Windows 11 vs SteamOS On AMD - The 9060 XT Tells A Very Different Story
The follow-up everyone asked for. Last video was Windows 11 vs SteamOS vs Omarchy on Nvidia. This time — the same fight on an AMD RX 9060 XT. And everyone who said AMD is the better Linux experience? You were right. But the…
The follow-up everyone asked for. Last video was Windows 11 vs SteamOS vs Omarchy on Nvidia. This time — the same fight on an AMD RX 9060 XT. And everyone who said AMD is the better Linux experience? You were right. But the details are messier and more interesting than the tribal wars suggest.
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WHY THIS TEST MATTERS
Straight from the Steam Hardware Survey — 71% of Steam gamers run Nvidia, 13% AMD, 6% Intel. The most-owned card on Steam is the RTX 3060, the 5060 Ti sits eighth, and the 9060 XT I'm testing lands at 34th. This isn't a 9060 XT vs 5060 Ti shootout — it's the same question as last time: what performance do you keep when you flip from Windows 11 to SteamOS or an Arch distro, this time on AMD.
Same four games at 1440p — Cyberpunk 2077 (ultra ray tracing), Black Myth Wukong, Homeworld 3, Returnal. Windows 11 on the latest Adrenalin drivers, SteamOS on the stock 3.8 / 6.16 kernel, and Omarchy on the latest Mesa stack.
AVERAGE FPS
Windows takes Cyberpunk and posts an absolutely bonkers Black Myth Wukong number — I checked repeatedly, no frame gen enabled, same settings, and it still ran away with it. Something in the Adrenalin drivers or the benchmark tool with FSR. But Homeworld 3 and Returnal? Near parity — and Returnal on Linux actually holds up better than the Nvidia equivalent did. That's the AMD Mesa integration doing its thing.
One important caveat — SteamOS on stock 3.8 uses an older kernel with older Mesa. If you're running a newer AMD card on SteamOS, go up to 3.9 and the latest kernel, because the drivers are baked into it. My results would improve.
1% LOWS AND FRAME PACING
Windows wins the lows where it clocks higher — Cyberpunk and Wukong. But Homeworld and Returnal flip toward Linux, with Omarchy taking Homeworld frame pacing outright and SteamOS holding firm on Returnal. The Wukong and Returnal Windows pacing results were so extreme I genuinely distrust them — likely FSR-related weirdness. The honest headline: on AMD it's neck and neck with Windows in half the games, which is a very different picture from the consistent 20% Nvidia tax.
THE VERDICT
AMD gives you the smoother Linux ride — the drivers live in the kernel and it shows. If you're buying a card specifically for a Linux gaming box, AMD is great value and the integration is real. But 71% of you own Nvidia, and you shouldn't be penalised for that — with the patch you can run SteamOS today, at slightly lower performance, and it's completely playable.
The one genuine Nvidia reason remains CUDA — I run DaVinci Resolve on Linux, and without an Nvidia card you lose effects and acceleration. If Resolve wasn't in my life, the 9060 XT would be in my main rig tomorrow.
And no, I'm not testing CachyOS — Omarchy is as close as makes no difference, and these benchmarks already took a full day of Windows 11 pain. The French and German governments are dropping Windows for Linux. Gamers — it's the right time to make the jump. Roughly 95% of your library is good to go; kernel anti-cheat titles remain the holdout.
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00:00 - Start
00:09 - PRE AMBLE
02:55 - GPU Market SHARE
05:16 - AVERAGE FRAME RATES
06:21 - 1% LOWS
07:16 - FRAME PACING
09:25 - FINAL WORDS