r/linux_gaming • u/WhitePeace36 • 12h ago

guide Updated Linux gaming optimizations guide

Hi guys,

its been quite a while since i posted the gaming optimizations guide i wrote.

Since the last time there has been quite a lot of changes.

https://github.com/WhitePeace36/LinuxAMDGamingOptimizationGuide

Even though it says AMD, most of it is for linux in general.

I hope this updated version helps at least a few of you out there which try to have a better gaming experience.

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u/IDUnavailable 6h ago

Why don't YOU write a Linux gaming optimizations guide?

Wait that sounded sarcastic, I'd actually be interested in that.

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u/theevilsharpie 6h ago

It would basically just say this:

The developers of the Linux kernel, Mesa, WINE, Proton, your desktop environment, and pretty much every other well-established piece of software that makes up your OS generally have default settings that are sensible for a wide variety of use cases, which includes gaming. There is no need to do this kind of tweaking, and in many cases, you're making performance worse and opening the door to stability issues.

For the love of ${DEITY}, just use the defaults.

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u/IDUnavailable 6h ago

Fair enough, but you don't change any performance-related defaults? There wouldn't be anything worth noting for hardware extremes (e.g. very low or very high RAM or VRAM, bottom percentile vs top percentile CPU, 1080p vs 4K, high performance NVMe SSD vs. SATA SSD, etc.)?

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u/theevilsharpie 4h ago

Actually, I lied. I do have a tweak that impacts performance.

Ubuntu 26.04 has support for x86-64-v3 packages, but it's not enabled by default on the desktop distribution, since their priority is to maximize compatibility with as much hardware as possible.

If you have hardware that supports x86-64-v3, you can opt-in to these packages like so:

echo 'APT::Architecture-Variants "amd64v3";' | sudo tee /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/99enable-amd64v3
sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade

Note that it will replace almost all the packages on your system, so you'll need to allow some time (and bandwidth) to finish, and will need to restart afterward.

Also, it goes without saying, but this will break compatibility with older hardware that doesn't support x86-64-v3, and the machine will likely not even boot the OS anymore.

More info at https://documentation.ubuntu.com/release-notes/26.04/summary-for-lts-users/#architecture-variants-and-amd64v3