DRI2 Support Proposed For The Generic Mode-Setting Driver

[phoronix]

Phoronix: DRI2 Support Proposed For The Generic Mode-Setting Driver

Eric Anholt while working at Broadcom on the Raspberry Pi graphics driver has sent out patches that add support for DRI2 with GLAMOR to the xf86-video-modesetting driver...

http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=MTgyMzc

[mark45]

I don't get it, what problem is he trying to solve or improve? (and why is it worth the effort..? I thought DRI3 is the future for X.org?)

[uid313]

Why do this in DRI2?
Couldn't this just be done in DRI3 instead?

[Gusar]

I don't get it, what problem is he trying to solve or improve?

He wants to eliminate the need for hardware-specific X drivers. A hardware-specific driver isn't needed when you can have a generic driver that hooks into KMS for modesetting and mesa (via glamor) for 2d accel.

[uid313]

He wants to eliminate the need for hardware-specific X drivers. A hardware-specific driver isn't needed when you can have a generic driver that hooks into KMS for modesetting and mesa (via glamor) for 2d accel.

Except for that Glamor gets outperformed by XAA, EXA, UXA and SNA.

[droidhacker]

Um... waitaminute.... this sounds like something with the potential to make 2d acceleration possible using blob 3d drivers on shit hardware like intel atom-Z's... you know, the powervr ones.

[bridgman]

Except for that Glamor gets outperformed by XAA, EXA, UXA and SNA.

Not sure that's true any more. Different accel methods are faster on different benchmarks, so it's easy to prove whatever you want, but AFAICS Glamor has caught up with XAA/EXA.

Not sure about UXA/SNA, they don't work on my hardware

[smitty3268]

Um... waitaminute.... this sounds like something with the potential to make 2d acceleration possible using blob 3d drivers on shit hardware like intel atom-Z's... you know, the powervr ones.

Only if those drivers hook into the KMS API, which is pretty unlikely. Although i guess NVidia intends to do that as part of their Wayland support, so maybe others will too.

[Ansla]

This makes me wonder what difference would it make to radeonsi users if they switch from the dedicated X.org driver to the generic one. Would the 3D driver use features like tiling that are controled by the X.org driver?