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Nouveau In Linux 3.10 Kernel Isn't Too Exciting

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  • Nouveau In Linux 3.10 Kernel Isn't Too Exciting

    Phoronix: Nouveau In Linux 3.10 Kernel Isn't Too Exciting

    The pull request for the open-source NVIDIA "Nouveau" Linux graphics driver for the Linux 3.10 kernel has been submitted to the DRM subsystem maintainer. While Nouveau has many shortcomings against the official NVIDIA Linux graphics driver, there isn't much to get excited about with this new kernel driver update...

    Phoronix, Linux Hardware Reviews, Linux hardware benchmarks, Linux server benchmarks, Linux benchmarking, Desktop Linux, Linux performance, Open Source graphics, Linux How To, Ubuntu benchmarks, Ubuntu hardware, Phoronix Test Suite

  • #2
    I love the concept of open source video drivers, but the performance of the nouveau driver is so horrendous I don't plan on using it anytime soon, even for my workstation. Why does anyone actually use it over the proprietary nvidia drivers, other then if you have extremely old hardware?

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    • #3
      Originally posted by enfocomp View Post
      I love the concept of open source video drivers, but the performance of the nouveau driver is so horrendous I don't plan on using it anytime soon, even for my workstation. Why does anyone actually use it over the proprietary nvidia drivers, other then if you have extremely old hardware?
      Everybody, always, apart from VM situations.


      Basically when you start any fresh Linux Distro, you have Vesa or Nouveau as choice. Second if works is always better than first.
      So unless you are helping in Nouveau development, its just very good Nvidia binary blob downloader (rephrasing IE saying..)
      And maybe it had better Optimus support. Now that Nvidia added something like it in their drivers? Michael should test power consumption of both.

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      • #4
        I actually prefer Nouveau over the binary blob for general day-to-day use.

        I am not a gamer so I don't care much about gaming performance. I do care about stability and compositing desktops, two areas where Nouveau excels. The binary blob is simply not as stable. Every time I installed the binary blob (for example, in order to get accelerated video) I ended up removing it and going back to the open source driver.

        The mere existence of open source video drivers is pretty exciting. When their performance gets more-or-less on par with proprietary drivers we will get the best of all worlds.

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        • #5
          Originally posted by amehaye View Post
          I actually prefer Nouveau over the binary blob for general day-to-day use.

          I am not a gamer so I don't care much about gaming performance. I do care about stability and compositing desktops, two areas where Nouveau excels. The binary blob is simply not as stable. Every time I installed the binary blob (for example, in order to get accelerated video) I ended up removing it and going back to the open source driver.

          The mere existence of open source video drivers is pretty exciting. When their performance gets more-or-less on par with proprietary drivers we will get the best of all worlds.
          Yeah, I've had a decent experience with Nouveau on my laptop which i only use very lightly and never for gaming. It can composite the desktop, play videos, and browse the web, which is all i need it to do, so there's no real point in downloading a big blob driver. I wouldn't use it on my main system, though.

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          • #6
            Originally posted by enfocomp View Post
            I love the concept of open source video drivers, but the performance of the nouveau driver is so horrendous I don't plan on using it anytime soon, even for my workstation. Why does anyone actually use it over the proprietary nvidia drivers, other then if you have extremely old hardware?
            Nouveau comes by default, is better integrated with the kernel and Xorg stack, is more stable, supports more hardware and has some additional features like KMS and perhaps most importantly, developed and supported by a broader community. Unless you need that extra speed for gaming or whatever, the proprietary driver offers no real advantage and even in that area, the open source drivers are getting better incrementally.

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            • #7
              Nouveau isn't there yet, but it's coming along nicely. Once there is proper reclocking support it should be able to get up to the 50-75% range at least. I personally just like playing around with open source software, and testing this stuff out. It's so easy to do with Gentoo at least.

              I also have an AMD Trinity laptop and the open source drivers are mostly good enough with performance for the things I want to do, and they are FAR more stable than fglrx. I've yet to have my system hang from the open source drivers, but it happens all the time with fglrx. It's also actually more compatible in some areas. E.g. I can run PCSX2 with the DX renderer under wine with the open source drivers, but not with fglrx. This was also true in the past for nouveau vs the binary nvidia drivers, although it was fixed eventually. There are other areas where fglrx is better supported of course, but it's still nice.

              Finally I can't speak for xvba over vaapi because I never bothered with it, but VDPAU on the open source drivers mostly works great. I.e accellerated flash does actually work, which is something I could never get to work with the nvidia binary drivers. There is still some stability issues on some sites when going full screen, but it mostly works well enough.

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              • #8
                Well, this deserves a bit of excitement, at least for me (nVIDIA ION user)...

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