Considering a new GPU soon. How's the 7700 series on Linux?

[bridgman]

QUOTE=maldorordiscord;274984]Right Intel products do not have this effect.[/QUOTE]

Aren't you still paying for Windows drivers ?

Oh right, it's like a buffet

[maldorordiscord]

Aren't you still paying for Windows drivers ?

Oh right, it's like a buffet

You are right. the paying for windows drivers are a big problems.
But I'm sure my next hardware will not have windows drivers.

Then its not a stupid "buffet" then its a clever selection.

[Newfie]

I should probably update this, even if it wasn't the original plan.

I decided to get an NVIDIA card and ignore AMD completely for now. So far, every graphical issue I had is 100% solved. My system no longer has random hard-locks, Suspend works, tearing is non-existent, there's no input delay... etc. After being so used to using FGLRX for over a year, the PC feels incredibly smooth... there's no way I could ever go back to FGLRX again.

For now, I guess the only option is NVIDIA if you want a trouble-free blob. I know some people claim that FGLRX works fine for them (not disputing that), but the fact is that it is a huge issue for a large number of people. I didn't have the major issues that some users seemed to (always installed and removed just fine), but the little things really bugged me over time.

Will check on AMD's progress on my next upgrade for sure; the price/performance ratio on AMD cards is usually much better. Hopefully in ~2 years the open source Radeon driver will be nearer to my needs.

[Panix]

Both are Windows-friendly companies and it seems the Nvidia detractors are mostly looking at their refusal to engage in any open source projects. But, on the desktop, there doesn't seem to be a real choice. Optimus, SLI and KMS were mentioned as 'COMMON' (?) computer setups but one is only in laptops, the other is if you have TWO video cards in the same computer and just there, these are NOT COMMON setups by any means.

AMD/ATI just don't have Linux on their minds as something to support. They are understaffed, don't invest in the resources and don't have Linux anywhere at the top of their priorities. For Nvidia, Linux might not be a priority or something they want to open source whatsoever but compared to AMD/ATI, their drivers are usually up to date and they can keep up with changes in the kernel. They update or at least 'try' fixing their driver so subsequent driver updates show up now and then which sometimes have improvements. Whereas, the amd/ati drivers with catalyst are constant disappointments that never seem to end. Most hardcore Linux enthusiasts who want open source options usually push for AMD/ATI but even the open source driver can't deliver all the features and many functions that are important are lacking. Does AMD/ATI offer the 'hybrid' video card functionality that Nvidia Optimus doesn't provide, nope. What about power saving (including correct hibernate/suspend functions)? Nope. What about hardware accceleration? Nope. ATI/AMD drivers don't really provide any bonus or 'extras' in terms of working functions and features that Nvidia doesn't so you don't get anything extra choosing AMD/ATI. In theory, you should but I've read nothing here that illustrates you get something extra and/or something that works (better or at all).

*Edit* Oh, maybe radeon drivers work a little better than Nouveau?

[crazycheese]

Hopefully in ~2 years the open source Radeon driver will be nearer to my needs.

For Intel opensource, they need to release more powerful hardware. Can happen instantly, depends just on them.

For AMD opensource, based upon your experiences (I have switched back to nvidia as well), I think they need at least 4 years. Remember RadeonSI support fiasco?

[bridgman]

For AMD opensource, based upon your experiences (I have switched back to nvidia as well), I think they need at least 4 years. Remember RadeonSI support fiasco?

I'm still trying to find out about this "fiasco" myself. So far the work seems to be going pretty much as planned. Remember it's the *next* GPU core generation where we were expecting launch time support.

[sonnet]

I wanted to ask if anyone has tried both (Nvidia and AMD) recently with VMware 3d acceleration for windows.
Currently I have a 460gtx, and I found out that VMware virtualization is much faster than wine even with 3d games (I know they are 2 different things, but still is more convenient for me
play windows games inside a vm than with Wine, apparently).
I'm not and I won't use compositor windows manager or desktop effects, only plain metacity. So I think that most of the issues people have with frglx wouldn't interest me in case I buy an AMD card.
As also I'm not interested in using wine anymore (which is said to perform much better with nvidia drivers).

With native games frglx seems to performs as good , if not better than nvidia drivers (comparing cards with similar performance on windows) , by looking at the benchmarks on phoronix.
So I'm wondering how an amd card would perform with a linux host and a windows 7 guest using vmware vitualization (workstation/vmplayer).
I know the vga is actually emulated, but in order to achieve such impressive performance surely the vga must be used somehow.
Any idea about it?

[Paul Frederick]

I should probably update this, even if it wasn't the original plan.

I decided to get an NVIDIA card and ignore AMD completely for now.

That is how I've been operating. If I hear a lot of wonderful things about AMD from credible sources I may have to reevaluate my present stance. But as things are now nVidia just works better than AMD on Linux for me. Well, I had that annoying blue shift problem with YouTube, but I applied the patch and I even have that working with my nVidia accelerated now. These are the instructions I followed to do that:

http://www.grocock.me.uk/tag/libvdpau/

I tried some other stuff with no success.

With TwinView I can play games across both of my screens, and even watch movies dual screen too.

Pseudo command:
mplayer -vo sdl -fs -rootwin SomeMovieFile.mkv

I only have a GT520 but I'm thrilled!