Testing 65 Different GPUs On Linux With Open Source Drivers 134
An anonymous reader writes "How good are open source graphics drivers in 2014 given all the Linux gaming and desktop attention? Phoronix has tested 65 different GPUs using the latest open source drivers covering Intel HD Graphics, NVIDIA GeForce, AMD Radeon, and AMD FirePro hardware. Of the 65 GPUs tested, only 50 of them had good enough open source driver support for running OpenGL games and benchmarks. Across the NVIDIA and AMD hardware were several pages of caveats with different driver issues encountered on Linux 3.15 and Mesa 10.3 loaded on Ubuntu 14.04. Intel graphics on Linux were reliable but slow while AMD's open-source Linux support was recommended over the NVIDIA support that doesn't currently allow for suitable graphics card re-clocking. Similar tests are now being done with the proprietary Linux drivers."
ARE YOU FREAKIN' KIDDING?!!! (Score:0, Insightful)
As a notice before getting started, if you appreciate all of this extensive Linux hardware testing done exclusively at Phoronix, please consider subscribing to Phoronix Premium. Premium subscribers are able to view the site ad-free, view multi-page articles on a single page, and it goes to support the site. At the very least, due to the vast amount of time I single-handedly invest into the site, please don't use AdBlock for Phoronix.com.
THIRTEEN page clicks and no Print option?
FUCK YOU.
AMD Open Source (Score:4, Insightful)
I have an old Radeon X1950PRO in guest/spare PC. While it's getting long in the tooth it's still good enough for some Star Craft 2 and Dota 2 action with friends. Unfortunately I have to boot to windows 7 to get decent performance. The kernel devs are always changing the driver interface, so the last time I was able to use the proprietary drivers was around Ubuntu 6. Now in Linux my only option are buggy, glitch drivers like Phoronix described in their drivers or booting to Windows. The hardware specs were released. Now if after 8 year, the open source drivers are still buggy and slow, they will never be as good as the proprietary. What Linux needs a stable driver interface like Windows has.
Re:AMD Open Source (Score:5, Insightful)
What Linux needs a stable driver interface like Windows has.
Windows does not have a stable driver interface. What windows does have is the market share necessary to not suffer too much when the interface changes.
In any event its inexcusable in both cases to ever undergo more than 1 driver interface change per architecture. I get it.. at first you do something that works but later the design proves inadequate, so the second time around it should be designed right. Pick an ABI and stick with it, and design to be extensible.
Re:Linux and the Office Max/Staples Test. (Score:4, Insightful)
Being that your computer is down, you are unable to research what you should get
This was true for me in the 90s In 2014 I probably have 10 different internet devices in the house between consoles, phones, tablets, laptops, etc. Sure I'm on the high side of things, but even my parents on both sides have at least 4-5 devices each. My 80 year old grandmother I think might have just one... but she's not going to be researching hardware for her linux desktop build by herself either.
Who today is a linux enthusiast and would really not have any internet access if their computer went down because they only have one device that can browse the internet?
I disable AdBlock for no-one (Score:1, Insightful)
These people would do as well to stand on a soap box on a public street corner to engage in gifted oration, then hand out leaflets to the crowd suggesting that people express their support and appreciation by signing up for a no-cost-to-your-pocket-book alcohol tolerance study at the local university (to more precisely characterize the vomit threshold for the advancement of medical science) , for which the orator himself receives a small referral fee.
Advertising, much like alcohol, is hardly known as a tonic to clarity of mind. I'll pass, thank you very much. I've far in extreme of the Mormons on the issue of what passes into my brain through my eye sockets. Alcohol only makes me vulnerable to the lizard housed within (he's not so bad, really, once you stare him down). Advertising, on the other hand, exposes me to spitting cobra exotoxins. The dead giveaway is the spinning iris of seduction: animated GIFs, Flash-based logo rotations, pop-ups, pop-overs, all resembling nothing so much as a vulture with the twitching tail of a live and highly agitated squirrel shit to the ischium out of the vulture's ass.
Shall I welcome this bubonic creature to peck at my eyeballs from the side of my screen? Even for "Four score and twenty" or "I have a dream"?
Nah. I don't think so. Not unless I've got a bag full of Shuriken ice picks and it's somebody else's HD monitor.
Let me turn you onto something BETTER (Score:0, Insightful)
By FAR & on multiple levels in efficiency, speed, security, + reliability:
APK Hosts File Engine 9.0++ 32/64-bit:
http://start64.com/index.php?o... [start64.com]
(Details of hosts' benefits enumerated in link)
Summary:
---
A. ) Hosts do more than AdBlock ("souled-out" 2 Google/Crippled by default) + Ghostery (Advertiser owned) - "Fox guards henhouse", or Request Policy -> http://yro.slashdot.org/commen... [slashdot.org]
B. ) Hosts add reliability vs. downed or redirected DNS + secure vs. known malicious domains too -> http://tech.slashdot.org/comme... [slashdot.org] w/ less added "moving parts" complexity + room 4 breakdown,
C. ) Hosts files yield more speed (blocks ads & hardcodes fav sites - faster than remote DNS), security (vs. malicious domains serving mal-content + block spam/phish & trackers), reliability (vs. downed or Kaminsky redirect vulnerable DNS, 99% = unpatched vs. it & worst @ ISP level + weak vs FastFlux + DynDNS botnets), & anonymity (vs. dns request logs + DNSBL's).
---
Hosts do more w/ less (1 file) @ a faster level (ring 0) vs redundant browser addons (slowing up slower ring 3 browsers) via filtering 4 the IP stack (coded in C, loads w/ OS, & 1st net resolver queried w\ 45++ yrs.of optimization).
* Addons are more complex + slowup browsers & in message passing (use a few concurrently - you'll see)
** Addons slowdown SLOWER usermode browsers layering on MORE - & bloating memory consumption too + hugely excessive CPU usage (4++gb extra in FireFox https://blog.mozilla.org/nneth... [mozilla.org])
SO - Instead, I work w/ what you have in kernelmode, via hosts (A tightly integrated PART of the IP stack itself)
APK
P.S.=> "The premise is, quite simple: Take something designed by nature & reprogram it to make it work FOR the body, rather than against it..." - Dr. Alice Krippen "I AM LEGEND"
...apk