this post was submitted on 22 Mar 2026
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I knew they were working on a general Steam OS release. Can't wait to switch my gaming rig over.
Beware of steamOS as main distro. It's immutable without support for layering.
If you want anything other than gaming, it can get tricky. In my case some developer tools, printer/scanner... Were borderline impossible when I tried some time ago.
Things might have changed, but Bazzite is a damm good alternative for a similar feeling.
YMMV
FYI, there is now an overlay for /etc that stores changes in /var and files can also be noted as persistent in /etc/atomic-update.conf.d.
Valve has also added a persistent /nix folder for declarative package management if you're into that kind of thing, it has been glorious in my little world.
Nice, this is very cool! Thanks for the info
Good to know, but this is for my dedicated gaming PC.
Commented elsewhere in this thread with details on persistence in steamos if you're interested. glhf!
Thanks, very interesting.
Have you looked at Bazzite? Seems similar while being (a) already available and (b) designed for both gaming and general use on any hardware
Not yet, need a spare SSD to test it out. Which a buddy is giving me next week.
Bazzite is likely everything you're hoping SteamOS will be. So don't wait for SteamOS, just go for it.
AFAICT they probably won't be advertising it as a general distro because they want some control of it (broad hardware compatibility is hard) but they do want other OEMs to use it and contribute patches to make it work on their hardware, which is easier on Linux if the distro is simply available to test on other hardware freely and patches can be upstreamed via the Linux kernel for drivers, etc
Tldr the public release will probably be full of disclaimers and oriented to PC makers
Still right up my alley