What follows is a guide to installing ZeroTier on the Steam Deck, but this technique can be used to install any software on Steam Deck that is available for Arch Linux 👍️
Virtualized network. Allows other computers to connect to the network and make it look like its in the local network and not outside of it.
Use cases can range from accessing a local device at home, LAN gaming, streaming content remotely from a home server. You could theoretically for example bypass netflix’ sharing block as anyone connecting to the home network would have similar IP and wouldnt get flagged as being in a different region.
ZeroTier is a way to basically create a peer-to-peer VPN of sorts. This is just a blog about how to set that up.
One possible use case for having such a VPN or overlay network is that you can then play LAN games over the Internet because every machine in the ZeroTier VPN is on the same LAN. This is great if a game you play (usually older) does not support Internet play but does support LAN multi-player.
Another possible idea is that you can also use this to stream games from say your desktop computer to your Steam Deck even if you are out of the house (if the machines are on the same ZeroTier network).
An alternative to ZeroTier is Tailscale which would allow you to do basically the same things.
Do you see any benefits in using ZeroTier for game streaming compared to Moonlight/Sunshine? I’m mainly doing this while at home so I don’t have to hide away in my corner to play games.
I use zerotier as a way to connect to my private emulated servers without having to worry about connecting to an external IP address and opening up a ton of ports. Plus if you have a dynamic IP, the address can change. Some people set up a domain name to circumvent the dynamic IP, but it still means you have to port forward. Zerotier solves it via creating a manageable virtual lan network. Think Hamachi.
In my use case, I run a solo EverQuest server emulator, WoW server emulator, City of Heroes, Ultima Online. I simply spin up my virtual machine connected to zerotier then boot up my steam deck. Then I can connect to them while I’m out and about at a hotel, friends place, etc.
It’s lightweight, so not much bloat, does exactly what I need it to do and initializes on startup. Then if you want to disconnect/reconnect, it’s really simple to do. Been using it for about a year now. Zero complaints (no pun intended).
Is this what I think it is? I can sit at my laptop and play games that run on my gaming pc? And it works with Linux host and client? With great performance?
Any notablie differences between Nvidia vs. AMD based GPUs? I’ve read that Nvidia cards can struggle on Linux with certain software. If there aren’t any notable problems I will probably try Linux everywhere.
Sounds good. My gaming pc needed a complete blowout anyway so I’m trying to convert to Linux as we speak. A lot to learn. But it feels manageable and not as overwhelming anymore.
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