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Should X 7.1 still be testing only because of closed source drivers (ati/nvidia)?
Yes!
55%
 55%  [ 254 ]
No!
37%
 37%  [ 172 ]
I don't care!
6%
 6%  [ 28 ]
Total Votes : 454

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aidanjt
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 5:25 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I understand people's concerns with keeping Xorg 7.1 in testing due to nvidia's binary drivers not working with it.. But if there was a major opensource project that wouldn't work with Xorg 7.1 the same thing would happen.. Given that there is no feasable alternative for nVidia users, I think it's a wise decission, there would be too much of a mess generated by stabilising 7.1 when the vast majority of nVidia users use the binary driver, and when they update to Xorg 7.1, and their desktop breaks, who will they blame?.. and then they have to go about figuring out how to downgrade properly.

If we are really this passionate about having a good performing graphics card we should petition nVidia and ATi to both propose a graphics chip free of IP which would let both of these companies to release opensource drivers and documentation pretaining to writting them so that we may all contribute to, and see the drivers bundled with Xorg. That's the only practical route to take. But in order to do this *ALL* of GNU/Linux and *BSD users need to unite in order for nVidia and ATi to see numbers that are worth investing time in, we can't just have one distro leading the way, or a small segment of a distro users making bold requests. This needs to be financially feasable for both companies to become a reality.


Last edited by aidanjt on Tue Jul 11, 2006 5:31 pm; edited 1 time in total
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Q-collective
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 5:31 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

AidanJT wrote:
If we are really this passionate about having a good performing graphics card we should petition nVidia and ATi to both propose a graphics chip free of IP which would let both of these companies to release opensource drivers that we can all contribute to, and see the drivers bundled with Xorg. That's the only practical route to take.

Petitions don't work. And they don't have to write opensource drivers at all, let them just release the specifications and we do the rest.
Ati did this up to the 9200, hence why that card is perfectly well supported by DRI, they didn't release specifications for the r300/r400 or r500 and after years of reverse engineering we're getting somewhere with the r300 driver, but the r500 driver still doesn't exist.
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aidanjt
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 5:34 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Q-collective wrote:
Petitions don't work. And they don't have to write opensource drivers at all, let them just release the specifications and we do the rest.
Ati did this up to the 9200, hence why that card is perfectly well supported by DRI, they didn't release specifications for the r300/r400 or r500 and after years of reverse engineering we're getting somewhere with the r300 driver, but the r500 driver still doesn't exist.


Petitions don't work because the numbers are so pathetically small they aren't even worth considering. We need a million signatures for an IP free GPU. 10,000 people demanding for the drivers to be made open source is nothing, the legal ramifications are far too high, and still not legal for both companies to violate licenses. The need is for a fully IP free GPU, with numbers massive enough to see a return on investment.
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Q-collective
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 5:39 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

AidanJT wrote:
Q-collective wrote:
Petitions don't work. And they don't have to write opensource drivers at all, let them just release the specifications and we do the rest.
Ati did this up to the 9200, hence why that card is perfectly well supported by DRI, they didn't release specifications for the r300/r400 or r500 and after years of reverse engineering we're getting somewhere with the r300 driver, but the r500 driver still doesn't exist.


Petitions don't work because the numbers are so pathetically small they aren't even worth considering. We need a million signatures for an IP free GPU. 10,000 people demanding for the drivers to be made open source is nothing, the legal ramifications are far too high, and still not legal for both companies to violate licenses. The need is for a fully IP free GPU, with numbers massive enough to see a return on investment.

Petitions don't work, not because they are only signed by a small number of people (although that is an inherit flaw of a petition), but because it gives no real "strength", no ultimatum if you will. So companies do as they please.
Our only real hope of a IP free graphics card is The OpenGraphics Project.
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EAD
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 5:42 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Bummer, so now every user of Nvidia can't use Xorg 7.1 ? :?
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dberkholz
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 5:51 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Q-collective wrote:
And the DRI efford to make nv a great driver seems to have died a long long time ago.

Not true ... http://nouveau.freedesktop.org/ devs are working on documenting nvidia cards right now. They can't begin to write a solid driver until the cards are decently documented.
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Gusar
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 5:54 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Q-collective wrote:
And the DRI efford to make nv a great driver seems to have died a long long time ago.
Wrong, check this out: http://nouveau.freedesktop.org/wiki/. They're a long way to go, but they're making progress.

EAD wrote:
Bummer, so now every user of Nvidia can't use Xorg 7.1 ? :?
You can, but you have to turn off RenderAccel, which means dog slow antialiased font rendering (or no antialiasing).


As for this issue, I can't really say. Both sides have good arguments, it's really a tough issue. Personally, I'm on ~x86 which means I had to manually mask xorg7.1 a while ago anyway.


Last edited by Gusar on Tue Jul 11, 2006 5:55 pm; edited 1 time in total
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EAD
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 5:54 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

nouveau seem cool, but does it stand a chance in performance compare to Nvidia original drivers?
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EAD
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 5:55 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Gusar wrote:
Q-collective wrote:
And the DRI efford to make nv a great driver seems to have died a long long time ago.
Wrong, check this out: http://nouveau.freedesktop.org/wiki/. They're a long way to go, but they're making progress.

EAD wrote:
Bummer, so now every user of Nvidia can't use Xorg 7.1 ? :?
You can, but you have to turn off RenderAccel, which means dog slow antialiased font rendering (or no antialiasing).


As for this issue, I can't really say. Both sides have good arguments, it's really a tough issue. Personally, I'm on ~x86 which means I had to manually mask xorg7.1 a while ago anyway.


Amm I see, well I won't use 7.1 if I can't have all the power of my Nvidia, it is like using Vesa or something, its pretty suck.
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complexity
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 6:05 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I have also voted yes. I am curious though. Does the xorg team contact vendors like Nvidia and ATI before a major change like this to give them time to prepare? If not i don't think that would be a bad idea myself. Would probably drop the waiting game down a bit IMHO. Not a huge gamer myself but it would be nice to have all my hardware working up to its potential. I do play games here and there and i like having that ability if i choose.
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Gusar
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 6:20 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

complexity wrote:
Does the xorg team contact vendors like Nvidia and ATI before a major change like this to give them time to prepare?


Nvidia devs are very active on the xorg mailing list. In fact, one of the ABI breakages - the one that will make xv work with composite - was done by a nvidia dev. So they knew that ABI was being broken.
The problem is, that the nvidia linux team is not the one calling the shots at nvidia - there's the fact that code is shared between the windows and linux drivers, then there's QA and execs and all that stuff...
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EAD
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 6:27 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Gusar wrote:
complexity wrote:
Does the xorg team contact vendors like Nvidia and ATI before a major change like this to give them time to prepare?


Nvidia devs are very active on the xorg mailing list. In fact, one of the ABI breakages - the one that will make xv work with composite - was done by a nvidia dev. So they knew that ABI was being broken.
The problem is, that the nvidia linux team is not the one calling the shots at nvidia - there's the fact that code is shared between the windows and linux drivers, then there's QA and execs and all that stuff...


So, will there be soon a new nvidia module? or maybe a better Xorg ? let's say 7.1.1 that will fix this?
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R!tman
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 6:32 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

EAD wrote:
Gusar wrote:
complexity wrote:
Does the xorg team contact vendors like Nvidia and ATI before a major change like this to give them time to prepare?


Nvidia devs are very active on the xorg mailing list. In fact, one of the ABI breakages - the one that will make xv work with composite - was done by a nvidia dev. So they knew that ABI was being broken.
The problem is, that the nvidia linux team is not the one calling the shots at nvidia - there's the fact that code is shared between the windows and linux drivers, then there's QA and execs and all that stuff...


So, will there be soon a new nvidia module? or maybe a better Xorg ? let's say 7.1.1 that will fix this?

Probably, nvidia usually has better linux support than ati. Which brings me back to the issue I mentioned earlier: What will happen if only one, ati or nvidia, releases a working driver?
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Gusar
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 6:38 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

EAD wrote:
So, will there be soon a new nvidia module? or maybe a better Xorg ? let's say 7.1.1 that will fix this?
There's nothing to fix really - changes were made to provide new functionality. It's just that all opensource drivers were immediately updated to work with the changes, because the code is, well, open. You can't do the same with closed drivers, so we have to wait.

As for a new nvidia driver, based on time between releases of previous drivers, I would expect it anytime between september and november - I know, not very accurate, and it's just my personal guess so don't quote me on that one.
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EAD
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 6:43 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Gusar wrote:
EAD wrote:
So, will there be soon a new nvidia module? or maybe a better Xorg ? let's say 7.1.1 that will fix this?
There's nothing to fix really - changes were made to provide new functionality. It's just that all opensource drivers were immediately updated to work with the changes, because the code is, well, open. You can't do the same with closed drivers, so we have to wait.

As for a new nvidia driver, based on time between releases of previous drivers, I would expect it anytime between september and november - I know, not very accurate, and it's just my personal guess so don't quote me on that one.


What? 8O
september and november ?!
It is very long time!! ,Why can't they do it in few weeks or even days?
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R!tman
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 6:53 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

EAD wrote:
Gusar wrote:
EAD wrote:
So, will there be soon a new nvidia module? or maybe a better Xorg ? let's say 7.1.1 that will fix this?
There's nothing to fix really - changes were made to provide new functionality. It's just that all opensource drivers were immediately updated to work with the changes, because the code is, well, open. You can't do the same with closed drivers, so we have to wait.

As for a new nvidia driver, based on time between releases of previous drivers, I would expect it anytime between september and november - I know, not very accurate, and it's just my personal guess so don't quote me on that one.


What? 8O
september and november ?!
It is very long time!! ,Why can't they do it in few weeks or even days?

LOL, judging from another comment of yours
EAD wrote:
Amm I see, well I won't use 7.1 if I can't have all the power of my Nvidia, it is like using Vesa or something, its pretty suck.

you don't seem to use X 7.1, do you? Why would you want nvidia to release a new driver _right now_ then?
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dberkholz
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 7:17 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

R!tman wrote:
What will happen if only one, ati or nvidia, releases a working driver?

We'll wait for both. I'm not giving favored treatment to one over the other.
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R!tman
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 7:29 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

dberkholz wrote:
R!tman wrote:
What will happen if only one, ati or nvidia, releases a working driver?

We'll wait for both. I'm not giving favored treatment to one over the other.

That's only fair!
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candrews
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 7:40 pm    Post subject: ATI Open Source Drivers Reply with quote

I've been using the r300 drivers on my laptop (Radeon Mobility 9700 w/128mb) for at least two or three months now, and they're pretty awesome. There's no problem with restarting the X server or switching VTs (which under fglrx used to freeze the machine) and performance in 3d games (like Quake 3) is just as good as under FGLX. Also, I haven't had an issue with freezing, which used to happen every once in a while with the closed source drivers. Everything that worked under the closed source ATI drivers works under r300... after switching, I never looked back.

I think this Xorg 7.1 issue should be a wake up call to us linux users that we aren't free until we're totally free of closed source software, even if it's just a relatively tiny hunk of code. Granted, that driver may make your system perform a bit better, but is it worth running behind the latest and greatest software, and more important, running closed source (READ: NOT FREE) software?

I can use AIGLX (well, I should be able to run it soon, I seem to get white window outlines on a blue background, but that's another story) and I can always run the latest kernel and the latest Xorg... can't do that with ATI.

And as for the nvidia people (sadly, I also have a desktop with an nvidia card) maybe it's time to start really pushing behind the nv open source project. I'd be willing to donate a couple bucks - imagine if we all did!
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chrismortimore
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 8:29 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Xorg 7.1 shouldn't wait until nvidia and ati get their drivers out. My x86 desktop has an SiS card that I use sometimes, so I have to go and keyword the files? Ridiculous. I know there arn't that many files, but it's a hassle.

Question: Is it possible to make packages mask other packages? My thinking is that it would be handy if installing the nvidia/ati drivers masked xorg 7.1 automatically, thus resolving this issue.
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 8:58 pm    Post subject: Re: ATI Open Source Drivers Reply with quote

candrews wrote:
I can use AIGLX (well, I should be able to run it soon, I seem to get white window outlines on a blue background, but that's another story) and I can always run the latest kernel and the latest Xorg... can't do that with ATI.

Wasn't the r300 driver still a bit too primitive for that stuff?
I'm using the r300 driver myself for about a year now but didn't know they were that close to be honest.
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 9:06 pm    Post subject: Re: ATI Open Source Drivers Reply with quote

Q-collective wrote:
candrews wrote:
I can use AIGLX (well, I should be able to run it soon, I seem to get white window outlines on a blue background, but that's another story) and I can always run the latest kernel and the latest Xorg... can't do that with ATI.

Wasn't the r300 driver still a bit too primitive for that stuff?
I'm using the r300 driver myself for about a year now but didn't know they were that close to be honest.

Works pretty well, really. I tested it on a few games recently:
http://spyderous.livejournal.com/73449.html
http://spyderous.livejournal.com/72672.html

Basically it works on everything but Doom 3.
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spielc
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 9:27 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Q-collective wrote:
Oh, karmapoints to codergeek :)
I also voted no, it's silly to wait for binary drivers. And it's an extra stimulant for nvidia and ati to get their stuff right, asap.
I have (hard)unmasked xorg for about a year now, love it ;)


hmm well i guess nvidia might be up for the task but ati DEFINITELY won't... They have a hard time getting other things to work correctly (e.g. xv is not working for a few months on my x1600 pro, not to speak of hardware-accelerated compositing... :roll: )

So in case the devs want to spare themselves from alot of trouble: Don't consider doing that before both major gpu-distributors have working xorg-7.1 drivers
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chrismortimore
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 11:00 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Strangely enough, I just installed xorg-7.1 in my chroot (running completely stable just now, other than the keyworded xorg files) and it opened up fine without needing the "-royally-fudge-xorg-to-work-with-old-skool-drivers" switch (you might not be able to tell, but I can't remember the actual switch) running nvidia drivers 1.0.8762.. That was very unexpected.. So does xorg-7.1 even need to be keyworded or am I just very lucky?
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 11:11 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I vote yes because people that say no are just crying for something that is easily fixed by just unmasking it on /etc/portage/package.keyword. I am using ~x86 and I masked xorg 7.1 and thats not a problem for me so why should unmasking it be a problem for you?
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