Hello, I’m not a total Linux noob, but I’m not sure what my plan is for windows 10s shutter, and I’m not going to 11. I have a PC exclusively for games with an nvidia gpu.
My dream setup works something like a headless gaming pc: I keep my tower on my desk with some monitors and mkb, then run Ethernet all over, and I can stream the tower to: my deck, my phone, a steam link, thin client etc. Then I could get a steam link for my driving sim and send it over there, maybe add in a flight sim later with another steam link. Is this possible?
Hurdles:
- can I still run halo/microsoft games easily? Rocket league? I don’t want to reconfigure every game after every patch.
- What distro would be best?
- Can it switch to the right resolution for what I’m streaming to? I have 16:9, 21:9, steam deck and my phone to contend with. When I tried moonlight it always swapped to the plugged in monitor resolution instead.
- Can it output 4K120hz over the Ethernet?
- Good option for steam link devices?
- Can I stream outside the home with Tailscale
Biggest hurdle: input is a bitch, especially for more sim-oriented devices like wheels.
What if this is being done via Steam which has superior input configuration?
You’ll likely still have to install additional stuff to get them working to begin with. It will depend a lot on which model in particular. Some work ootb, some won’t work at all due to missing drivers, some will work but miss working FFB, etc.
I’m not sure they have Logitech wheel drivers built in yet. Or fanatec or whatever. Don’t the thin clients just act as usb to Ethernet adapters then I just need the drivers on the main pc?
Could converting to windows 10 iot not keep your current configuration intact and allow you to continue receiving windows updates?
I had thought that only extended it out to 2028, but 2032 is a bit further away. I still need to switch eventually, I may as well start. Would using windows make it any easier to set up the headless part though?
I sort of run this setup right now @4k/240hz. The only part of this I don’t do is flight sticks.
I run Ubuntu on my interface workstation on a 9700T/32gb/30506g and sunshine/moonlight to my rack mounted gaming desktop downstairs running win11 on a 9900X/32gb/5070. I also have an Ubuntu machine upstairs and in the living room that leverage the same streaming setup to put games there. Works great on my phone too with a Bluetooth clamp controller
Windows on the gaming PC is the way. Yeah there’s a lot of bullshit there but it literally only streams games. Use the ctt winutil to strip out most of the annoyance and you forget windows even exists
Swapping to Linux and headless is maybe a bit much to bite off at the same time, though It really feels like in home game streaming will be the future. It would be nice if steam made a native moonlight hosting feature in steamOS and modern steam link clients.
I suppose since it’s just for games windows 11 will work, but I might have to swap out some hardware.
There’s no need to go headless on the Linux workstations, I don’t, although I do build the system myself from headless to keep the bloat down. X11 and awesomewm/i3 is like, 100-300mb of ram with modern necessities included
I use the Linux workstations with awesomewm for 99.9% of my computing needs, moonlight only comes out to connect to the gaming PC when I want to play a game.
To expand, my main workstation is a $180 eBay used Dell that I slapped a 3050 in. Tower in its entirety cost <$400 and realistically, I only needed the GPU because I have a 4k/240hz main display, and 4 total.
This fall I will finally have the space to leave my driving sim unfolded, or get a better one… 🤑 what is your sim setup? Do you have VR too?
I don’t have a sim or VR, I purely use keyboard/mouse/controller/fight sticks across my various setups
