My question is basically the title, but here are some more details.

My computer is used about 75% for work, 20% for personal use (almost entirely web), and 5% for gaming. ~2 y.o. midrange rig w/ Intel CPU, AMD graphics, 32GB DDR4 RAM.

For work, I need lots of straightforward things: video conferencing on Teams (web is fine), Zoom, Word document editing (web is fine), a bunch of other web apps, some light database stuff, etc.

Plus two things that are a bit trickier: OneDrive professional/SharePoint (so I'll need abraunegg's onedrive) and Excel 2024 desktop (web isn't good enough) for which I'll need to run Windows (10? Ameliorated, maybe?) in a VM.

But I also want to do gaming. I wouldn't install a kernel-level rootkit anyway (and I boycott Denuvo), so SteamOS-level compatibility should work great for my needs. I also have a Quest 3, so I'll want to do PCVR, which apparently works great (with Bazzite).

But I don't really grok what Bazzite being immutable means for using it as a daily driver for work/productivity. Under the hood, it's just Fedora 42, right? For immutable distros, you use flatpaks instead of apt install, and they're basically just "apps" that should "just work", right? Do I care about kernel modification?

Or, more to the point, I don't know what I don't know. After preliminary research on this all, I think my plan of going for Bazzite then adding abraunegg's onedrive and a Windows VM with Office 2024 will hit all my needs, but can anyone "sanity check" that plan, or compare the pros/cons with a non-Ubuntu-based alternative?

I'm good enough with computers that I should be able to tinker through the inevitable small challenges that will come up, but I don't really have enough time to do it twice if my initial plan is terrible. (I connect to a Debian server remotely using the terminal, so I have some background—but I needed to install a bunch of packages to get web app software running, and idk if I'll need that as a desktop user.)

Any advice much appreciated! And thanks for reading this far, even if you don't comment. :)

Edit: thanks for the input so far! I'm turning in, but I'll read everything and reply to stuff tomorrow.

Fanatical is running a Steam Deck games bundle right now. Are any of these games worth the time?

I feel like I've heard good things about Arise, but I'm out of the loop. I don't recognize many of the others by name.

Prices are reasonable, so it's less a question about if it's worth the money, more if its worth the time. (3 for CA$6.79, 5 for CA$9.59, or 8 for CA$13.69)

Terror of Hemasaurus
Jack Move
Garden Story
Castle on the Coast
The Tarnishing of Juxtia
Arise: A Simple Story
Zombie Army Trilogy
Beyond the Long Night
ATONE: Heart of the Elder Tree
The Smurfs - Mission Vileaf
Röki
Home Sweet Home EP2
Hero's Hour
Moonlighter
Pathologic 2

I'm just curious if anyone else tried to get one of the Limited Edition Steam Decks before they sold out. I tried for it (on 3 devices) but kept getting error messages until it sold out. I just ordered the 1 TB edition instead.

This will be my first portable gaming device since the DSi, so I'm really excited for it. Getting the clear LE one would have been cool, but I'm probably better off not spending the extra $40 CAD, lol.

So, what's your Steam Deck situation? Did you try for/get the LE? Do you already have one? Getting one? Don't want one?

All over Twitch, about half the streamers I usually watch playing turn-based strategy games are all suddenly playing the same new game. I watched a few streams, and it looked interesting. Normally, I never buy games when they just come out because I have such a backlog and can wait for a sale, but I figured if everyone (figuratively) is playing it, it must be amazing.

Turns out, they're giving the full game away for free during their "early access" phase as a "demo". But it's the full game, just with only 2 class choices.

I had a blast! And now I'm probably going to buy it on release.

The last time I remember doing this was for Minecraft. I see lots of games doing free weekends on Steam, which is very similar; doesn't work well for me since I only have a few hours for gaming each week, but I imagine that must be successful for a lot of games, too.

What do you think of that business model? And/or, what do you think of Backpack Battles, if you've played it?

There's a big protest being organized across Canada to protest SOGI being taught in schools, and I'm fed up with it. There are so many vulnerable students who need to know that what they're experiencing is normal, and right-wing extremists are politicizing human rights and spreading manufactured controversy about children being shown pornography in schools.

The linked article is just one of many anti-SOGI protests happening across Canada on Wednesday.

Anyway, the reason I bring it up here is that some of these right-wing anti-SOGI [redacted; unkind] are parents of kids in our kids' classes, and a couple of them are close friends with my kids.

How do you handle that? Kids shouldn't be held accountable for their parents' beliefs. But what about playdates and birthday parties and such? Should we discuss the friendship? It feels wrong to ostracize the child. They deserve to feel safe and have friends.

Also, I'm thinking of taking time off work to counter protest, and making a sign like this one:

Not really related to parenting, but I think it's important kids feel supported and bigots are told their archaic world views are unwelcome. It'll be super awkward if a parent I know is standing on the other side of the protest.

My context / use case

I got Fire 7 tablets for my kiddos a few years ago and they're dreadfully slow and can't really run many apps at all. With my daughter needing some educational support at home, I was looking for a cheap replacement that actually had enough power to manage recent education apps, and hopefully be future proof for a while.

Alternatives

The cheapest tablet at Costco.ca, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite, is $500 CAD, has a weak processor, only 4GB RAM, and 64GB storage.

I'll never touch Apple products for a zillion reasons, but cost was completely prohibitive for a device my child could drop any day. Even used ones are insanely priced. And the app ecosystem for education on iOS is almost entirely paid apps, increasingly using a subscription model. (Or so it seems.)

Newer Amazon Fire "HD" tablets suck, too, but at least they're cheap. And they might be powerful enough to run some things? idk. I wasn't enthused.

Then, I thought to check AliExpress and found an 8GB tablet with 128GB storage, a processor better than the S6, and a 2K (1440p) display. After reading reviews to check if it's legit, I ordered one.

Informal Review

The great:

Price/value for the specs. I paid ~$240CAD for a bundle that includes a nice case, screen protector, charging block and cable, and a child-size Bluetooth keyboard. (It doesn't have a digitizer, so I skipped the stylus.)

The good:

The tablet is snappy. The battery lasts a long time. The screen has plenty enough resolution to render everything crisply on a 10.4" display.

It's a perfect tablet for my kids use as an educational tablet. It's great for PDF ebook reading (mostly picture books and early reader chapter books to date, lol!) and has handled all the education/edutainment apps without any slowdowns.

3.5mm jack. 18W fast charging. Build quality feels solid. Well positioned hardware buttons and 3.5mm jack make it easy to use in either orientation. The included case works as an angled stand. SD card slot for expansion. SIM compatible for phone/data.

The bad:

The viewing angle is pretty terrible. It's completely fine for solo use or for applications where colour accuracy isn't important, but it's very noticeable.

The speakers suck. I'm not a sound geek, so I don't know the correct terms, but the sound is muddy and distorted. They also have a fairly low maximum volume, and become increasingly distorted at higher volume. They work well enough, but it's not enjoyable for music. I would definitely use headphones for music/video/games.

I haven't tried the camera at all, but I've heard it's not great. Can't comment on that.

The purchase

The vendor I ordered from (ALLDOCUBE Direct Store) swapped the EU plug for a US plug at no extra cost. It arrived quickly (3 weeks?) from China.

The package arrived with the retail box crushed, so the included screen protector broke. After using it for a day, I decided to buy a second one for my other child, and asked them to include a replacement. Not only did they include a replacement, but they pre-installed the screen protector on tablet #2 so it couldn't break, without my asking them to.

I would recommend the seller, but ask them to pre-install the screen protector (if you plan to use one) so there's less risk of damage in transit.

Discussion

Anyway, not sure if this is the kind of content people want here, but I thought I'd do my part to add something!

Has anyone else experimented with cheap AliExpress/Chinese Android devices?

Based on my success with these, I'm considering getting a phone for my wife there. I'm a bit more worried about data vulnerabilities and software support longevity on a daily driver phone, but it's really hard to find a small quality phone for a reasonable price. Also, it needs to have a good camera or it's a nonstarter.

Do you have any experience or thoughts on this?