ? I have an OAF router with a USB port that’s samba shareable, and I just got to my files by going: smb://phanto:[email protected]/share If you can get it to work once, it’s a heck of a lot easier to get a simple fstab mount so your share just sits in a folder, accessible at boot. I know I’m Windows, you can keep a Z drive, I just have a /media folder. Anyone whose smarter than me know what might be the issue?
I actually fixed it, you can see what I did on the day 2 post.
Basically had to modify the file that controls samba sharing, then install another program that does the mounting, then modify that mounting program to do sambav1. It was a bitch and is a process only those of us actually using the ASUS routers deal with since I’m convinced those are the last pieces of hardware produced locked into samba v1.
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You’re doing the lord’s work here
Oh Lord Omnimessiah, bestow your blessings upon the machine spirit of this workstation. May it’s sacred code be free of blasphemous error and wasted resources. May the magnificence of it’s function be even a pale reflection of your own perfection. In your name we pray, amen.
Yes. Linux desktop has been and always will be a pain in the ass. Either deal with some bloat or Linux bullshit you ain’t getting away from both.
There’s only so much ass I can handle. Linux seems to almost delight in being utterly inaccessible.
It has its strengths in hosting services and professional work is far easier and supported very well commercially.
Desktop is a hot mess. Unless you are willing to learn Wayland and x11 and how they work you are going to run into issues. Electron in Wayland was basically unfixable for most apps for a very long time while still being the default in many common distros.
When I google “how to mount a network drive in windows” I get https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/map-a-network-drive-in-windows-29ce55d1-34e3-a7e2-4801-131475f9557d as the first result. Which is a complete step by step tutorial on how to do it. It uses a nice little GUI set of windows, wherein you input your server and username and bam, everything just works.
When I google “how to mount a network drive in Fedora 39” I get absolutely NOTHING related to how to do this in Linux. Which is a basic bitch level of functionality btw, mounting a remote drive is basically required in an office environment.
When I finally found instructions they were.
- Create a local folder
sudo mkdir /media/SYNC_ME
-
Open fstab, which appears to be an equivalent of a MS registry key where drive configuration is stored.
-
add the following line to FSTAB to link your remote server to the local folder you created which ‘mounts’ it in the OS.
//NASIPADDRESS/SYNC_ME /media/SYNC_ME cifs username=USERNAME_HERE,password=PASSWORD_HERE,iocharset=utf8,sec=ntlm 0 0
- When this inevitably doesn’t work, basically sit and stare at the screen. Because I’ve deep dived at least a dozen fucking forums at this point and no one seems to have an answer as to why it doesn’t work. I’m sure some guru could make it work, but making it user friendly at all to do this basic bitch level of functionality is frankly insane.
RTFM
Peak Linux forum response. It’s not the tech, it’s you.
Year of the Linux desktop™️.
Treat others the way you want to be treated mate. You come in here blabbering about Linux users being liars so you obviously want to be treated like an asshole.
Lolol you just rtfm’ed a new user bitching any common Linux desktop problems.
Could you be anymore of a neckbeard stereotype?
What fucking manual?
I’m googling and reading a dozen god-damned articles. Maybe stop releasing a whole new version every 6 months and sit down to document shit.
Or how about this… Make it easier to do basic shit. Command line is for psychopaths. It’s fucking 2023 and you haven’t figured out how to make this steaming pile of shit user friendly? That’s a failure of the entire Linux community at this point.
Begone troll.
Not a troll! I legit am trying linux and am going to document my week long experience trying to adopt and replace windows as my daily driver.
If that experience is a bad one and you’re actually a fan of this hot garbage, maybe listen and learn how to reach more users based on my shitty experience.
