Boot SteamDeckOs from USB

[Ben Bernanke]

I want to run Windows 11 from my Deck's NVME. Can I install SteamDeckOS to a usb drive and boot it from there?


(Windows fights Linux to be installed on native hdd and doesn't want to boot from usb and Valve doesn't support dual boot is why I'm doing this).

I thought you could do this but there's a lot of topics that are confusingly similar but not this:
(1) making a usb drive to install steamOS to the NVME
(2) installing SteamOS (a debian-based OS that Valve made for non-Deck computers)
(3) dual-booting windows or booting windows from a USB hd through rufus and windows-to-go.
(4) installing games or other deck software to an external HD to use with SteamDeckOS

and I keep finding info on this stuff and not on what I want to do (what I want to do is kinda weird bc there's not much reason to install SteamDeckOS and not use it for when you're carrying your deck around. But I just want to mess with the OS but leave Windows installed as only OS on NVME).

I tried to "hack" the recovery scripts. I just changed the DISK="/nvme" line (I know the string is not exactly that) to my external hard disk using an entry in the /dev/disks/by-id folder.

The script runs (if it doesn't find the disk it quits immediately). But then it partitions the usb drive I'm trying to boot from and nothing appears to happen after that point. I don't think there's any errors. The window exits fast.

[Cody The Wolfdog]

There's a fork of SteamOS called Holo ISO that is made for desktop computers. You should try using that. If not, Try Chimera OS or Bazite.

[Ben Bernanke]

Originally posted by Cody_The_Wolf_:

There's a fork of SteamOS called Holo ISO that is made for desktop computers. You should try using that. If not, Try Chimera OS or Bazite.

Valve has some warning that SteamOS doesn't work on steam Deck. I'm also not sure that it wouldn't be different (SteamOS is debian-based while DeckOS is arch-based).

I don't want just any Linux (I have Ubuntu installed on a USB). I want SteamDeckOS only.

Bazite is maybe interesting but it looks like it's Fedora-based.

Valve changed a bunch of stuff with the SteamDeckOS (maybe SteamOS too, idk about that) but they got rid of glibc and they seem to have everything installed via the flatpaks somehow (I think SDL2 and other things that games would typically depend on are somewhere not in the normal root but I don't remember).

I wanted to mess with it to learn more about how applications find the stuff they need to run.

I think Holo is something people made before Valve was supporting SteamOS for pc hardware generally. I think valve made its own PCs and made the SteamOS just for those PC's and Holo was someone's effort to make those early SteamOS releases available to be installed on any hardware u wanted. I think since SteamOS3 Valve is now supporting installing SteamOS on all hardware directly so I would just go with that but SteamOS3 is debian-based and the Valve download link to it says "don't use with Deck" so I didn't. Idk that SteamOS3 might have the flatpak/dependeny thing that I was curious to poke around with arranged differently also.

[WarnerCK]

You seem very confused.

Originally posted by Ben Bernanke:

Valve has some warning that SteamOS doesn't work on steam Deck. I'm also not sure that it wouldn't be different (SteamOS is debian-based while DeckOS is arch-based).

SteamOS 1 & 2 were Debian-based. SteamOS 3 is Arch-based. SteamOS 1 & 2 are no longer available from Valve - the download links give you the recovery image of SteamOS 3 for the Deck. They just haven't updated the text because they don't really have anything to update the text with.

I don't want just any Linux (I have Ubuntu installed on a USB). I want SteamDeckOS only.

Then you're out of luck. The SteamOS installer is only set up to wipe everything and be installed as the only OS on the internal drive of a Steam Deck.

Bazite is maybe interesting but it looks like it's Fedora-based.

Correct, Bazzite is Fedora-based.

Valve changed a bunch of stuff with the SteamDeckOS (maybe SteamOS too, idk about that) but they got rid of glibc

No, they did not.

and they seem to have everything installed via the flatpaks somehow

No, they do not.

(I think SDL2 and other things that games would typically depend on are somewhere not in the normal root but I don't remember).

Everything in SteamOS is installed "normally," but the OS directories are read-only (and there are two copies for atomic image-based updates). The user can install whatever they want, but they can only put files in user-writable locations which excludes system packages and snaps (no snapd in the SteamOS images) but leaves flatpaks, appimages, and programs that can be run without installing.

I wanted to mess with it to learn more about how applications find the stuff they need to run.

Good for you.

I think Holo is something people made before Valve was supporting SteamOS for pc hardware generally. I think valve made its own PCs and made the SteamOS just for those PC's and Holo was someone's effort to make those early SteamOS releases available to be installed on any hardware u wanted.

No, HoloISO is specifically built from the recovery image of SteamOS 3 for the Deck - making it installable on some other hardware.

ChimeraOS was the effort to make a Steam Machines-like gaming appliance OS prior to and for a while after the Deck.

There have been many immutable distros made before and since the Deck. They're gaining more visibility as containerised software distribution methods like flatpak and snap are getting more mature.

I think since SteamOS3 Valve is now supporting installing SteamOS on all hardware directly so I would just go with that but SteamOS3 is debian-based and the Valve download link to it says "don't use with Deck" so I didn't. Idk that SteamOS3 might have the flatpak/dependeny thing that I was curious to poke around with arranged differently also.

Valve absolutely have not yet released SteamOS 3 for generic PC hardware. They've said they intend to at some point, but there's not any particular benefit to them or to users from them doing so. The only "special sauce" to SteamOS is its tight integration with the Deck hardware. You lose that on generic hardware, and distros for generic hardware - both traditional and immutable - already exist.

[RSebire]

Give it time.
In time SteamOS will be available for PC as a standalone installer.

Patience is a virtue

[Ben Bernanke]

Originally posted by WarnerCK:

You seem very confused.

Maybe, but not nearly as much as you are. The only things I have "wrong" in here is that SteamOS will be debian-based (and not Arch-based) in version 3 and that HoloIso is a universal installer for DeckOS.

But since Valve doesn't appear to have actually released an arch-based SteamOSv3 for non-Deck computers, I don't see why it matters to this discussion (since I can't download and install it on my Deck). If HoloIso changes anything about DeckOS then I don't want it. Also the parts they took out could be deck-essential (so it might not work on my Deck).

Also, even if Valve does release Arch-based SteamOSv3, it will probably lack things that are needed for Deck to run so it won't work on Deck anyway (Valve has some proprietary parts to the Deck and/or OS. I think they don't want to put that in open source code).

Originally posted by WarnerCK:

Originally posted by Ben Bernanke:

I don't want just any Linux (I have Ubuntu installed on a USB). I want SteamDeckOS only.

Then you're out of luck. The SteamOS installer is only set up to wipe everything and be installed as the only OS on the internal drive of a Steam Deck.

This is what I'm trying to change. I don't recall the specifics but when you download the steam deck recovery iso and boot it from a usb drive, it enters a KDE desktop with like 4 links to apps. And the re-install/re-image apps just call a shell script with different command-line options.

What I want to do is change the code in these scripts so that the "Disk" variable is not pointed at the NVME but to my USB. Which I did and it finds the drive but then it doesn't install, so I'm here asking people what more I have to do.

But I'm not that good at bash and I don't know what all is required to change it.

Originally posted by WarnerCK:

Originally posted by Ben Bernanke:

Valve changed a bunch of stuff with the SteamDeckOS (maybe SteamOS too, idk about that) but they got rid of glibc

No, they did not.

They absolutely did, though. Write a .c program and #include <math.h> and call a math function. It won't be found.

This Falaichte guy did a whole series on trying to get his anime player on there and he couldn't do it. He ultimately resorts to using containers because you just can't overwrite enough of Valve's changes with Arch components to run actual Arch apps (a few simple ones will work, but a lot of them won't).

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1675200/discussions/0/3757725080155282436/

Valve devs have confirmed that if you want to install certain things, you need to reinstall the arch version of glibc.

I'm not saying that glibc isn't on Deck at all. I'm saying that there is a massively pared-down version of it if you open the KDE desktop and then open terminal and try to call it. I don't know how Steam games run without having the standard glibc; that's part of what I want to find out.

Originally posted by WarnerCK:

Everything in SteamOS is installed "normally," but the OS directories are read-only (and there are two copies for atomic image-based updates).

This isn't correct at all. You can't install many Arch packages because of missing dependencies (frequently it's glibc that's missing). All you're mentioning here is that Valve made the home folder read/write and root read-only. That has nothing to do with what bins and libs are in root to begin with.


"SteamOS3 isn't base Arch. A significant amount of system binaries and libraries were removed to reduce the size of the image. Adding them back is likely possible, though it would mean disabling the read-only/immutable flags on the system. Doing so would mean future updates to the OS would undo those changes as well."
https://www.reddit.com/r/SteamDeck/comments/ulalfn/compiling_with_gcc_on_the_steam_deck/

This redditor isn't giving you the full story, either. Even if you install Arch stuff to the root, Valve will have changed needed dependencies. This is what Falaichte was complaining about. He could never get it back to be Arch regardless of whether updates would overwrite his changes.

(I just want to add that Valve did this so that you can boot/sleep /save game state super fast on your Deck. It's really nice what they did; but you can barely write a hello world program on the KDE desktop so I don't want to use it as my daily-driver).

You can go through whatever the KDE app store is called and try installing things. You will have all kinds of problems. Or you can use pacman to install Arch and whatever the user-repo Arch stuff is. Almost none of it will work right.

Originally posted by WarnerCK:

No, HoloISO is specifically built from the recovery image of SteamOS 3 for the Deck - making it installable on some other hardware.

You're right but (1) many users are complaining that Holo is not stable, (2) it might be malware, and (3) if the authors (who provide almost no details in the readme) changed things like glibc back to the Arch version, then this won't help me understand how the flatpaks/containers/wherever-valve-stuck-things work on Deck.

Originally posted by WarnerCK:

ChimeraOS was the effort to make a Steam Machines-like gaming appliance OS prior to and for a while after the Deck.

I don't care about these other Linuxes. I only want to know how SteamDeckOS is organized internally. I've been trying to make that clear since my OP.


Anyway, I think maybe I should just be posting stuff like this in the dev forums. Most of the deck forum posters don't seem to know/care about the under-the-hood Linux stuff and only want to play games (which is understandable). I just thought maybe someone would have tried doing this already. My bad.

[Ben Bernanke]

Originally posted by RSebire:

Give it time.
In time SteamOS will be available for PC as a standalone installer.

Patience is a virtue

I don't want SteamOS on my broken thinkpads, though.
I want to (1) boot SteamDeckOS, (2) on my Steam Deck, (3) from a USB drive that isn't the NVME.

I want to play with SteamOS while having Windows 11 installed as only OS on NVME.