Hi guys.
Just started looking at using Linux on my main pc. I don’t use it too often these days but I like to play around with my pc.
I tried Fedora and it seems fine. I chose Fedora 41 as I wanted to have working Nvidia drivers and secure boot. Got that working but then I tried to use my wireless Xbox series X controller and had no luck getting it working. I tried to install xone but was getting errors.
I’ve tried Ubuntu is the past but just wasn’t to my liking. Linux mint was ok but didn’t like the available desktop environments.
I know Nobara is available, but I’d prefer to have something minimal and be able to configure everything myself to my liking.
I’m not so fussed about which distro. Can anyone recommend something that works with: Nvidia drivers Secure boot xone (or something else)
I like the gnome desktop environment.
Thanks. ☮️❤️
You install the xone driver and distro doesn’t matter. Can confirm it works with my Xbox wireless adapter.
I couldn’t get that working on Fedora 41. Which distro do you use? Thanks
Maintainer has been absent for some time so kernel v6.11 and v6.12 isn’t supported OOTB, to get it to work with kernel v6.11 you need to pull the fix from: !48
Or install the working fork instead: https://github.com/dlundqvist/xone
Thanks! The error I was getting did mention the kernel.
I got it working on LMDE6. If you are using secure boot you may need to mess around with that.
I install it from AUR on EndeavourOS
Have you tried CachyOS? I’ve been considering 1 of these 2. Was leaning more to Cachy.
Short: xone driver fork
Long:
I use Xbox controllers for years on Linux. And my current one is Xbox One S controller with the official Microsoft dongle (not Bluetooth, but the proprietary connection). Linux does not support this driver, but there is a community driver: https://github.com/medusalix/xone And for whatever reason the newest Linux Kernel 6.11 and upwards broke this driver. That means this driver does not work on Linux Kernel 6.11 or newer, until it is patched. And I believe Fedora 41 ships with 6.11. But wait! There is an alternative fork that fixed the driver: https://github.com/dlundqvist/xone You only need to install this one.
Why is it that complicated in Linux? That’s because the Microsoft driver and dongle are proprietary and do not provide an official driver for Linux. Look it this way instead being complicated: It still works, because of the awesome community! Some people prefer using the Bluetooth connection. I personally don’t like Bluetooth in general for any device. So cannot assist with that.
EDIT: Alternative way with xpadneo. Apparently this works too with the official wireless dongle from Microsoft: https://beehaw.org/comment/4056781 The installation might be more involved.
Somebody else mentioned a working fork too. Thanks.
Fedora 41 works with nvidia and secure boot. For your controller take a look at Xpadneo works fine with the wireless controller ☺️
Oh nice. Thanks. Which desktop environment did you go with?
Hi, I’m hijacking this thread to answer your other questions. Xpadneo is the correct answer, it will work with any desktop environment (xorg or Wayland) and all reasonable distros. It’s also the driver used by the steam deck, so go with that. But I suggest you read the troubleshooting section for two things: fixing input latency (if you experience it) and secure boot (more on that later).
I use both KDE and GNOME (on different computers, for different reasons), but in general I suggest you use KDE.
Now I will explain secure boot:
You can use third party drivers with secure boot on any distro that supports secure boot. Here’s how it works. Secure boot means that the bios checks that the kernel and requires that the kernel checks that all kernel drivers are signed with a key that it recognizes.
Now, either using a second bootloader (like redhat’s shim) signed by Microsoft, or either directly getting Microsoft’s signature, you get secure boot support on distros like Fedora or Ubuntu. So your kernel and all your included drivers are signed by Fedora with a key they got from Microsoft.
Other drivers (like Nvidia’s and this) aren’t signed, so secure boot will not accept those. But, secure but supports MOKs (machine owner keys), which are keys for signing drivers that you manage yourself and you installed on your bios, and secure boot will accept drivers signed with those.
Now, external drivers can be installed using two systems: akmod (used mostly by Fedora and redhat derivatives) and dkms (used by anyone else). These two are not in conflict and will work on the same system at the same time, it’s just preference. The Nvidia drivers you installed used akmod, xpadneo uses dkms.
Both these systems support setting up a key for signing, you should then register that key on your bios. When you installed your Nvidia drivers a little interface made by Fedora for those drivers helped you to set up your key for akmods, and now you can use any akmod driver with secure boot. You could always do it manually and you can do it on any distro, Fedora just adds the graphical interface.
To use xpadneo you need to do basically the same thing but for dkms, and you need to do it manually, it’s very easy, the troubleshooting section should direct you here for instructions, you will recognize some of the steps of registering the key.
If you feel a little adventurous, you can find which key akmod uses, and set dkms to use the same, so you don’t need to register another one.
Also, I strongly discourage this, but you can technically remove Microsoft’s key and sign everything with your own key if you really hate Microsoft. Please please please don’t do it, you will screw up and break your system badly, and it’s also a lot of work. Places like datacenters and such do this. Because they want total control on what goes on those machines. Also they don’t sign stuff on the machine themselves, but they sign on a more secure one and then deploy the signed stuff.
Looks like xpadneo is Bluetooth only at the moment. I enrolled the mok for akmod. I’ll look at doing it for dkms too as xone uses that too.
Why do you suggest KDE?
GNOME tries to set a high standard of polishedness, look-and-feel, and simplicity of design. This is not wrong and makes GNOME good looking and easy to use for a less savvy user. But this has some drawbacks.
For a more savvy user that knows what he wants to do, the simplistic interface gets in the way and wastes time. In contrast KDE Will hold your hand less, and get less in your way. Though, when you drop these requirements GNOME becomes very pleasant to use, especially on laptops, which is why I use it on my laptop.
Another drawback is that GNOME developers will not ship something that doesn’t fig their standards of usability. This adds to the polishing, but it means you will miss out on features, for reasons like “the options in the settings would be confusing for the users” until they are satisfied. E.G.: fractional scaling and vrr. On the other hand, KDE Will ship things that are less polished, but at least you have it.
Also some applications will work suboptimally on GNOME with Wayland, because of client side decorations.
I prefer KDE since a started with Linux
Xpadneo only supports Bluetooth, not the official wireless adapter.
It works very well with the wireless adapter, see this comment for a great long explanation
Are you sure we are talking about the same thing. I’m not talking about an universal Bluetooth adapter? The official Wireless Adapter from Microsoft uses a proprietary driver. Xpadneo supports only Bluetooth (as stated in the Github, unless I misunderstand something). To use the official Microsoft dongle xone is needed. The Xbox One S controller supports both, Bluetooth and Proprietary drivers.
Yes the official wireless adapter from Microsoft. Xpadneo makes it work with Linux, you can fully use the controller with the original wireless adapter. Only audio is not working
My Xbox One wireless adapter works great on Debian, with xpadneo
Thanks. Will look at xpadneo.
I am on Fedora as well and have used the microsoft wireless dongle with the medisalix/xone kernel module in the past, but i stopped using it since it had me pull and plug the dongle once every while to make it work again.
Nowadays i just use bluetooth (with my xbox one and xbox series x controller). You actually don’t need any additional packages for that. Three things to consider about this:
- You possibly have to upgrade the controller firmware with an atrocious app on a windows machine
- pairing is a nightmare (needed an hour for one controller always trying until the pairing completed)
- You need to set some bluetooth settings in a config file for Bluetooth LE timings since the microsoft team thought it would be funny to not let the controller advertise the right configurations.
All that said, once paired and configured it just works ™. Feel free to reach out if you need further information.
SteamOS is compatible with fuckloads of gamepads and gaming peripherals from JoyCons (+ Gyros) to Airpods (Mode switching etc). It might not be best for the custom hardware though.
Bazzite, perhaps? I don’t have the dongle but all of my controllers have worked with it out of the box and I have a couple weird ones. It’s gaming focused so you might have some luck with it.
Also as others have said: xone.
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Garuda comes Nvidia ready out of the box
Arch seems like it would probably be one of the best distros to pick for gaming because of Valve’s use and support of it for the Steam Deck. I can’t answer the specific question
It involves a lot of self-setup and management. A lot of the benefits of Valve working on Arch will find their way to upstream and then to other distros, so that benefit is likely very small.
Happy to try an Arch based distro if it meets my needs. I have Cachyos downloaded but not looked into it yet.
I use CachyOS and it works great for my gaming needs. I use a PS4 controller on it just fine, no clue about the newer XBOX controllers, but I don’t see why they wouldn’t.
What’s the advantage of using the wireless adapter over bluetooth for the controller?
I get a little bit of interference using Bluetooth every now and then that I never have using the wireless adapter. It isn’t very often though.
Do you use a USB bluetooth adapter? If so, try to use a very short USB A to USB A cable, it gets rid of most 2.4 GHz interference.
