That’s exactly what the GSMA is saying. Universal interoperability means not having to use Google’s encryption method, therefore iPhones and all other phones including customized Roms should work.

Now, they could absolutely get in the way of this, but I would hope that they would think it’s not worth the effort.

Absolutely. It sounds ideal for something like that.

The issue is they sit in this odd place from a price perspective. I can get an N4000 based stick PC with 4GB RAM and eMMC storage for $140 CAD, or a vastly better performing N95 based mini PC with 8GB RAM, real SSD, and additional outputs for $50 more.

The stick PC really only makes sense if you need that form factor, or if you’re on a really tight budget. The improvements for $50 are just too much to ignore.

Your wishlist sounds almost identical to mine. As frustrating as the limitations of streamers are, they are easy to use. HDMI CEC makes single remote setups possible, easy volume changes, input switching, etc. Apps are vetted so they “just work”.

As for casting, most platforms support running Miracast or AirPlay receivers. Google is the stickler here that won’t let you run a Google Cast receiver (or at least I haven’t found one) and also doesn’t implement Miracast on Pixel devices. It’s such a shame because I vastly prefer casting the URL to the TV and letting it source the content than mirroring my phone all the time.

Yeah, those were on my radar as well. I haven’t yet had a chance to look into what the Linux compatibility is like, but that sounds promising that you were able to do it.

The big downside I see is that while the power consumption is low, they’re running a really old SoC, usually based on Intel N4000 (launched late 2017). Looking around it seems to have h.265 decode which is the most important one to look out for. It doesn’t support AV1, but that’s mostly streaming services and not that common (I think?). There may be other disadvantages I’m not thinking of at the moment.

What was the performance like for you?

I do have surround sound, but I wasn’t aware of that being an issue with a PC solution. Have you encountered issues getting that to work?

All my current self-hosting is running off an N100 mini-PC. OPNsense, NginX, Home Assistant, Unifi Controller, Docker host, etc. They are fantastic, it just seems a bit overkill for sitting behind the TV and playing Plex/Jellyfin and the occasional web stream in a browser. There’s really not much competition though as all the products below it offer a lot older processors that don’t have very up to date HW decode.

We’d need a suitably powerful APU upgrade in order to make running a 1080p screen viable. Most of the reason the Steam Deck performs as well as it does is because games are only rendering at 720p.

My wishlist for a Deck V2 would be a

• Higher res screen (if it makes sense as I mentioned above)
• Higher refresh with VRR (partially handled by thr OLED 90hz but no VRR)
• Second USB-C port supporting USB4
• Fingerprint reader
• QoL improvements like smaller bezel, modern wireless chipset, etc.

AND a Steam Controller v2 as a companion with the exact same buttons/sticks/touchpads as the Deck.

Of course they could, this is a software limitation. However consumer friendliness is not in either companies interests. Apple prefers to keep total control over their ecosystems so they aren’t going to do Google any favours, and Google likely doesn’t care much either way seeing how long it’s taken them to even attempt a similar network.

Kind of. From what I’ve heard each network will alert you if it always sees the same tracker from the other network, as a precaution against unwanted tracking / stalking. I don’t believe it goes further than that though, as in the networks won’t report back all the tags they see on a daily basis to help with location.

Any tag following you = alert

Tag from the other network seen = nothing

Nope. I was actually able to get it working the other day after ditching flatpak and re-installing Steam, Gamescope, and MangoHUD with DNF instead. All the guides I read said that flatpak would be no issue, but it was clear that as soon as I referenced any of the above applications in the launch arguments it would fail to load because it didn’t understand what I was asking to launch.

So, all in all, I now have Rocket League running at a high framerate with FSR on integrated graphics. It only took two days :P

Yes I am. I appreciate the help though. It seems pretty clear that it’s failing to recognize the gamescope argument because even if I use it barebones without any resolutions or FSR arguments it still fails to launch. Wish I could see thr output somewhere so I could know what to look into.

That said, I have since looked into Nobara and Bazzite and they look really promising. They should have all this stuff I’m trying to do baked right in. The point still stands though that these are extra complications that I wouldn’t have on Windows with a full driver suite.

Like you I’ve tried to game on Linux and each time have had to go back. I really want it to work, and to be fair, it DOES work. I love my Steam Deck and it’s proof that with enough tuning you can get a good experience.

However if you want to get more than a game just running, that’s when you have some issues. Like you I had the X11 multiple monitor issue people describe. Wayland is the fix these days but there were still issues using both different high refresh and VRR at the same time (may be fixed now).

My current issue is trying to get gamescope running when launching games from steam on Fedora 40. I have the flatpak of each and guides say it should just work, but every time I use gamescope as a launch option nothing launches. I imagine there must be a log somewhere but I don’t know where that is. I found some open bug reports that say gamescope just broke a few versions ago with Steam, who knows.

The only reason I need to use gamescope is that there is no AMD control panel, so no way to get FSR. This is a lower end GPU and I really need FSR for this particular game to run well. This is the biggest issue IMO, with only basic GPU drivers the community has to figure out how to implement the latest gaming features on their own, which means it is years behind. The VRR/High Refresh multiple monitor issue for example is something windows was doing with ease several years ago and Linux is getting it now.

So you have to give up a lot of multiplayer games, and you have to be OK with just running the game, not anything modern like DLSS or frame gen, or whatever is cutting edge. For this reason I can still only recommend gaming on Linux if you’re on a Steam Deck, or if you’re a techy person who mostly plays single player titles. Anything more and you will be messing around more than playing.

Man made one of the pioneering smartwatches before anyone else. My pebble still had better battery life than my current feature bloated smart watch. He knows what he’s talking about.

The same reason they removed the SD card, to get you using Google Drive, and the headphone jack, to get you to buy pixel buds.

I wish there were other options but most smartphone makers have dropped out of the game, cost a fortune, or have terrible updates.

It’s ridiculous that Google has disabled this feature. Even if we assumr it’s in preparation for desktop mode, that’s still unacceptable. Mirroring is a perfectly valid feature in its own right and it shouldn’t be held back by Google’s “plans”.

It’s crazy that my old Android phones from a decade ago could do this and the latest pixel cannot. We have been bleeding hardware features for years.

This is my fear too. No doubt there are great people working at Valve, but Gabe is responsible for how customer first the company is. I too worry that Valve will fall when he’s gone.

Valve is my favorite company. Not just because I like video games, but I love the way Gabe runs it. Valve is so customer focused and deserves the “don’t be evil” slogan. I am very scared of the day we lose Gabe because it’s his vision that drives them. Selling to Microsoft would destroy everything that makes them good.

Are you using the Unbound built into OPNsense, or something else? I ask because it’s easy to configure Unbound in OPNsense for DoT. If your ISP isn’t blocking DoT it will be just as secure.

And yes, it will be much more private. Right now if you’re using neither DoT or DoH your ISP will be able to see all your DNS requests in the clear. With either of the above it will be encrypted and they will not be able to read them.

How would you change his setup to prevent ARP attacks? More network segmentation (clients and servers on separate VLANs) or does OPNsense additional protections I should look into?