À PROPOS DE CET ÉPISODE
It started with a broken VR headset. It ended with a clean Linux install, an encrypted drive, and a PowerShell script with a two-line README whose name we probably shouldn’t repeat here.
This week, Matt walks Liam through the years-long saga that finally pushed him off Windows for good — a story that winds through faulty GPUs, crypto mining, second-hand warranties, a brand new Lenovo Legion, and a pre-bundled audio driver that behaves, in Matt’s words, exactly like a rootkit.
We cover:
- The state of VR in 2026 — Valve’s Steam Frame announcement, what Meta is actually doing (and what they’re not), and why the Linux VR gaming community is more viable than you might think
- The NAHIMIC driver saga: an OEM-bundled audio tool that installs itself into System32, survives clean Windows installs via Windows Update, deletes group policies to reinstall itself, and causes random system crashes — and what it actually took to get rid of it
- The privacy concerns around Meta Ray-Bans, and why the “surprise Pikachu face” reaction might be a little unwarranted
- Why Matt chose Arch-based CachyOS over boring, stable Debian — and what happened next
- Running local LLMs on Windows vs Linux, and why the Mac still punches above its weight
- How the Steam Deck quietly changed the Linux gaming landscape, and why the Steam Frame matters beyond just VR
- Avalonia’s Linux backend for .NET MAUI — write once, run on the desktop on Linux
No tidy resolution. No regrets. Just a stable machine, encrypted drives, working VR, and the quiet satisfaction of knowing NAHIMIC is never coming back.
🍻 Tonight’s Drinks
Matt – Aldi Scotch Liam – Archie Rose
🔗 Links from the Episode
- Playnite — open source game library launcher (WPF, free)
- playnite.link/nahimic-sucks — the Playnite team’s take on NAHIMIC
- Volute — the company behind NAHIMIC
- CachyOS — the Arch-based Linux distro Matt landed on
- Framework Laptop 16 — the repairability-first option Matt wanted but couldn’t quite justify
- Tailscale — the VPN Matt used to remote into his home machine
- Avalonia for .NET MAUI on Linux — .NET MAUI apps on the Linux desktop
- Valve Steam Frame — Valve’s upcoming standalone VR headset (check for latest)
- Matt’s NAHIMIC removal script on GitHub
Any 👍 Likes, 📣 Shares, 🔔 Subscriptions, and ❤️ Love go a long way to helping us keep doing this for fun.
Cheers! 🍻
Anglais
États-Unis
contenu explicite
TRANSCRIPTION 🔗
Are you the producer of this podcast?
Add a podcast transcript
Need Audio-to-Text?
Transcribe with Listen411 in Just 60 Seconds
RECHERCHER LES ÉPISODES PASSÉS
Rechercher les épisodes précédents de The Beer Driven Devs.
AUTRES ÉPISODES DANS CE PODCAST
Last week we talked about bespoke software and whether it has to be out of reach for smaller businesses. This week we pick up the thread we deliberately put a pin in: what even is enterprise — and do you actually need it?
Spoiler: probably not as much of it as you’ve been quoted for.
The co…
First things first: an apology. After three-plus years and 73 episodes without missing a drop, we finally missed one. Turns out even the Beer Driven Devs need a break sometimes.
Refreshed and back at the mics, Matt goes full tech historian this week. While researching a long-form essay for his blo…
Matt’s back from /NEW Conference in Newcastle and has a lot to unpack. Liam missed out this year, so this episode is a whistle-stop debrief of the highlights: talks, panels, stickers, and a few recurring themes that kept surfacing across the two days.
The conference theme was Human in the Lo…
We promised we weren’t a political podcast, but here we are.
This week Matt drags Liam through the tangled history that led us to EuroOffice, the EU-driven scramble to build a homegrown alternative to Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace. It’s a story that starts in 2008, runs through Ir…
This week Matt and Liam pull at a thread they’ve been circling for a while: the idea that bespoke software is too expensive, too risky, and only really viable for the big end of town.
It’s a myth. And once you start poking it, it falls apart in several directions at once.
Liam comes a…
Avertissement: Le podcast et les illustrations intégrés sur cette page proviennent de Matt Goldman & Liam Elliott, qui est la propriété de son propriétaire et n'est ni affilié ni approuvé par Listen Notes, Inc.
MODIFIER
Merci de nous avoir aidé à tenir la base de données de podcasts à jour.
