7.12 - speculation time...

[Svartalf]

There's nothing more irritating than having some jerk on a forum snidely drop the "go buy an Nvidia card" comment every time someone has an ATI-related graphics problem.

It may be irritating to you, but it's still a valid comment, whether you're able to act upon it or not.

YOU (and for that matter, I) may not be able to do anything of the sort for now on some of our machines, but getting all bent out of shape is as sophomoric as the people you're labeling "sophomoric", unfortunately.

Well, news flash... there are a huge number of people running an ATI/Linux combo on a LAPTOP.

Here's another news flash... When you bought the laptop, you had to have known issues were present with the ATI support and bought anyway- either because you expected them to get it straightened out (Myself, for example...) or expect the open source drivers to fix the mess this stuff's in. Unfortunately, the drivers never were all that great. They ALWAYS have had crippling problems with the drivers, especially with the laptop parts. Hypermemory not working right being one of them. Overall performance being another one. Even now, it seems they have a mixed bag with the performance problems- something that actually could be helped out by them running Oprofile on the offending stuff while the driver with symbols not stripped out is running.

You're suggesting that all of these people throw their whole PC away and get something else, because there are bugs in a driver?

Depends on what you're needing.

If you're willing to wait (and wait, and wait...) for the stuff to gel, or don't have budget to buy a new machine, yes, you'll need to just wait. If you've got budget and are unable or unwilling to wait (I had budget and COULDN'T wait...) you honestly need to evaluate your answer and buy accordingly. I bought an NVidia GPU based laptop as the answer. And, for desktop users, it's even less of a big issue- it's all hinging on budget.

I can't, in all conscience, tell someone to wait unless that's all they have at their disposal. If you've got the choice to change, then NVidia followed by Intel is your only good choices right at the moment. Perhaps 7.12 will resolve some of these issues- I'm hopeful, but I'm not betting on it.

Never mistake my comments as being "buy an NVidia, tee hee, hee..." as you put it. It's the statement of grim reality here that I make. You'll note that I'm in here trying to get them to fix things and off and on offering insight or encouragement. That's because I, too have ATI hardware, even in laptops.

But, I can't be honestly doing what you're doing or what several others have resorted to (Telling someone "GTFO" is very, very sophomoric...) either.

Especially in light of embarassing things like that memory leak that is spawned with one of the simplest OpenGL apps on Linux.

[Draku]

Like always, I am not permitted to discuss upcoming activities unless otherwise specified. Though if you pay attention to Phorogit, the catalyst-7.12 merge window is closing.

What's the big secret around ati driver anyway. What is wrong with answering a simple question like : It's fixing the AGP problem ? with yes or no. Or maybe the right answear will be : We don't know will have to wait for the users to test and see...

The real problem i think r the beta testers like you Michael who own only PCI-E cards so from my point of view you can't help ati fixing the AGP Issues because your feedback will not include our problems. And if the other beta testers r like you our problem will never be resolved...

We don't care if the driver works 100x faster if on our hardware don't work.

[Michael]

What's the big secret around ati driver anyway. What is wrong with answering a simple question like : It's fixing the AGP problem ? with yes or no. Or maybe the right answear will be : We don't know will have to wait for the users to test and see...

The real problem i think r the beta testers like you Michael who own only PCI-E cards so from my point of view you can't help ati fixing the AGP Issues because your feedback will not include our problems. And if the other beta testers r like you our problem will never be resolved...

We don't care if the driver works 100x faster if on our hardware don't work.

It's all a matter of NDA. I will say that ATI has a Christmas present for those using non-PCI Express hardware.

[mo0n_sniper]

People are to blame for ATI's "Buy Us Fuck You" attitude but I don't think that developers are to blame or the employees for spec being released from AMD .If the developers from Ati couldn't write the linux driver Ati would just have fired them. Instead Ati didn't pay attention for the linux market.
Now from what I am seeing Amd has a different approach and good things have happend(performance improvements,RadeonHD, AIGLX, etc......) and I think 7.12 would bring us a Christmas present.
For the release date I've read a Michael article or post that say "the 7.12 driver coming later this month" hope I'm not mistaken

[Tsume]

People are to blame for ATI's "Buy Us Fuck You" attitude but I don't think that developers are to blame or the employees for spec being released from AMD .If the developers from Ati couldn't write the linux driver Ati would just have fired them. Instead Ati didn't pay attention for the linux market.
Now from what I am seeing Amd has a different approach and good things have happend(performance improvements,RadeonHD, AIGLX, etc......) and I think 7.12 would bring us a Christmas present.
For the release date I've read a Michael article or post that say "the 7.12 driver coming later this month" hope I'm not mistaken

They're going by Windows numbering now, meaning a new driver every month.

7.11 = 2007/11 (November)
7.12 = 2007/12 (December)

So yes sometime later this month is more than likely.

[mo0n_sniper]

We all know is coming this month but don't know how soon

[Tsume]

We all know is coming this month but don't know how soon

Judging by past releases, Windows wise, it's usually between the last 2/3 of the month and the end of the month. It will be there in time for Christmas though... heck we might get it right on the 25th with a "Merry Xmas" message in the installer somewhere =P

[Svartalf]

Judging by past releases, Windows wise, it's usually between the last 2/3 of the month and the end of the month. It will be there in time for Christmas though... heck we might get it right on the 25th with a "Merry Xmas" message in the installer somewhere =P

If they did that and it fixed the leak and the Rialto problems, I'd consider it a very nice present to us from them; and while the second doesn't cause me problems (No Rialto hardware...), the first does and I'd be happier even if the performance wasn't 100% where it needed to be. It'd show that they really ARE paying attention and trying to fix this mess they have. (I don't doubt that they're doing it- it just isn't showing right now... )

[Tsume]

If they did that and it fixed the leak and the Rialto problems, I'd consider it a very nice present to us from them; and while the second doesn't cause me problems (No Rialto hardware...), the first does and I'd be happier even if the performance wasn't 100% where it needed to be. It'd show that they really ARE paying attention and trying to fix this mess they have. (I don't doubt that they're doing it- it just isn't showing right now... )

For me I want 2 things fixed and that's it.

1: Bug where with AIGLX+Compiz on I stretch a rectangle selection across monitors, when it is large enough the Xserver just up and crashes. Might also be related to random corruption in lower right.
2: Flickering with AIGLX+Compiz playing videos or a game like WoW.

I'm sure at least one of those issues will be fixed *crosses fingers*

I feel bad for the Rialto users but I almost know they are going to fix it this time.

[givemesugarr]

They're going by Windows numbering now, meaning a new driver every month.

7.11 = 2007/11 (November)
7.12 = 2007/12 (December)

So yes sometime later this month is more than likely.

yep, you're right!!!! so for next year we'll have:
8.1 = 2008/01 (January)

a new year eve present, since it's known that the devs are working on the first of january since they're just a bunch of nerds without social life.............



ps. guess i'll have to tell that my words are just jokes, since the last time i've tried to be ironical i got misunderstood by some people.