CachyOS: Fast and Customizable Linux Distribution

Original Article ↗ Hacker News Discussion ↗

Role of Gaming/Performance Distros

  • Debate over whether “gaming distros” are necessary vs just fixing base distros.
  • Pro side: they ship codecs, proprietary firmware/drivers (especially Nvidia and game controllers), tuned kernels, up-to-date Mesa, preconfigured Proton/Steam Big Picture, and sane defaults so non‑tinkerers can game without wiki-diving.
  • Skeptic side: any useful patches should go upstream; these spins are hype/memes that repackage Arch/Fedora/Debian, add fragility, and fragment support.

CachyOS Features and Optimizations

  • Arch-based with heavy emphasis on performance: custom linux-cachyos kernel, BORE and other schedulers (including BPF-based), optional -rt kernels, and tuned I/O schedulers.
  • Rebuilds packages (and kernel) for modern CPU instruction sets (x86‑64‑v3+), trading compatibility with older CPUs for lower latency and small speedups.
  • Offers an online installer with many choices (DE, filesystem including Btrfs/ZFS, bootloader), plus helpers for one-click gaming stacks and alternative kernels, and a detailed wiki.
  • Kernel and repo tweaks are also available standalone for Arch, Gentoo (overlay), and Fedora (COPR).

Performance and Stability Reports

  • Many users report noticeably snappier UI, smoother gaming, better frame-time stability under load, and “Windows‑parity” gaming performance; some claim 10–15% improvements in number-heavy workloads.
  • Others see only marginal gains vs vanilla Arch or Fedora, or view benchmark deltas as trading throughput for latency.
  • Several long-term daily-driver reports (including Nvidia setups) describe it as very stable, surviving large update gaps and heavy use.
  • Counterexamples: broken i3 flavor due to stale AUR dependency, sleep issues on some hardware/DE combos, and at least one recent update window that temporarily produced unbootable systems.

Rolling Release vs LTS and “Meme Distro” Debate

  • Arch/Cachy defenders argue rolling updates with small changes are more reliable than disruptive dist-upgrades; many compare favorably to Ubuntu/Fedora upgrade pain.
  • Critics contend rolling models are inherently less stable and smaller Arch derivatives lack support, making them poor choices for newcomers; recommend mainstream LTS distros instead.
  • Others reply that such “boutique” distros are valuable on‑ramps with better defaults and branding, and can help test patches that later land upstream.

Other Themes

  • Wayland vs X11 friction appears via broken tiling-WM/i3 setups; some see X11 WMs bit‑rotting, others blame Wayland and project governance.
  • Interest in ARM/Apple Silicon support exists but is gated on Arch’s own porting effort.
  • Some express supply‑chain and geopolitical concerns about small or Russia‑linked projects, suggesting reproducible builds and maintainer transparency as mitigations.