Nouveau Improves Some Games With Linux 3.9 Kernel

Written by Michael Larabel in Nouveau on 10 April 2013 at 12:36 PM EDT. Add A Comment
NOUVEAU
Nouveau, the reverse-engineered open-source NVIDIA Linux graphics driver, is faster for some OpenGL games when running on the soon-to-be-released Linux 3.9 kernel.

Early this morning I published some new Nouveau benchmarks from Mesa 9.2-devel. After that testing, from the Lenovo ThinkPad W510 with NVIDIA Quadro FX 880M graphics, I then compared recent Linux kernel releases. The Linux 3.9 Git kernel as of yesterday was compared to the vanilla mainline releases of Linux 3.8, 3.7, and 3.6.

While there isn't any breakthrough performance gains to find with Nouveau on Linux 3.9, at least for this particular hardware, there are some modest improvements over recent Linux kernel releases. For those unfamiliar with the actual Nouveau DRM driver changes in Linux 3.9, see The DRM Pull Request For Linux 3.9. The Nouveau changes this time around though aren't particularly thrilling.
Nouveau Linux 3.9 Kernel Benchmarks
All benchmarking was handled in a fully automated and reproducible way using the Phoronix Test Suite open-source software. All of these benchmark results in full can be found on OpenBenchmarking.org within 1304103-FO-NOUVEAULI32.
Nouveau Linux 3.9 Kernel Benchmarks
Nouveau Linux 3.9 Kernel Benchmarks
Nouveau Linux 3.9 Kernel Benchmarks
For some tests, the NVIDIA Quadro FX graphics performance on this reverse-engineered driver edge slightly higher with Linux 3.9 over 3.8/3.7/3.6.
Nouveau Linux 3.9 Kernel Benchmarks
World of Padman delivered the biggest performance jump with Linux 3.9.
Nouveau Linux 3.9 Kernel Benchmarks
There are more OpenGL Nouveau results on OpenBenchmarking.org. The good news is that while the gains weren't always very noticeable, there doesn't appear to be any serious regressions, at least for this "GT216GLM" graphics core. More Nouveau benchmarks of Linux 3.9 are coming, including a big Nouveau vs. NVIDIA Linux comparison.
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About The Author
Michael Larabel

Michael Larabel is the principal author of Phoronix.com and founded the site in 2004 with a focus on enriching the Linux hardware experience. Michael has written more than 20,000 articles covering the state of Linux hardware support, Linux performance, graphics drivers, and other topics. Michael is also the lead developer of the Phoronix Test Suite, Phoromatic, and OpenBenchmarking.org automated benchmarking software. He can be followed via Twitter, LinkedIn, or contacted via MichaelLarabel.com.

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