Audio devices can have multiple modes or “profiles” that determine what they do.

For my headset I have:

For my internal sound card I have:

If I set my headset to one of the options that doesn’t have “+ Mono Input” the mic stops working and doesn’t even show up in settings and apps anymore. Same if I use the “Stereo Output” mode on my internal sound card. They must be set to a mode with both output and input enabled to work.

I can see this from “Sound” in my KDE settings, but you can also configure this in the “Configuration” tab of pavucontrol.

Tekken 3 is a PS one game, not PS2.

It has no PC version. Any such thing is just the PS one version with an emulation wrapper.

You definitely seem to have what looks to be the right audio device getting detected.

The device that is “unplugged” should be the 3.5mm jack on your laptop (if you have one) not the internal mic.

My first guess is that your audio device is in the wrong mode. If it is currently set to something like “stereo output” change it to “stereo output+mono input” or “stereo duplex” from pavucontrol or audio settings.

intel-undervolt/amdctl for cpu, lact for amd gpu, gwe for nvidia gpu (although voltage control on linux with nvidia is not possible, you can get a similar result by overclocking+limiting power)

Undervolting is great on gaming laptops. Usually nets you a performance boost simply by reducing thermal throttling.

Even just a few mV has made a difference for me.

They mean other platforms like GOG or Epic, not stuff like consoles.

Steam games mostly work, with some exceptions. You can check out ProtonDB to see more precisely what games work, which ones straight up don’t, and which ones need a fix. ProtonDB will usually also tell you what that fix is, which is handy.

But most of the time, you can just hit play and not worry about it.

A note on dualbooting. Linux uses different filesystems from windows. It can access windows NTFS partitions, but it’s not a smooth experience.

A common pitfall is trying use your game library while it is still on a windows filesystem, from linux. Since you can see the folders, and even add them in steam, it’ll seem like it should work. But you’ll run into issues actually running the games. It’s technically possible, but not worth the hassle.

Generally you really want to either format your storage and redownload your games, or if you have the space, copy them over to a fully supported file system.

What I do, is have a minimize keybind.

When I want to quickly do something with a window below the one on top, I hit that minimize keybind, do my thing, then alt-tab.

Unless I interacted with a third window, the one I minimized comes right back.

Or are you looking for something more like picture in picture? A pinned window you never interact with, only look at?

Edit: what if you flip this the other way around?

Make the windows you want to be interacting with transparent, and keep them on top. You’ll always see the window you want to see, through them.

Some of it, yeah.

All a distro is, really, is a preset. It comes with some package manager or other, along with a collection of pre-installed packages.

The reason one chooses one distro over another, is because it’s closer to what you need. I could install arch, and spend a day setting it up exactly the way I like. Or, I could start with Endeavour, and get to essentially the same state in an hour.

I’m familiar enough with linux that I could strong-arm any install into doing whatever I need, but at times, to get from preset A to preset B, it’s faster to just start over from a known preset that’s closest to what I want.

Rolling releases typically mean the software available is recent, but that’s only one aspect of what your starting point could look like.

“Gaming” distros are going to be a preset that contains a bunch of configurations, defaults and software, that gamers typically care about. That steam is usually already installed, is an example of one such thing. The same way my mention of GPU and CPU support is only an example.

Maybe instead of “They tend to make sure stuff that gamers care about are up to date and working” I should have phrased it “They tend to make sure things that gamers care about are easy to set up and supported, if not even ready to go, out of the box”.

This looks fine.

I have a massive library of various games, and three years in I haven’t really come across any cases where I want to tear my hair out.

If ProtonDB says a game doesn’t work, you’re not gonna tweak your way to having it run. If it says it does, and it didn’t run right away with no problems, you can usually just apply the fixes other users have found, and be off playing your game.

In fact things are often simpler than on windows, because all the fixes have been gathered on protondb. While on windows you have to google-fu your way to finding someone on reddit or the steam forums who has the exact same problem, and also figured out and posted the fix.

Sometimes.

They tend to make sure stuff that gamers care about are up to date and working.

You’ll likely need the newest kernels and software packages if you’re running the latest gen of GPU and/or CPU, to get the most out of them, or even get them to work at all.

My first one to switch did so recently. Gave him an open offer to help get going if he ever got interested, then proceeded to just go about using my linux system for our multiplayer gaming and couch gaming hangouts.

It took a little less than three years from when I first switched for him to follow.

My sister is also on linux, has been since she took my gaming laptop as her own, and she never felt a need to switch it back to windows.

You can use VLC if you get the stream url via a web browser, first. MPV can do the same.

The problem is VLC/MPV don’t have a built-in way to browse and pick what you want to play.

Op didn’t install anything on their system yet.

It sounds like maybe the usb drive is a bit crappy.

I’ve had trouble with cheap ones crapping out partway through being used, but be fine once you re-write the files to them. Twice now, yours worked, but then stopped working suddenly for seemingly no reason.

The drive might also be getting too hot. That happens with the Kingston DataTraveler drives I have. If I try to read or write continuously for too long, they shut down for thermal protection, and I have to let them sit for a bit before they work again.

Did you try re-doing that?

The EFI partition is something that exists on the storage device being booted, so if something is wrong with that, then the problem is something on the USB.

Since windows still works, the EFI partition on your computer must be fine.

You can also give Ventoy a go. It replaces the need for Balena Etcher/Rufus.

After you install Ventoy on the usb, it will continue to work like a normal usb drive. Now you just put the .iso file you want on the usb. Or multiple at a time, even. And you can continue using it as a usb drive without removing Ventoy or the isos. It wont care if there are other files on it.

When you go to boot from it, Ventoy will show you a menu of the isos on the usb, and let you pick one to boot. Makes it really easy to try a bunch of different distros if you want.

And it works with windows isos, too.

Did you install anything yet?

It sound like you set up the installer usb, tried it, then went into windows to free up disk space, and now the usb no longer boots?

If I got that right, tell us more about the usb drive you used, and the software you used to make it bootable.

Nextcloud was my thought as well.

Calendar, file storage, and social features. All fairly integrated once you get it set up.

The hurdle would be that setup, getting the right apps installed to get the calendar and social features you want enabled.

And I’ve not really seen anything that can do calendars better than Nextcloud.

I’d be happy to advise on that, OP.

Yes.

Just do yay timeshift, then install all three packages that show up.

Timeshift itself is one, autosnap is a second, and the third is a systemd timer that handles the scheduled snaps (monthly, weekly, etc).

Oh, for sure. If you wait a month, the bigger update can be a lot more trouble.

But look at it like this. If a rolling distro has a problem once a week, which is fixed within 24 hours, updating daily guarantees you will run into it.

While updating weekly means your chance is only one in seven. Since because by the time you update, the fix is more likely to already be in the repos, so you’ll be jumping over the problematic update.

The functionality is conceptually identical, yes.

And timeshift is by default set up such that only / is rolled back while /home is kept as-is.

So same as atomic distros, rolling back doesn’t mean going back in time in terms of personal files or settings.

So I’m really only missing out on the updates for something like Bazzite being potentially more reliable.