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Nvidia submits patches to open source driver

lists.freedesktop.org

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Re: Nvidia submits patches to open source driver

#12
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On a somewhat related (non-mobile) note, I really regret buying my AMD 5870 three years ago. Things have changed quite a bit in that nvidia has done some serious work on their Linux binary drivers, while AMD's has been utterly unimpressive, if not embarrassingly bad. I understand that Linux has been a lesser priority for both companies, which is understandable. It's not going to make them the truckloads of money that…

It has been interesting to watch the effect of Linus telling Nvidia to f*ck off.

As far as DRM-BUF?

Re: Nvidia submits patches to open source driver

#14
post #2

On a somewhat related (non-mobile) note, I really regret buying my AMD 5870 three years ago. Things have changed quite a bit in that nvidia has done some serious work on their Linux binary drivers, while AMD's has been utterly unimpressive, if not embarrassingly bad. I understand that Linux has been a lesser priority for both companies, which is understandable. It's not going to make them the truckloads of money that…

As someone who has bought both brands recently-ish, I have to say I would VASTLY prefer AMD over Nvidia for Linux compatible graphics cards. I found that the community-provided AMD drivers where leagues ahead of Nvidia proprietary and community drivers (in terms of shear usability). Here's a thread where I test my Nvidia 670 and my AMD 6870 in Linux. I explain why I like one over the other: http://www.reddit.com/r/li…

The community drivers are pretty limited if you need to drive more than two monitors or need to work with non-trivial OpenGL applications or games. Neither open source driver has very good power management, either. They both leave a lot to desire.

Re: Nvidia submits patches to open source driver

#15
post #2

On a somewhat related (non-mobile) note, I really regret buying my AMD 5870 three years ago. Things have changed quite a bit in that nvidia has done some serious work on their Linux binary drivers, while AMD's has been utterly unimpressive, if not embarrassingly bad. I understand that Linux has been a lesser priority for both companies, which is understandable. It's not going to make them the truckloads of money that…

Just to be clear you are taking about binary drivers for desktops/laptops and this news is totally about mobile (Tegra). It is commonly agreed upon knowledge that on PC platform ATI's binary drivers suck compared to Nvidia's. However in my experience ATI's GPU docs project plus the resources they invested in getting OSS driver to properly support ATI hardware means that normal users shouldn't really need to install b…

I don't personally use the OSS drivers, so their status doesn't weigh in on the buying decision at all for me. My 5870 is meant to drive up to six monitors, something the OSS drivers can't do right now (I have three).

Re: Nvidia submits patches to open source driver

#17
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Note that this is Tegra related, which might explain their new-found eagerness to help (unlike desktop, they don't fully "own" the mobile high performance chips market yet, and it moves very fast) Still, a great news

in the thread the guy explains that he works @nvidia, but not the GPU desktop BU but for tegra that seems a 'burnt on the chip' of the card minus the pci bus and one clock (memory clock maybe?) (according to what I understand of the source). And he seems to say this division (tegra) does not reflect nvidia global policy. I may have made quite some mistakes in precision, but globally I think that is the idea: this is not nvidia doing

Re: Nvidia submits patches to open source driver

#18
post #3
post #2

On a somewhat related (non-mobile) note, I really regret buying my AMD 5870 three years ago. Things have changed quite a bit in that nvidia has done some serious work on their Linux binary drivers, while AMD's has been utterly unimpressive, if not embarrassingly bad. I understand that Linux has been a lesser priority for both companies, which is understandable. It's not going to make them the truckloads of money that…

It has been interesting to watch the effect of Linus telling Nvidia to f*ck off.

You misspelled "fuck".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dF1NUposXVQ

Re: Nvidia submits patches to open source driver

#19
post #13

Linus approves https://plus.google.com/+LinusTorvalds/posts/TQDXxxr6ixm

Linus: > Hey, this time I'm raising a thumb for nvidia.

Commentor in G+ thread: > They aren't there yet, more middle finger recommended.

A little chuckle to start the day ;-)

Nvidia's Linux support is generally pretty decent these days; however, the one issue that gets the middle digit moving in their direction is power management in a multi-head laptop setup. Ouch, max power = heat = fan noise.

I had to flash the VBIOS in order to force the chip into low power mode (not a gamer, just need to drive multiple displays).

Doesn't help that they remove PM features from anything but their high end chips; have a K2000M here, nvidia-smi shows a bunch of N/A, can't do diddly.

Re: Nvidia submits patches to open source driver

#20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I only have limited experience with AMD chips: helping friends and family get Ubuntu running on their desktops and laptops. I have been sticking to Nvidia for the past 10 years whenever a Linux box is involved. I have to say that while the AMD/ATI OSS drivers do work, getting them working can be an exercise in the mystical arts. The most recent issue was getting my brother's HP laptop to run Ubuntu. The OS installed…

That's odd. What laptop was that? There really shouldn't be any reason for all but newest ATI GPUs to not work out of box. With nvidia the terrible stability and kernel upgrade hassles plus the need to externally install the drivers means it should be much uglier an experience than out of box ATI OSS drivers. Anyway as long as it works...

Never had any stability issues with nVidia drivers personally. As far as installing, I just use the akmod packages from rpmfusion, they take the binaries and package it up for every kernel. When you pull down a kernel update, you also pull down the associated binary drivers. Open source ATI linux drivers might be less install hassle, the problem is they just don't work for anything beyond the most popular cards running 2D graphics on a single monitor.
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