The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 Is Running Great On Linux

The GeForce GTX 980 is NVIDIA's most advanced graphics card to date and is running brilliantly on Linux -- assuming you're okay with binary blobs.

One week ago NVIDIA launched the GeForce GTX 970/980 graphics cards as their top-end, next-generation hardware built on their Maxwell architecture. Given the successes I've had with their mid-range but very power efficient GTX 750 series hardware that were the first on this new architecture, I've been incredibly anxious to see these high-end NVIDIA GeForce 900 series GPUs running on Linux... Fortunately, today the GTX 980 arrived.

Next week I should have my full Linux review of the GeForce GTX 980 that was sent over by NVIDIA Corp. All I have to say right now that it does indeed work assuming you're using the new NVIDIA 343.22 binary driver. Users won't yet want to try it with Nouveau given the lack of re-clocking support for allowing the GPU to operate at its true performance potential. Additionally, Maxwell on Nouveau requires messing around with generating your own firmware files that first require initializing the GPU with the binary blob.

If you don't mind tainting your kernel with a closed-source graphics driver, the GeForce GTX 980 is looking quite good for a Linux gaming rig with unmatched performance potential -- as long as you're willing to spend over $500 USD on a graphics card.

Stay tuned for the full results and other updated NVIDIA Linux benchmark results next week. If you have any other interesting GTX 980 Linux test requests, let me know via the forums or @MichaelLarabel on Twitter.