Hey everyone, I was wondering if anyone has experience on gaming with a low end "potato" pc. I'm running Linux Mint, and I already have Steam installed (Which means I can use proton experimental to play a lot of games). The problem: I don't have a graphics card. Just the integrated i5 chip that comes with this workhorse. I've thought about playing Old School Runescape, but I wanted to know if this could handle something else? Any suggestions? I like MMOs, but i'm willing to try new things too.

Cheers!

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On 06 Oct 2024, Ariadne said the following...

Hey everyone, I was wondering if anyone has experience on gaming with a low end "potato" pc. I'm running Linux Mint, and I already have Steam installed (Which means I can use proton experimental to play a lot of games). The problem: I don't have a graphics card. Just the integrated
i5 chip that comes with this workhorse. I've thought about playing Old School Runescape, but I wanted to know if this could handle something else? Any suggestions? I like MMOs, but i'm willing to try new things
too.

Cheers!

I only play on linux. You should be able to do quite a bit. Many indy games are 2D so all of those would play on your system. Also all the JackBox games are good make your laptop the life of the party.

|23|04Dr|16|12Claw
|16|14Sysop |12Noverdu |14BBS |20|15Radio|10@|14HTTP://Noverdu.com:88
|16|10 Standard ports for SSH/Telnet |04 WEB|14@|12HTTP://noverdu.com:808 |20|15Global Chat, Global Messaging and Games! |16|10Ditch the Unsocial Media

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Re: Linux gaming on low end PC's?
By: Ariadne to All on Sun Oct 06 2024 06:11 pm

Hey everyone, I was wondering if anyone has experience on gaming with a low end "potato" pc. I'm running Linux Mint, and I already have Steam installed (Which means I can use proton experimental to play a lot of games). The problem: I don't have a graphics card. Just the integrated i5 chip that comes with this workhorse. I've thought about playing Old School Runescape, but I wanted to know if this could handle something else? Any suggestions? I like MMOs, but i'm willing to try new things too.

The list of requisites for the game suggest you could run it on a toaster:

https://oldschool.runescape.wiki/w/Game_Requirements

That said, if you want to play a serious game at any point, you are going to benefit from a dedicated GPU. You can make do with integrated graphics sometimes by lowering the quality of the game's graphics but that is fine only for testing the game of having some casual fun.


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games). The problem: I don't have a graphics card. Just the integrated
i5 chip that comes with this workhorse. I've thought about playing Old School Runescape, but I wanted to know if this could handle something else? Any suggestions? I like MMOs, but i'm willing to try new things
too.

How about trying some old titles like some of the early civilization games? These days Civ 3 & 4 will run on a potato... Civ 4 is still really popular and has an active modding community (go take a look at civfanatics.com) and should work in wine at least winedb says they should.

You can get then pretty cheap from gog as well.

You could also look at running old DOS games in dosbox or dosbox-x in linux. That will give you plenty to choose from......

... CanYouComeHereAndFixMySpaceBarKey?ThankYou!

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Probably would be fine with many of the various retro-esque games. Platformers, Metrovania types, text-based, and shoot-em ups/bullet hell to name a few.

Some games spec absurdly old GPUs as "minimum requirements" and I'm pretty sure the avg intel onboard graphics meets those needs. ie Dead Cells lists the Nvidia GTS 450 but Intel Iris 550 (Mobile Skylake) is benchmark competitive. Then there are games like Duskers that, where they bother to list graphics, say "DX9 (shader model 2.0) capabilities; generally everything made since 2004 should work"

Dead Cells, Broforce, Cassette Beasts, Duskers, Exapunks, Dome Keeper, Transistor, Hyper Light Drifter, Jack Move, Unsighted, Hacknet

All of these I play/played on my Steam Deck which admittedly has built in graphics of a decent power. But I checked through the specs and tried not to include anything that might be too much for onboard graphics.

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I've always considered Linux to be a power-hungry highly demanding OS. You need quite the specs to get the thing going, especially with a window manager desktop built in.
I mean, I know about distros specifically designed to be stripped bare to the minimum so they run on smaller/older HW, but those are that: specifically for that purpose.
Anything "mainstream" (think about that term, used regarding a handful of Linux distros...), with the latest Gnome should have some decent amount of RAM and CPU cycles to get the gears rolling.
Does any of this rambling make any sense?

Cheers!

Pol Malvinas.

Islas Malvinas, siempre Argentinas!

... Islas Malvinas, siempre Argentinas.

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* Origin: The Vault BBS (21:4/167)

I've always considered Linux to be a power-hungry highly demanding OS.
You need quite the specs to get the thing going, especially with a
window manager desktop built in.

This has never been my experience. The running joke is that Linux runs on anything.

When the netbook trend first cropped up, most of the offerings ran
Linux, not Windows, because of the lower hardware demand. Those netobooks were part of how Ubuntu got its start and made such inroads with the general populace. The Asus Eee PC 700 was the first mass-produced netbook; it ran Xandros, IIRC. Others followed and many lineups started with some Linux distro before later models (as more powerful energy-efficient mobile processors hit the market) offered Windows (XP at that time) option as well.

ChromeOS comes from this period and the Chromebook is perhaps the last enduring survivor of that era.

We can see this as well in other devices that will run Linux. Raspberry Pi 2 was running a desktop environment on 900MHz quad-core ARM Cortex-A7 CPU and 1GB RAM in 2015.

I have a small collection of Panasonic Toughbooks, all a decade or two (or more) old. They are obviously sluggish running whatever version of windows they came with (XP or 7) but all of them run the latest version of Linux Mint w/ the MATE DE quite fine. And LM is not some ultra-strip-down distro either. In addition to being one of the most popular (if we judge by distrowatch) for quite some time, its also intended to give a Windows-like experience, making it an excellent comparison OS (no matter which of its DEs you pick) for performance.

Continuing on - Ubiquitious Roku devices found in homes all over, pushing hi-res movies and video and performing onboard transcoding for the enjoyments of millions? Roku OS is a distro variant of Linux.

On the DIY front, OSs like LibreELEC/OpenELEC or Kodi exist, converting anything from the old family computer to a Raspberry 4 into a Home Theater PC as a free alternative to Firestick or Roku.

Please don't take this the wrong way but its honestly shocking to find someone who's experience with linux is not the trope-ish "it runs on a potatoe". Usually the complaint is compatibility and drivers for hardware. Or how strange/different it is.

I am curious what machines/use cases/setups you saw the reverse of
this traditional relationship between Windows and Linux. I smell an interesting story.

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A48 (Windows/32)
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pyrewyrm wrote to Malvinas <=-

Please don't take this the wrong way but its honestly shocking to find someone who's experience with linux is not the trope-ish "it runs on a potatoe". Usually the complaint is compatibility and drivers for
hardware. Or how strange/different it is.

You're thinking of NetBSD. They added support for Russets with the last
major upgrade.

I am curious what machines/use cases/setups you saw the reverse of
this traditional relationship between Windows and Linux. I smell an interesting story.

Single-core IBM-branded Thinkpads like the T43 started getting sluggish
with Windows 7 (They came with XP). They ran lubuntu just fine, with lightweight app choices and LXDE. I think the install only needed 512 mb
or RAM? Mine idled using 192 mb.




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Re: Re: Linux gaming on low end PC's?
By: Malvinas to pyrewyrm on Mon Mar 24 2025 08:59 pm

I've always considered Linux to be a power-hungry highly demanding OS. You need quite the specs to get the thing going, especially with a window manager desktop built in.
I mean, I know about distros specifically designed to be stripped bare to the minimum so they run on smaller/older HW, but those are that: specifically for that purpose.
Anything "mainstream" (think about that term, used regarding a handful of Linux distros...), with the latest Gnome should have some decent amount of RAM and CPU cycles to get the gears rolling.
Does any of this rambling make any sense?

Well, I don't know how far your "always" reaches, but Linux DE bloat is extremely recent (think post 2015 or so) and even then it is much less painful than what the other mainstream systems are doing.

In fact I have been using computers running a recent non-specialist Linux distribution on computers with 2 GB of RAM which have been performing much better than my mother's WIndows computer with 8GB of RAM, because Windows is so I/O hungry it is no longer funny.

Now, I am willing to buy the argument that an old computer from the early 2010s might do better for certain games running Windows 7 than a modern Linux system. I mention this because I gave it a try. The downside is that gathering a healthy Windows 7 plus drivers is a bit more work than usual these days since all the hardware that used to be suported is EOLed.

On the other hand, for actual retrogames, Linux works very well, even better than modern Windows, because Linux solutions have all the tooling you'd use to run old programs on new Windowses included.


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Single-core IBM-branded Thinkpads like the T43 started getting sluggish with Windows 7 (They came with XP). They ran lubuntu just fine, with lightweight app choices and LXDE. I think the install only needed 512 mb or RAM? Mine idled using 192 mb.

I would imagine taking a single-core XP machine and going to 7 would not be great. I can even see a many of the moderately nice visuals linux distros today might not perform well on such a machine.

But I struggle to see how a comtemporary linux version of either XP or 7 would perform worse on any machine. Or many distros from ten years later even would likely still be as least as smooth, barring some hardware requirement (ie a given standard of integrated graphics).

Hence my interest - No given system (no matter how much I like it) is the end all/be all/do all. Linux covers this largely by drowning you in options to suit every conceivable need Linux can support. But I was hoping to see a case where Windows was genuinely better than a fairly-picked linux distro in terms of performance. If only to say I saw it or to truly know an upside to Windows. At best, it might reveal some aspect of my coming complete divorce from Windows this Oct that I need to account for before the proverbial court proceedings are finalized on the day Win10 EOLs.

I was even hoping perhaps there would be something interesting to test out. The upside to the Toughbooks is the hot-swappable drive caddies. I can jump between operating systems in the time it takes to shutdown and bootup again. So if there was something in the story I could actually test, I was interested to give it a go.

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Re: Re: Linux gaming on low end PC's?
By: pyrewyrm to poindexter FORTRAN on Fri Mar 28 2025 02:50 pm

I would imagine taking a single-core XP machine and going to 7 would not be great. I can even see a many of the moderately nice visuals linux distros today might not perform well on such a machine.

They did OK, as long as there wasn't any background processing going on. Once you ran a virus scan or the index search kicked in you'd need to go for a walk.

Not much later, we got the first Core 2 duo systems with SATA drives, they were a breath of fresh air.
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I would imagine taking a single-core XP machine and going to 7 would no great. I can even see a many of the moderately nice visuals linux distr today might not perform well on such a machine.

They did OK, as long as there wasn't any background processing going on. Once you ran a virus scan or the index search kicked in you'd need to go for a walk.

Not much later, we got the first Core 2 duo systems with SATA drives,
they were a breath of fresh air.

LOL! I run my BBS on a P4 running Windows 7. The OS runs fine but most Web browers don't and like you said, forget about running any virus software. I'm using Seamonkey and that seems to run fine.

It works fine for running Mystic but thats pretty much all I use if for.

|02-=|10Cozmo|02=-

... I wish life had a scroll-back buffer.

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Cozmo wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

LOL! I run my BBS on a P4 running Windows 7. The OS runs fine but most
Web browers don't and like you said, forget about running any virus software. I'm using Seamonkey and that seems to run fine.

Yeah, I hear you - I ran my BBS on a cast-off Celeron 1 ghz machine.
Single core, 512 MB of RAM. Since traffic had died down, I was usually
getting one caller at a time. Worked fine...



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Re: Re: Linux gaming on low end PC's?
By: Arelor to Malvinas on Thu Mar 27 2025 20:36:02

...Windows is so I/O hungry it is no longer funny.

Was it ever?

The downside is that gathering a healthy Windows 7 plus drivers is a bit more work than usual these days since all the hardware that used to be suported is EOLed.

That only applies to Windows Updates and security patches. The OS itself will work just fine, just keep it offline. I mention this (wow, deja vu!) 'cause I've run across a few people that thought EOL meant it would just...die, shut down forever, etc.
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Re: Re: Linux gaming on low end PC's?
By: poindexter FORTRAN to pyrewyrm on Fri Mar 28 2025 13:44:32

Once you ran a virus scan or the index search kicked in you'd need to go...

Unless your accessing large databases or some such, you don't need indexing. It--as you mentioned--slows things down and can use gobs of storage space since it keeps growing over time.
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Hello Mortar!

01 Apr 25 14:29, you wrote to Arelor:

I mention this (wow, deja vu!) 'cause I've run across a few people that thought EOL meant it would just...die, shut down forever, etc.

That is what MS want people to think. That the computer will just stop working. They want people to go out and purchase a brand new
system. Even though the hardware of the current PC would do the job (Minus the stupid W11+ requirements).

I've installed Linux Mint on mum's pc, and the only anoyance is the canon printer driver can't see how much ink is left.
I did do a test install of W11 after running refus though it to remove the TPM requirement etc, but the are no printer drivers fro her
printer, and the w10 ones won't work.. arghhh...


Vorlon


--- GoldED+/LNX 1.1.5-b20240302
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Hello Mortar!

01 Apr 25 14:29, you wrote to Arelor:

I mention this (wow, deja vu!) 'cause I've run across a few people that thought EOL meant it would just...die, shut down forever, etc.

That is what MS want people to think. That the computer will just stop working. They want people to go out and purchase a brand new
system. Even though the hardware of the current PC would do the job (Minus the stupid W11+ requirements).

I've installed Linux Mint on mum's pc, and the only anoyance is the canon printer driver can't see how much ink is left.
I did do a test install of W11 after running refus though it to remove the TPM requirement etc, but there are no printer drivers for her
printer, and the w10 ones won't work.. arghhh...


Vorlon


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Re: Linux gaming on low end PC's?
By: Vorlon to Mortar M. on Wed Apr 02 2025 09:41 am

I mention this (wow, deja vu!) 'cause I've run across a few people that
thought EOL meant it would just...die, shut down forever, etc.

That is what MS want people to think. That the computer will just stop working. They want people to go out and purchase a brand new system. Even though the hardware of the current PC would do the job (Minus the stupid W11+ requirements).

Although Microsoft does produce some of their own PCs, I don't think they're very common. If someone buys a new system, it would likely be a different brand of computer, and Microsoft would only be getting paid for a Windows license (either from the computer's OEM, or if the user built their own PC, they may have bought a Windows licence to install Windows on it legally and for support).

I've heard sales of Windows isn't Microsoft's biggest income generator anymore though, as sales of computers has shrunk a bit and people are buying more smartphones & tablets. Lately, I've heard Microsoft makes a lot more money from data services, hosted applications (Office 360, etc.), and other business-related things. Also, deals with corporations that deploy Windows laptops to their employees and use Microsoft Outlook email etc. probably provide a lot of revenue for Microsoft. I'd guess more so than home users.

Nightfox

Re: Linux gaming on low end PC's?
By: Vorlon to Mortar M. on Wed Apr 02 2025 09:41:10

I've installed Linux Mint on mum's pc, and the only anoyance is the canon printer driver can't see how much ink is left.

That's why I haven't switched to Linux or BSD as my daily driver. Dispite what the fanboys tell you, there's still a lot of incompatibility or even absence of drivers for various hardware. I have a Canon flatbed scanner from the 2010s (I think) and there are no linux/BSD drivers for it, nor will SANE work with it.

What I'll probably end up doing is use Win10+VirtualBox when I need the scanner, which isn't often, but enough to need it.
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Re: Linux gaming on low end PC's?
By: Nightfox to Vorlon on Tue Apr 01 2025 17:17:57

...Microsoft would only be getting paid for a Windows License...

MS has always been in bed with various hardware companies. Back in the '90s it was all about the licensing, as you mention. PC makers had to pony-up for the "privilege" to have Windows pre-installed, or face bankrupsy as Windows was, virtually, the only game in town. A few tried to buck the system by offereing Linux systems, but by then, all the public knew about was "Windows", so they ended up caving.

Today, withe the inclusion of Co-Pilot, MS is pressuring PC makers to include special AI-enhanced chipsets into their machines, believing that consumers will fall in love with AI. Personally, I have my doubts, based on what I've seen and read.

I've heard sales of Windows isn't Microsoft's biggest income generator... I've heard Microsoft makes a lot more money from data services, hosted applications (Office 360, etc.), and other business-related things.

Quite right, and has been that way for years. In an intervew with Steve Ballmer (the previous CEO), he admitted that vary fact, which didn't sit well with home consumers.
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Once you ran a virus scan or the index search kicked in you'd need to go

Yeah, the disk IO impact of operations like that vs the spinning disks of that era - I don't think anything would work great, barring you being able to load everything into RAM and work from there while the disk runs off with its new process lover.

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That's why I haven't switched to Linux or BSD as my daily driver.
Dispite what the fanboys tell you, there's still a lot of
incompatibility or even absence of drivers for various hardware. I have
a Canon flatbed scanner from the 2010s (I think) and there are no linux/BSD drivers for it, nor will SANE work with it.

I wouldn't listen to anyone's "fanboys" if they are going to be deceptive.

Conversely, having worked in linux for going on more than a decade now, I can say the list of mainstream hardware that doesn't work has gotten a lot shorter. I'm sure there is a lot of specialty equipment that still won't play nice (like some industry software we have to accomodate for our customers.And
there is a lot that is more minimal.

Linux as a whole isn't an OS catered to the ultra-convenience users any more than Windows is aimed at the artsy-types or OSX is focused on serious business environments and gaming. And neither Windows nor OSX seem interested in giving their users any more control over their devices than absolutely demanded by the market.

The beautiful part is everyone has a choice and I won't begrudge anyone theirs. I only hope they are fully informed going in and make their decision with an eye to the future vs the conveniences of today.

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Vorlon wrote to Mortar M. <=-

I've installed Linux Mint on mum's pc, and the only anoyance is the
canon printer driver can't see how much ink is left. I did do a test install of W11 after running refus though it to remove the TPM
requirement etc, but the are no printer drivers fro her printer, and
the w10 ones won't work.. arghhh...

I have a Canon MX 922, and it's kooky. It's got separate CYMK tanks, plus a second black tank for black and white prints. There's an LED underneath
the installed cartridge that glows red. Any low cartridge blinks.

I hate inkjet printers with the fire of a thousand suns, but I love this
one. It's got a scanner, 50 sheet feeder, separate paper trays for
regular and photo paper - so no swapping paper or paper hanging out.

Ink is $14 per set, and best of all - the printer was free!

I found it on the side of the road, brought it home, tried printing and
got an accordion jam on the exit side. Looked into the printer and saw
that a highlighter had fallen back there. Shook it out, and VOILA! free
printer AND free highlighter!






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Nightfox wrote to Vorlon <=-

Although Microsoft does produce some of their own PCs, I don't think they're very common. If someone buys a new system, it would likely be
a different brand of computer, and Microsoft would only be getting paid for a Windows license (either from the computer's OEM, or if the user built their own PC, they may have bought a Windows licence to install Windows on it legally and for support).

I'm sure there's some pathway where Microsoft pays Microsoft for Windows licenses on Surface tablets and laptops.



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Re: Re: Linux gaming on low end PC's?
By: Mortar M. to Arelor on Tue Apr 01 2025 02:29 pm

The downside is that gathering a healthy Windows 7 plus drivers is a bit more work than usual these days since all the hardware that used to be suported is EOLed.

That only applies to Windows Updates and security patches. The OS itself will work just fine, just keep it offline. I mention this (wow, deja vu!) 'cause I've run across a few people that thought EOL meant it would
just die

What I meant is I have a Windows 7 era laptop around, and I can't download most of its drivers from the manufacturers because they shut the respective download pages down after 10 years of operation. If you ever need to reinstall this thing you are up for a rough ride.

So basically you have to fish for the drivers at Russian warez sites or dedicated retro sites.

Can you do it? Yes. But it is more work than it should.

Also, Windows 7 activation services are down so you need to crack the thing in order to get rid of piracy warnings.



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Re: Re: Linux gaming on low end PC's?
By: Arelor to Mortar M. on Sat Apr 05 2025 09:52 am

What I meant is I have a Windows 7 era laptop around, and I can't download most of its drivers from the manufacturers because they shut the respective download pages down after 10 years of operation. If you ever need to reinstall this thing you are up for a rough ride.

While a certain version of Windows is still actively supported, it can be good to go download the drivers & things and make a backup of those somewhere in case you ever need to re-install it from scratch.

Nightfox