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ATI Open-Sourcing Their Linux Driver?

phoronix.com — "In the coming months AMD also plans to accelerate efforts to address the needs of the open source community as well." Does that mean they are opening up the source code to their Linux driver?

Who dugg this? Made popular Sep 5, 2007

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  • lyzz, on 10/10/2007, -0/+18They have stated their commitment today http://lwn.net/Articles/248227/ .
  • Shootfast, on 10/10/2007, -1/+12Damn, Good news for ATI buyers. I hope Nvidia follows suite with an open driver, having choice again would be awesome
  • mattst88, on 10/10/2007, -1/+11No they haven't.

    Official Nvidia drivers are not open source. You just hear fewer people bitching about them since they *work* and therefore fewer people demanding an alternative, ie open source drivers.

    There are drivers supporting Nvidia cards included in X that are open source, though.
  • lippyjka, on 10/10/2007, -0/+9Yep indeed, I have submitted it to digg here as a separate article as it is confirmed; http://digg.com/hardware/AMD_to_open_up_graphics_specs
    Also there is an article in waiting at phoronix, which will have more in depth information; they will release it when they have been given the all clear by AMD.
  • ScornForSega, on 10/10/2007, -3/+12An early Xmas present??!?!?! To use the hardware of my choosing on the software of my choosing?

    That might be an Xmas present if I was an Apple fan.
  • bieber, on 10/10/2007, -0/+7As noble as your idea is, you fundamentally don't understand the nature of device drivers. It would be both impractical and unnecessary to have a single standard like that; if manufacturers would just publish specs for their hardware, we'd make our own drivers, anyways.
  • jcaino, on 10/10/2007, -2/+6as a linux user with radeon graphics in my desktop and laptop, i'm extremely excited by what this could mean...
  • f0dder, on 10/10/2007, -0/+4Nvidia only released the binary, not the source code.
  • haiduz, on 10/10/2007, -2/+5I don't think you fully understand the concept of an xmas present.
    Kid1: What did you parents get you from xmas?
    Kid2: A loosy sweater, I can't believe it!
    Kid1: You think thats bad? I got updated drivers for my videocard.
    Kid2: Wow, your parents hate you.
  • reventlov, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3I will believe if when I see it on an ATI card under linux. They have issued many press statements promising vague things to come and have no credibility. There is no detail here, just useless speculation.
  • foreplay, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2anyone else think that this may have more to do with dell, hp and other pc manufacturers shipping Linux now than any amount of fan boys screaming.

    don't get me wrong im immensely happy that i will be able to use compiz properly next month when they release this awesome new binary blob that apparently works properly and look forward to the open source version coming installed by default in any distribution i care to use.
  • init100, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2"Well, I'm expecting a whole bunch of people opening up their wallet and buying those ATI cards."

    Um, no, I won't buy an ATI card just because they did this. But the next time I'm up for a graphics card upgrade, AMD/ATI would become an option alongside of nVidia, with a plus on their side due to the open spec. Until now, AMD/ATI has simply not been an option for me.

    But of course, the above assumes that this is true, which we don't know until (usable) specifications are really published.
  • crowsattack, on 10/10/2007, -1/+3I was thinking about buying a Nvidia card. The drivers have improved with promise of opening up this is great. AMD/ATI cards going to support ALGIX next release... I may just hold off on buying that card.
  • paradexes, on 10/10/2007, -2/+4AMD/ATI can afford to at this point. With their annoucement that SSE5 is coming (essentially an onboard GPU to put it breifly) nVidia has nothing on them and neither does Intel. Intel MAY be a competitor at some point but like the 64bit extensions did AMD justice I think they are just going for the same win again with SSE5. Open Sourcing ATI drivers would just give them a HUGE marketshare grab in the linux and mac world. Nvidia cannot afford to do something like that as it is basically their buisness. SLI is closly tied to their chipsets. While AMD has Crossfire they also have other things to sustain their business besides video cards. nvidia only has the chipset market which revolves largly around their video cards.
  • krusader3z, on 10/10/2007, -2/+3I don't think you fully understand what is going on here.
  • inactive, on 10/10/2007, -1/+2As far as I'm aware this is inaccurate to a certain extent, ATi is opening their specs and releasing a _LIMITED_ open-source driver _EXAMPLE_, it won't have any 3D acceleration. I couldn't possibility be incorrect myself though.
  • inactive, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1They haven't said anything about open sourcing their driver, they just said they are planning on addressing the need of the open source community. That probably translates to, where going to release a driver that is actually somewhat usable (and maybe some specs under a NDA). This is also the 2nd time its happened (with the exact same topic) I wish people would stop making up complete rubbish and putting it on Digg.
  • planktonx, on 10/10/2007, -2/+2What we need is an Open Standard Driver for devices where manufacturers can adhere too. Imagine if we have this, that means my Linux Cellphone can connect to any printer and print maybe my grocery orders, or flight ticket. I can download pictures from my digital camera to my Linux cellphone, or Linux computer, or Linux PDA. Let's form an Open Standard Organization!

    Here we set the Open Document Format (which is already existing), Open Driver Specification for devices, etc. I'm tired of International Standards (ISO, IEEE, ...) that are manipulated by private corporations (like what's happening with Open Document and M$). Plus you have to pay royalty at times to the owner of the standard. These should be free.
  • Tenoq, on 10/10/2007, -2/+2Gold.
  • inactive, on 10/10/2007, -4/+4i don't care if the driver is binary or open source, just make aiglx work on my x700
    the xorg radeon driver is so slowww
  • HonoredMule, on 10/10/2007, -1/+1I could easily discover myself doing an about-face and returning to ATI within the next 6 months. We'll have to see how quickly and effectively open source driver development takes over (and if the underlying hardware will actually be fully accessible, stable, and performant).

    Like mattst88 said; nVidia binary drivers are way better than ATI ones, but open specification trumps that advantage by leaps and bounds.
  • inactive, on 10/10/2007, -2/+2i doubt it
    but it could make good strategic sense
  • shavenlunatic, on 10/10/2007, -1/+1haha, with this combined with the improved performance of their prop. drivers, I can't help but feel the irony.. in my pocket.. only just recently bought an (equivalent) nvidia card to improve my linux compatability and performance... AAHHRRGG
  • uzytkownik, on 10/10/2007, -1/+1I really hope they will. But I'm afraid it's stupid hope because they always says they will.
  • cronot, on 10/10/2007, -4/+4This has been discussed and mentioned already elsewhere, but oh well...

    No, they won't. What this means is that they will release specs and cooperate with the community with the efforts (that already are ongoing) on producing open-source drivers that are compatible with older cards (R5xx). Newer cards will still need the binary drivers, but since they are finally releasing good drivers this and next month, it's pretty much a moot point anyway, as far as usability is concerned.
  • captcanuk, on 10/10/2007, -3/+2I've been using the fglrx binary driver without problem for two years now. Over that time, I've read a rather vocal group of people in some forums complain about binary drivers and fglrx stating that they would buy hardware of the first of ATI and Nvidia to fully open their specs. Well, I'm expecting a whole bunch of people opening up their wallet and buying those ATI cards. Maybe I should buy some ATI stock!
  • schestowitz, on 10/10/2007, -9/+7It's more of a matter of supporting the existing open source initiative. The main news is about them boosting performance of their drivers very significantly (a very early Xmas present?). http://digg.com/linux_unix/Breakthrough_ATI_AMD_Driver_Has_Just_Become_up_to_10_Times_Faster
  • inactive, on 10/10/2007, -3/+0Perhaps you should try taking a break from being an "evangelist" and spending all your waking hours FUDing on the internets. Go outside, get some air and forget about Microsoft for a few hours. You post to Digg so much that I think you're starting to lose it. Isn't enough to spam the Netscape portal and comp.os.linux.advocacy on a 24/7 basis? Not to mention all your attack blogs.
  • f0dder, on 10/10/2007, -8/+2When you're not the top dog you go open source. Isn't that the norm?
  • smurf22, on 10/10/2007, -9/+2No Nvidia kicks the ***** out of ati and they've had open source drivers for a long time.

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