Linux and Windows use very different methods for distributing and updating drivers. Windows takes a more hands-on approach, where you’ll have to download and update most packages manually. This is especially true for GPU drivers. On the other hand, Linux updates GPU drivers system-wide when you trigger the update through your package manager, which streamlines the process.
Windows might automate some of these updates, but more often than not, there is a conflict between Windows’ version and the latest official version from the Nvidia website itself. This makes Windows really annoying to deal with on certain kinds of hardware.
There’s also the fact that Windows 11 carries a notorious amount of overhead (in the form of bloat and nagware), which has skewed results toward Linux in the past. Curious, I decided to test out the graphics performance on a relatively low-end AM4 system, intent on finding out if the “driver tax” was really as big as I suspected it would be.
A look at the test machine
Not a very powerful machine, but the restrictions may end up highlighting a bigger picture
The test system is a PC that is cobbled up using leftover parts, mostly to serve as a DIY home server. It’s not a very powerful machine and has the following specifications:
- CPU: AMD 5 Ryzen 3400G
- RAM: 16GB DDR4 overclocked to 3200 MHz (dual-channel)
- Storage: 512GB NVMe sole boot/data drive
- GPU: Nvidia RTX A2000 (6GB variant)
The RTX A2000 is the star of the show here. It’s a wonderfully compact, low-power RTX Quadro GPU that needs no additional power connector to work. It’s exceptionally good for HTPCs, but its 6 GB RAM limit is going to be a major bottleneck.
A 12GB version of the same card exists, but I don’t have one on hand right now. As for the CPU, it’s not great. The Ryzen 3400G wasn’t a powerhouse back when it was released, and time certainly hasn’t been kind toward it. The measly 6MB of total cache is something that will bottleneck the performance catastrophically.
There’s 16GB RAM here, running in dual-channel at 3200 MHz. Nothing too fancy, and this is the cheapest RAM I had on me during the ongoing RAMpocalypse. VRAM is also going to be a bottleneck here.
It’s also no secret that Windows 11 struggles with compromised PC hardware, and lower-end machines have a harder time running it than Linux. This is something we’ll also have to consider here, as this is a pretty barebones PC and the results will eventually speak for themselves, as you’ll find out soon enough…
Windows 11 (stock) versus Bazzite Linux
And a look at the games being represented
The test system had two separate, clean installations to test on. The first was a standard Windows 11 Home installation. This was updated to the latest release, along with the newest Nvidia Studio drivers (R595 U8/597.06) for the RTX A2000. I should mention that this is a stock Windows 11 installation, with no de-bloating in place.
This part of the benchmarking process was, without a doubt, the worst. Setting up Windows 11 afresh is an awful experience, and I lost track of the number of times I was interrupted to sign in and use something unnecessary.
Bazzite, on the other hand, was pleasantly simple to install. I chose the KDE Plasma variant for Bazzite, with RTX GPU support baked in. Sure enough, it detected and booted to the KDE Plasma desktop without issues. I also decided to update the system to the latest release, along with the Nvidia GPU drivers. I used the latest CachyOS Proton version.
With each installation ready to go, I plugged in a drive containing the following games, which I feel are indicative of titles you’d actually run on this class of card:
- DOOM (2016)
- Batman: Arkham Knight
- Cyberpunk: 2077
- Doom: The Dark Ages
Doom: The Dark Ages is a bit of an outlier here, since it’s a lot more demanding. It also mandates 8GB of VRAM at minimum, but the RTX A2000 seemed not to care, amusingly enough. The other three titles are what I’d assume are the kind of games you’d want to run on a 6GB GPU.
Linux maintains a consistent lead over Windows 11
An updated driver stack helps
The benchmark prints a rather sharp lead for Linux over Windows 11 in (almost) every scenario. This just doesn’t include the average FPS, but the minimum 1% lows as well, which matters a lot more toward ensuring a stutter-free experience.
Taking Cyberpunk 2077 as an example, Bazzite has an impressive 8 FPS lead over Windows 11 in both the average and minimum FPS spectrum. While 8 FPS might not seem like much at first glance, this is the difference between playable (37 FPS) and unplayable (29 FPS with dips to 21) gameplay for this class of system, even with DLSS applied.
The pattern continues with DOOM (2016) and Batman: Arkham Knight. However, Doom: The Dark Ages remains an outlier. Both Windows and Bazzite perform roughly the same, and I really couldn’t tell a difference. The game might be VRAM-constrained, since 6 GB is nowhere near enough for The Dark Ages.
Linux’s lead shouldn’t be all that surprising, though, since Windows 11 carries a lot of overhead on low-end devices, and Linux is usually a lot lighter on resources. There’s also the fact that distros like Bazzite carry additional optimizations like scx schedulers, a custom kernel, and more importantly, a more up-to-date Nvidia driver stack. Which should explain the driver overhead.
Windows really needs to clean up its driver updating process
If there’s one thing that really grinds my gears about Windows 11, it’s the driver-updating process. Especially for GPUs, where you’ll need to manually search for and install the latest driver to get games working properly.
Linux is a lot less involved, and the driver stack is updated when using the package manager. All you need to do is ensure that you’re on the latest GPU drivers for your particular vendor, and you should be good to go. There’s no OEM version trickery involved either, which is a pleasant surprise, especially if you’re on a laptop.
Updating is also a ridiculously simple process, even if some early fixes need you to hop through the git versions instead. Windows should take note here, and the update process needs serious work. It’s in no way intuitive.