Steam Deck @sopuli.xyz kugmo @sh.itjust.works 8 mo. ago

Valve's custom kernel patches for SteamOS' kernel; how many are up-streamed into the mainline kernel already?

Title says all, is it possible to use a mainline kernel on a non-SteamOS install or do you have to use Valve's kernel they ship with SteamOS 3.x? Is it possible to find all the the patches they use and compile a kernel yourself?

11 comments

Most things should work with mainline kernel. According to archwiki the OLED models still need steams kernel patches to get wifi and bt working but older models work fine.
- Mainline is also missing some OLED patches around changing the panel refresh rate and audio cutting out when switching from desktop back to game mode, last I recall. Those are the issues holding me back from installing Bazzite on my OLED.
  
  OLED was tempting me but the idea of not having bazzite makes it easier to hold back.
  
  I have Bazzite on my OLED, and the audio issue is maddening. That alone is making me consider switching back to Steam OS simply for the QoL experience.
- Awesome! Gimme some energy and I will try to run OpenSUSE on there.
I really hope those patches make their way into the other distros. I've got a few Linux machines and the Steam Deck is the only one that wakes from sleep without locking up. It's also the only one that allocates VRAM for the iGPU automatically when a game needs more.
For the life of me, I can't figure out the search terms I need to find what I'm looking for. On top of that, I'm beginning to think I heard it on a podcast. But I seem to remember an interview with someone at Valve talking about how they were upstreaming EVERYTHING they were doing. I would assume that meant kernel work as well.
- I feel like I remember a Bazzite dev saying that at least some kernel improvements are upstreamed.

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