Gentoo as a gaming platform?

glenn_nz · n00b Joined: 23 Jun 2003 Posts: 16

I am determined to get a linux box to play games as good, if not better than my windows 98 and have yet to see it happen.

So after playing around with numerous distros which gave less than acceptable performance I have arrived at gentoo.

I wish to get ut2003 going because it has a native version and easy to compare with the windows version however I only have 56k and am eager to get some opinions as to what are the minimal amount of things I have to emerge/install inorder to get it to work. I have never used gentoo before.

I'm assuming I need X so I'll starts with that but if anyone's got some advice I'll take it.

Thanks all,
Glenn

dberkholz · Posted: Mon Jun 23, 2003 10:48 pm Post subject:

Basically, get through the install guide. Then,
1) xfree;
2) Minimalistic WM, such as fluxbox/openbox/blackbox/waimea (you don't need this but the default is VERY ugly);
3) Accelerated drivers for your video card (nvidia-kernel and nvidia-glx for nvidia, ati-drivers for ati>=9500, xfree-drm for most other stuff is the best choice);
4) Set up ALSA, so you get sound. guide on www.gentoo.org;
5) unreal-tournament.

Text-based (therefore smaller) extras that are irrelevant to gaming, but nice:
1) eterm - nice transparent terminal emulator
2) naim - instant messaging
3) mutt - email
4) bitchx or irssi - irc
5) lynx/links - browser, links has optional GUI front-end -- see https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic.php?t=62755 for more info
It's nice to run the text-based alternatives in the cool-looking transparent eterm.

glenn_nz · n00b Joined: 23 Jun 2003 Posts: 16

Cheers. I hope gentoo lives up to everyone's ravings.

erwan · Apprentice Joined: 01 Jun 2003 Posts: 150 Location: Tokyo

And of course, use the gaming kernel !
_________________
See me on Jabber: erwan@im.loisant.org

ericfether · n00b Joined: 16 Jun 2003 Posts: 17 Location: Atlanta, GA

Quake 3 on Win98 and on Gentoo --

I took an Athlon 1.4GHz with a Nvidia GeForce 2 MX card that was running Win98 and put Gentoo on it. I'm actually putlling better frames under Gentoo than I did Win98. At 16-bit color, 1024x768 (yes, I know about 16-bit and 32-bit color...but I really can't tell the difference when I'm dodging rockets) --

Win98 -- 62.4 fps
Gentoo -- 68.2 fps

Later,
Eric

blueworm · l33t Joined: 09 May 2003 Posts: 962

I hope you are not dissapointed by gentoo.
You probably wont manage to get better performance of UT2003 under linux.
There is a reason for this, sorry cant remeber where I read it it was an article by Ryan "icculus Gordon.
Had something to do with direct3d for windows version.
I can not verify this since I've been playing exclusively under linux for 12 months.
Nevertheless Quake3 and all those games based on this engine will definetly run faster under linux.
check out http://www.thehaus.net/index.php?ent=4158

glenn_nz · n00b Joined: 23 Jun 2003 Posts: 16

I finally bought the retail version of ut2003 and it runs decently under fluxbox. Although I get a seg fault when I try and create a profile and the game crashes as a result, the increased the load time and the temporary stutter for the first few moment when starting a game, it works quite well. I'm sure if I replaced my geforce2 MX I wouldn't notice a thing.

Must admit though that a light-weight windows manager is necessary. When I tried it in KDE it ran like three-legged dog.

FRiO · n00b Joined: 30 Jun 2003 Posts: 45

Mmm - UT2k3 can't be benchmarked against linux be default unless you change the Windows version to OpenGL acceleration (rather than Direct3d). If you do that, Gentoo comes out tops, but if not, Windows dos... as 2k3's OpenGL implementation is nowhere near as fast as it's Direct3d engine

.

But yer, 2k3 is damn nice under Linux. Just do what the others are suggesting and run a light wm, otherwise arts under KDE causes some nasty issues :/.