Valve Reveals More Steam Linux Distribution Details

[duby229]

No, Ubuntu was simply the largest target, it could have just as easily been Fedora, SuSE or any other distro that historically had at one time or another been the distro with the largest number of desktop users at a given time. Ubuntu just happened to be the distro with the most users this time around.

Does it really matter tho? I don't think it does. I know that it works fine on Gentoo, and I assume that it works just as fine on other distros as well. Provided that it remains transparent I don't see it as being a problem.

[duby229]

No, that was the real question, I use 32-bit on 2 Athlon64 boxes that only have 2Gb of ram, for some strange reason I have had a very hard time dumpster diving computers to find more ram, I blame the news for running so many stories a while back on what metals are in the damn things, now instead of finding them with their wiring torn out and nothing else wrong with the parts themselves I don't find them at all anymore.

I've seen junkers that used to only pick up anything with any metals other then steel or iron unless it was something really big like an old cast iron bath tub for scrap, they used to just open computer cases and cut the power supply and data wires out. Now I see all kinds of electronics in their trucks as well as occasionally see piles of plastic housings and CRT tubes in alleys.

I'd like to see an X32 version of Mint, so I can have my cake and eat it too.

There are some arguments for x32. The biggest one that makes sense is that you can use smaller pointers which reduces cache thrashing. But really I can't think of anything else. I just dont see the point when the only improvement to be had is theoretical and isnt likely to be a major factor in real applications. I suppose you could write a benchmark that would show the difference. But I doubt very much it would make any real difference in real applications.

EDIT: Check out ebay DDR2 is dirt cheap. At least one guy on there has a pretty big stock of G-skill DDR2-800. I know you can find at least 1GB modules, so if you have 4 slots than it could be possible to get 4GB total.

[nightmarex]

blah fuckity blah blah...

[Luke_Wolf]

Does it really matter tho? I don't think it does. I know that it works fine on Gentoo, and I assume that it works just as fine on other distros as well. Provided that it remains transparent I don't see it as being a problem.

well what we're taking issue with is your statement of us having Ubuntu to thank for bringing it when that's so very clearly not the case.

Otherwise you're right in that it doesn't really matter what it was developed for as it works everywhere.

[duby229]

well what we're taking issue with is your statement of us having Ubuntu to thank for bringing it when that's so very clearly not the case.

Otherwise you're right in that it doesn't really matter what it was developed for as it works everywhere.

Don't misunderstand me. I'm not saying that it is because Ubuntu exists that Steam was ported. Just that it was what it was ported to... So thank god for Ubuntu. If it was some other distro I would be saying the same thing about it.

[DDF420]

What's the benefit of 64bit if you have less than 4GB RAM on your system?

What benefits does a 64bit OS have over a 32bit PAE enabled kernel ???

[GreatEmerald]

What benefits does a 64bit OS have over a 32bit PAE enabled kernel ???

PAE is a hack that adds a lot of overhead.

[Kirurgs]

PAE is a hack that adds a lot of overhead.

And in real life on a laptop that would be?
Not measurable..., yes, that's what I was seeking for

[PeterKraus]

And in real life on a laptop that would be?
Not measurable..., yes, that's what I was seeking for

You're an idiot.

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?pag...210_3264&num=1

[VoodooSyxx]

What benefits does a 64bit OS have over a 32bit PAE enabled kernel ???

Glad somebody asked that, actually. As has been already stated PAE adds a lot of unnecessary overhead. More importantly though, PAE or not, a 32bit application can never access more than 2GB of RAM. Depending on what you do with your desktop, you may not care. On a server though, with things like MySQL that need to be pushed into RAM as much as possible, that absolutely sucks. Anyway, PAE is most definitely not the silver bullet many people like to think it is.