EndeavourOS’s latest update makes Nvidia gaming on Linux much easier to set up

The world of technology changes in strange ways, doesn’t it? Once billed as the one OS you shouldn’t game on, we’re now seeing Linux act as the beating heart for powerful gaming systems such as SteamOS and Bazzite. Gaming on Linux is no longer a joke; in fact, some gamers discovered that Linux handheld gaming can sometimes beat Windows 11 now.

As you might expect, some interested gamers are now checking out Linux distros to find their new home away from home. Ideally, they want an operating system that has a similar look and feel to Windows so they can get settled quicker, and one such operating system is EndeavourOS. It comes with the excellent KDE Plasma bundled in and gives people a solid Arch Linux base without any tinkering. Now, a new update to EndeavourOS has made it even easier for Nvidia gamers to get their PCs set up with the operating system.

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EndeavourOS now supports automatic Nvidia GPU driver detection

The change is part of the newest update for the operating system, titled EndeavourOS Ganymede. The update notes begin with the developers explaining why they haven’t been updating EndeavourOS as much as they’d like. As it turns out, the devs are going through some rough times, and they’re trying their best to avoid FOSS burnout. They’ve understandably “chosen to let [their] lives and loved ones come first over the project,” which I have zero qualms with.

The notes then get stuck into the meat of EndeavourOS Ganymede, with the spotlight feature being a new Nvidia driver detection system. Beforehand, you had to either install the “nvidia-open” package if your GPU was regarded as new, or the plain “nvidia” package if it was older. It was simple in practice, but not exactly intuitive for people making the jump from Windows to Linux.

Fortunately, that issue is now a thing of the past. As the patch notes state:

Nvidia – NVIDIA support has been significantly improved. Previously, the ISO always included the standard nvidia package by default. Now, the system automatically detects the GPU during ISO boot and installs the correct driver — either nvidia or nvidia-open.

Support for nvidia-open has been added both to the ISO environment and to the installer. The detection process ensures that the appropriate modules are loaded in the Live Session and correctly installed onto the target system.

If you want to give the OS a shot, head over to the EndeavourOS page and download it there. Or, if you just want to check out everything that the new patch introduced, visit the EndeavourOS Ganymede patch notes for all the details.