The Beta update has been released for a few days already

Dec 23, 2014 14:51 GMT  ·  By

SteamOS, a Linux distribution based on Debian and developed by Valve that aims to provide the best gaming experience, has been updated by its makers and a new Beta version has been released.

Valve has been very quiet in the past few weeks and they haven't released any meaningful updates for SteamOS, the distro that they are building to power the upcoming Steam Machines. You might have forgot, but Valve actually has plans to release a console / PC hybrid that will be powered by a Linux OS and that will run Steam (Big Picture) as its main interface. There hasn't been any new information about this endeavor and the SteamOS distro hasn't got too much attention.

The previous SteamOS update arrived on October 22, two months ago. It wasn't something out of the ordinary, but it was an update nonetheless. Now the Beta branch of the distribution, also called Alchemist, has been upgraded and it comes with some new packages that should greatly improve the experience. The update has been available for a few days already, but it's important for users to know about it nonetheless.

What's new in SteamOS

The Linux distribution has changed very little in the past few months. The only thing that really changes is the Steam client, which is embedded as the default interface, although a GNOME fallback is available to anyone who wants a proper desktop. It's still pretty far from a regular desktop experience, but it should provide the best gaming performance.

"SteamOS is designed to run Steam and Steam games. It also provides a desktop mode which can run regular Linux applications. SteamOS makes use of the standard APT package manager for software updates; you can add third-party sources to your subscribed repositories to gain access to more applications. SteamOS currently provides a limited set of packages, but many Debian wheezy packages work fine on SteamOS."

"SteamOS currently has two different repositories, 'alchemist' and 'alchemist_beta'. 'alchemist_beta' is a testing release where fixes and features will gradually accumulate on a daily or weekly basis. When the beta stabilizes, those fixes will be promoted to the 'alchemist' repository. This process is similar to the existing steam/steam_beta process. Important security updates or critical bugfixes may get pushed directly to 'alchemist' if needed," the developers said on the website.

The devs also said that the latest NVIDIA 343.22 Linux drivers have been implemented, the AMD graphics driver has been updated to version to 14.9, the Linux kernel has been upgraded to version 3.10.60, and XCOM: Enemy Unknown should now run smoothly. As expected, some of the other core packages have been updated as well.

You can download the SteamOS Beta Linux distro from Softpedia. This is not a Live CD and it needs to be installed in order to be used.

SteamOS (7 Images)

SteamOS in action
SteamOS main menuSteamOS games
+4more