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OpenGL 3.1 on Asahi Linux

asahilinux.org

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Re: OpenGL 3.1 on Asahi Linux

#31

Post by jacquesm »

JCWasmx86 wrote: post #30
kytazo wrote: post #3

Its been more than a year I'm running asahi on my macbook air and I can't stress how grateful I feel for enjoying such wonderful freedom. I don't feel like ever going back to x86 to be honest, at this point there is nothing lacking or unable to run and when the neural engine drivers come online now that the GPU is starting to mature people will be able to juice out every last bit of computation this machine is capabl…

Would you say buying e.g. a Mac mini for 2.3k€ just to run Asahi Linux is worth it?

Not the OP but I got a 13" and a larger model Mac of the x86 variety when they were still reasonably young and even though I eventually got all of the bits and pieces to work it usually pays off to wait until a somewhat larger distro supports the hardware as well. That way you benefit from a much larger crowd of testers and once they have no more issues you should be good to go.

Moneywise it was definitely worth it, both machines are still working many years later and have been pretty much trouble free after the initial bugs were ironed out.

If I was in the market for a new laptop right now I'd wait for a bit and then pull the trigger on the latest model with broad support.

Re: OpenGL 3.1 on Asahi Linux

#32

Post by Timon3 »

viraptor wrote: post #12
nightski wrote: post #4

This is great work and I commend it. But in other threads people are acting like Asahi Linux hardware support is 100% complete. My fear is that if I were to go this route and purchase the hardware I'd be seeing fraction of the performance and capability I would in Mac OS. To be honest this blog post seems like the project has a long ways to go, not that it is nearly completion. I just can't justify buying hardware fr…

> I'd be seeing fraction of the performance and capability You'd temporarily lose some hardware support (documented) while it's being worked on. But I'm not sure why you expect losing performance? This is running native code. Same binary will run the same on both systems (+/- the llvm version differences).

Does the CPU run at similar frequencies between Mac OS and Linux (since they're writing their own drivers this isn't guaranteed)? Is the scheduling done similarly? Are there any special hardware modes you have to activate with e.g. binary blobs?

There are a bunch of factors that could affect performance even under the same OS (try underclocking your CPU or play around with schedulers). Given the mostly non-existent documentation from Apple I'd strongly suspect that average-case performance will stay worse on the Linux side for a long time.

Re: OpenGL 3.1 on Asahi Linux

#33

Post by rowanG077 »

zamadatix wrote: post #19
viraptor wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd be seeing fraction of the performance and capability You'd temporarily lose some hardware support (documented) while it's being worked on. But I'm not sure why you expect losing performance? This is running native code. Same binary will run the same on both systems (+/- the llvm version differences).

E.g. the performance you can get out of the GPU at the moment is a subset of what you can get out of the hardware. Or as another more generic example, until this latest release CPU boost states weren't enabled due to lack of proper cpuidle driver which resulted in regressed single thread performance. There is nothing inherent about running Linux that will require it be slower, in some cases it will/is even faster, bu…

Even with the regressed performance it beat osx in a ton of workloads.

Re: OpenGL 3.1 on Asahi Linux

#34

Post by GeekyBear »

nightski wrote: post #4

This is great work and I commend it. But in other threads people are acting like Asahi Linux hardware support is 100% complete. My fear is that if I were to go this route and purchase the hardware I'd be seeing fraction of the performance and capability I would in Mac OS. To be honest this blog post seems like the project has a long ways to go, not that it is nearly completion. I just can't justify buying hardware fr…

You don't create a new bootloader that allows users the freedom to run an unsigned third party OS without having it degrade the system's security if and when they boot the native OS because you are "hostile to developers and hackers".

Re: OpenGL 3.1 on Asahi Linux

#35

Post by jb1991 »

JCWasmx86 wrote: post #30
kytazo wrote: post #3

Its been more than a year I'm running asahi on my macbook air and I can't stress how grateful I feel for enjoying such wonderful freedom. I don't feel like ever going back to x86 to be honest, at this point there is nothing lacking or unable to run and when the neural engine drivers come online now that the GPU is starting to mature people will be able to juice out every last bit of computation this machine is capabl…

Would you say buying e.g. a Mac mini for 2.3k€ just to run Asahi Linux is worth it?

I’ve owned both windows and Apple computers, quite many of them, over the last 20 years. On average, the Apple machines last at least twice as long as the windows machines while still being fully usable. One could argue just based on that basic math that they are worth twice the price.

Re: OpenGL 3.1 on Asahi Linux

#36

Post by kytazo »

smoldesu wrote: post #16
rollcat wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I just can't justify buying hardware from a company that is so hostile to developers and hackers as nice as it may be. I don't think it's hostile, I think they're just hands-off; they throw the hardware over the fence and say, "if you wanna make use of it, here's our software; if you don't like our software, sorry no docs but you're free to write your own". Which is exactly what's happening. I mean it would be nice…

There's a line somewhere, and I think it's different for every person. For a lot of people, the pricing itself is just outright hostile. 8gb of RAM in a base model Mac is not future-proofed in an age of local AI models, and paying to upgrade it gets expensive, fast. For others the OS is hostile when it unceremoniously drops support for $THING they use, or because it has the gall to show them ads. For others yet, the…

Well overall if you sum up what even a basic m1 mb air packs, be it the panel, quality peripherals and soc itself its rather reasonable and within reach for almost anyone contemplating of buying a new computer. When you factor in that they were the first ones with an actual capable desktop arm offer I'd even say its cheap.

At least this is how I felt 2 years ago back when I bought it and more or less even to this day. I'm wondering how is the market as of now, two years later, and how the $1k arm laptops coming out today compare.

Re: OpenGL 3.1 on Asahi Linux

#37

Post by samwillis »

School-Cotton wrote: post #25
samwillis wrote: post #2

The work of the Asahi team is incredible, and so much fun to watch unfold. I wander if now that you can get a rack mount Mac Pro with Apple Silicon (launched yesterday, the second coming of XServe), running server workloads on them with Asahi Linux becomes a viable route for some people?

FYI it's silicon, not silicone. Silicone is a type of rubber.

The curse of Dyslexia and crap Apple spell check.

Re: OpenGL 3.1 on Asahi Linux

#38

Post by kytazo »

zamadatix wrote: post #19
viraptor wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd be seeing fraction of the performance and capability You'd temporarily lose some hardware support (documented) while it's being worked on. But I'm not sure why you expect losing performance? This is running native code. Same binary will run the same on both systems (+/- the llvm version differences).

E.g. the performance you can get out of the GPU at the moment is a subset of what you can get out of the hardware. Or as another more generic example, until this latest release CPU boost states weren't enabled due to lack of proper cpuidle driver which resulted in regressed single thread performance. There is nothing inherent about running Linux that will require it be slower, in some cases it will/is even faster, bu…

CPU wise at least its been on par if not better from its first days. At least this is what the various benchmarks at the time showed.

Makes you wonder about how the rest of the system components will compare when they're finished.

Re: OpenGL 3.1 on Asahi Linux

#39

Post by jb1991 »

nightski wrote: post #4

This is great work and I commend it. But in other threads people are acting like Asahi Linux hardware support is 100% complete. My fear is that if I were to go this route and purchase the hardware I'd be seeing fraction of the performance and capability I would in Mac OS. To be honest this blog post seems like the project has a long ways to go, not that it is nearly completion. I just can't justify buying hardware fr…

There have been multiple reports of the last couple years that Apple has been informally internally helping the Asahi Linux team to make it run well on their hardware. Apple cannot come out and officially support another operating system of course, but they are aware of the interest and are helping make it happen, in an unofficial capacity.

Re: OpenGL 3.1 on Asahi Linux

#40

Post by kytazo »

JCWasmx86 wrote: post #30
kytazo wrote: post #3

Its been more than a year I'm running asahi on my macbook air and I can't stress how grateful I feel for enjoying such wonderful freedom. I don't feel like ever going back to x86 to be honest, at this point there is nothing lacking or unable to run and when the neural engine drivers come online now that the GPU is starting to mature people will be able to juice out every last bit of computation this machine is capabl…

Would you say buying e.g. a Mac mini for 2.3k€ just to run Asahi Linux is worth it?

You can get a used M1 mini for more or less 400€. Get a glimpse of whats going on in your local facebook marketplace, most likely you'll come up with nice offers.
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