What is Digg?137 Comments
- nixfu, on 10/12/2007, -20/+128>upgraded to a ATI Radeon X1650XT
Huge mistake.... ATI is not something anyone with a clue upgrades TO...its what you upgrade FROM. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -5/+98Hasn't this been a well-known fact for the last 3-4 years? Why are you guys still buying ATI then expecting a smooth Linux experience? Didn't you at least consider Nvidia? I personally think anyone still buying ATI then hoping to run it on Linux deserves what they get. Recently there have been at least 5 stories a week on Digg alone about this same issue. Vote with your wallet.
- diggapleaze, on 10/12/2007, -4/+90I've said it before and I'll say it again:
ATI's lack of AIGLX is having a rippling effect on the progress of the Linux free desktop. Yes, I am serious. One little thing like this has a HUGE effect on the Linux world. Let me explain how:
1) AIGLX is an extension to x.org, the fork of XFree86 which is a staple in nearly every desktop Linux distro
2) A distro that wishes to ship compiz/beryl by default has only 2 choices: ship with AIGLX or XGL. With the exception of Suse (where XGL started), every distro prefers AIGLX since it is being actively developed by x.org and x.org is already included in those distros (see #1)
3) For a distro to ship with desktop effects turned on by default, it needs to be assumed that AIGLX will be on by default as well. Since there are a significant number of Linux users that have ATI cards (which don't support AIGLX), distro maintainers cannot turn on desktop effects by default
Conclusion: Basically the entire Linux world is waiting on ATI to get their ***** together and support AIGLX. The 3D desktop is already the norm: Vista and Mac OS X are shipping NOW with 3D composited environment. Despite the fact that COMPIZ HAS BEEN STABLE FOR NEARLY 6 MONTHS, Linux is not yet 3D by default.
Thank ATI. - SniperGX1, on 10/12/2007, -1/+43For a lot of us stuck with ATI hardware at the moment we were just hoping AMD wouldn't ***** us with no lube like ATI was doing on a daily basis
- dicerandom, on 10/12/2007, -4/+35What's the best outcry for improved ATI Linux drivers?
Buy Nvidia cards. - kflasch, on 10/12/2007, -1/+32I've switched to NVIDIA cards because of problems like this. I've been rather disappointed in ATI's Linux support.
- cloakeddagger, on 10/12/2007, -2/+29i bought a few ATI cards in my time, but not anymore, now that i'm on linux i give my money to nvidia (and intel)
last three g cards where nvidia, i don't even consider ATI anymore... - schestowitz, on 10/12/2007, -6/+32Please, please, please Digg this if you care about Linux adoption. ATI needs to have its eyes opened to react. At this stage, only a bit of negative publicity seems to have an impact. Contact your stores as well, demanding/suggesting that they stock something with better Linux support. Show them you are not interested in ATI cards and they will pressure the maker (AMD).
- AnteChronos, on 10/12/2007, -2/+25"don't bitch if your school bought the thing for you."
He said that the school made him buy it, as in it was required for his classes, and he had to purchase it with his own money. I'd say he has a right to bitch. - drag, on 10/12/2007, -5/+26""And I am sure it is really hard to include some code that detects whether the user is running a supported video card so the desktop effects can be turned on.""
No it's not.
All ATI cards that are using Free software drivers can run AIGLX, _right_now_
Those cards are:
R200 series ATI 8700 to 9250
R300 series ATI 9500 to x600
R400 series ATI x700 to x850
Are supported by Free sofware drivers. Both 2-D acceleration (XAA and EXA drivers) AND 3D drivers (R200_dri and R300_dri) drivers. I had a R200 ATI 9200 in a Ibook, and I had a R400 ATI x800 PCI express card. Both using Free software drivers support running Beryl and Compiz using AIGLX.
The major exceptions to Free software support regards issues dealing with shared memory for low-end ATI cards or integrated graphics. Otherwise support is pretty good.
Weither or not drivers can support AIGLX is detected on the fly by the X server.
The R500 (x1300-x1950) series cards do NOT have any Free software support. No open source 2-D drivers. No open source 3-D drivers.
For the R200 and R300 drivers they had to be _reversed_engineered_ by Linux developers. Dealing with buggy hardware and stuck reverse engineering drivers slows down development of open source 3d drivers considurably and performance is still slightly less the then proprietary drivers.
However even though the Free software drivers are reverse engineered they not only support 3D desktops properly, they are _easier_ to install and they are _more_stable_ the ATI's proprietary drivers.
""What's their excuse for not adding it?""
They don't care about Linux users.
""Are they actively ignoring it, or have they acknowledged it?""
Yes they know that they have these problems. They don't care. Linux is not important enough for them.
http://support.ati.com/ics/support/default.asp?deptID=894&task=knowledge&questionID=26907
""Is there a financial reason that would affect their choice in adding it?""
Yes. Linux users are not important financially for them. Vista and XP users are more important financially so they devote more developers, time, and money to developing Windows drivers.
The only reason Linux has any support _at_all_ is because Linux and Unix is used in high end OpenGL workstations and movie making. These are areas were Windows in unpopular so for high-end graphics people are willing to pay a huge premium for Linux support. ATI and Nvidia is happy to provide them.
ATI has never given a crap about Linux users and they aren't going to start any time soon. Expect features and hardware support to drop far behind Windows support and expect Linux drivers to always be slower and be much more buggier then Windows drivers.
Nvidia doesn't realy give a crap either, other then high end folks. They just have a better hardware architecture design so they have the same core driver for Linux and Windows drivers. They just have ported their Windows driver core to Linux and that is how Linux with Nvidia support has about the same performance as what you get from Windows XP.
Ever wonder why the ATI drivers are called FGLRX?
Because they are designed for the FireGL series of video cards, which are the high end workstation cards. Originally Linux geeks hacked the FireGL drivers to work on consumer cards. ATI noticed that so they adopted the drivers slightly to support consumer cards, but they are realy for high end FireGL customers. http://ati.amd.com/products/workstation.html
People have this illusion that if you bitch to ATI long enough and hard enough that all of a sudden ATI is going to drop a ***** of money and developers into Linux drivers. _It's_not_going_to_work_. They don't _care_. It's not something that isn't going to make them a lot of money and they have to compete with Nvidia on the Windows market so they have to devote as much resources to Windows support as possible.
People have been bitching to ATI on the state of Linux drivers almost a decade. They've always sucked, they always were a huge pain in the rear to install.
If ATI was serious they'd donate developer time to Free software driver support and help people adopt the open source R300 DRI drivers to their R500 and soon to be R600 cards. They can do it under NDA. X.org developers frequently sign NDAs. Linux kernel developers frequently sign NDAs. They can be sure that Linux support won't leak out secrets about hardware design, engineering secrets, or manufacturing proccess. They can leave out patented stuff or code they bought from other companies... Like the licensing they have agree to with S3 for the texture compression algorythms that are commonly used in games. They can just leave that out and let the Free software developers fill in the blanks.
It wouldn't cost ATI anything, or at least very little. It would certainly provide drivers at a fraction of the cost the FGLRX drivers. Linux users would get 3D support out of the box. It would be stable and it would work without you ever having to install anything extra, unless it's very new hardware.
WE ALREADY HAVE OPEN SOURCE DRIVERS. But reverse engineering is a HUGE waste of money, time, and effort. Instead of people working on improving 3D performance, developers are stuck on tricky bug reports were they can't tell if they are dealing with drivers working perfectly and they are running into hardware bugs or if they are dealing with software bugs on perfect hardware. It's very difficult and very slow.
If ATI was to help out then driver support would be much easier. They'd just have to point out a few bugs here and there and that would be a tremendous help. All hardware has bugs, just like software. ATI isn't going unveil anything that isn't already known.
Currently the only company that supports Linux in a OK fasion is Intel of all people.
Intel has hired X.org developers to work internally on open source driver support. They work very well and although their hardware is slow it does support AIGLX and Compiz/Beryl very well as well as being able to play older games just fine. - jlebrech, on 10/12/2007, -3/+21How about a Linux ready sticker, Have it on the boxes for games (ie. unreal 3) and on the graphics cards (nvidia)
Ati will soon want the sticker. - fourcylthrill, on 10/12/2007, -1/+17This is the exact reason my Radeon was replaced. I didn't need a new video card, the Radeon was plenty fast, but from now on I'm an nvidia fanboy. It's not a performance thing, simply compatibility. What is ATI so afraid of? They are loosing their most loyal customer base, the ubernerd, because they don't want to spend a few grand on proper drivers. Then again they're a corporation and linux is a tiny percentage of their sales. Why bother with the small fries.
- SniperGX1, on 10/12/2007, -6/+21Open source shouldn't "shun" anyone. OSS is for everyone.
- fkr3, on 10/12/2007, -10/+23One day people are going to have to accept something that sounds an awful lot like this ridiculous piece of fantasy ....
ATI knew you existed, and knew you wanted drivers. AMD know you exist, and they know you want drivers too. At some point ATI or AMD or both made a decision, almost certainly based on research, that it isn't in their interests to produce and maintain a set of drivers just for you guys. That is, the $60 you guys will spend on second hand new video cards over the next 5 years doesn't justify the cost to create, maintain and distribute your drivers.
Don't like it, buy nVidia. Or find a million new users who can demonstrate there's demand for more high end video cards on Linux. - SniperGX1, on 10/12/2007, -3/+15Yeah they are screwed, they only provide the graphics for two of the three next gen videogame consoles, every machine Apple releases, and comes standard in many other machines. Not to mention all the processors AMD/ATI sells for embedded systems, pc's, and other devices. You are right, no linux drivers, they are *****
- Tacobake, on 10/12/2007, -1/+12My laptop is ATI I'm stuck with it :(
- Ouze, on 10/12/2007, -2/+12this article was 1 pages worth of actual content and 20 pages worth of ads worked across 5 pages.
- zachlutz, on 10/12/2007, -2/+12ATI's Linux drivers do suck. It's becoming more apparent for me as Desktop Effects will not work under Ubuntu when running ATI's drivers, which don't support compositing. There was talk that AMD would release some of the source following their purchase of ATI, yet nothing has been done...
I'm looking verry closely at Intel's upcoming GMA X3000 graphics system. It's got a lot more horsepower than previous generations, and is open source. - KibibyteBrain, on 10/12/2007, -2/+11Unfortunately, my school made me buy a laptop with a FireGL in it. If you think the mainstream ATI driver support is bad, you would not imagine how horrible having a laptop with a FireGL in it is driver support wise. Makes me beg for Intel integrated graphics - quite sad considering its a cream of the crop chip under the hood!
- silenceHR, on 10/12/2007, -2/+11i really likd ATi ... but i want Linux drivers .. after 3-4 years, welcome back Nvidia ...
- HerbertScrunge, on 10/12/2007, -2/+10"Why exactly should ATI spend lots of time and resources on Linux drivers?"
Well, they don't have to if they don't want to. It seems a little odd to me not to, though, when this is precisely what their *arch-competitor* is doing. Or rather, nVidia's drivers seem to be sufficiently well-written that a port to and maintenance of a Linux branch is manageable: I doubt they are spending "lots of time and resources" on the portion of them that is Linux-specific. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -2/+10What's their excuse for not adding it?
Are they actively ignoring it, or have they acknowledged it?
Is there a financial reason that would affect their choice in adding it?
I've always wondered why companies like this don't go balls out for Linux support. *****, if you had a card by a company that you knew supported Linux 100%, wouldn't you be inclined to buy it? I know I would. - InsaneMachine, on 10/12/2007, -5/+13And I am sure it is really hard to include some code that detects whether the user is running a supported video card so the desktop effects can be turned on.
- crazybrit, on 10/12/2007, -1/+8Yeah, I upgraded to a Radeon 9600 Pro because I got it on the cheap. The open source drivers work just fine for me, actually.
- Visceral, on 10/12/2007, -3/+10Both ATI and Creative have been real *****-suckers when it comes to Linux driver support. I finally ditched ATI and bought an 8800ts from Nvidia and while my x-fi is a useless piece of ***** in linux, it does work nice in xp. I was lucky to have onboard sound I can use in Linux.
They can both suck a nut, neither of their products are anything I can't live without. - stable, on 10/12/2007, -2/+8Yeah, I totally agree with this motto: vote with your wallet, buy NVIDIA!
- subxero37, on 10/12/2007, -5/+10I didn't figure I'd see an article on this so soon after trying Ubuntu Feisty on my new laptop -- I couldn't get the ATI drivers to work for *nothing.* No matter which guide I followed (there aren't many, and the guides that do exist differ from each other completely) it never ended up working, and eventually booting Linux was impossible and I had to reinstall it. I gave up shortly thereafter and installed Windows XP SP2.
It's my belief that even under Windows, ATI's drivers are absolutely terrible. Horrendous. Filthy. Their cards are just fine. Their drivers just suck.
Long story short: AMD needs to kick ATI's ass into writing software that doesn't suck. - coder_cotton, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6AMD knows:
http://support.ati.com/ics/support/default.asp?deptID=894&task=knowledge&questionID=26907 - drag, on 10/12/2007, -3/+8Don't get me wrong either.
I don't hate ATI or anything like that.
I actually quite like AMD. They have always been much better at Linux support in the past then Intel, but Intel has caught up to them and is actually better nowadays since ATI support sucks so badly.
If ATI was to properly support Linux with open source developer support then I'd go out and buy a ATI video card in heartbeat, but they don't so I won't.
It's financial. It's business. Not personal.
The reality of the situation is that if you want good, stable, 3d support with out usually a lot of hassles then you want a Intel motherboard.
Get a 945g motherboard right now.
The G965 motherboard provides for better 3D performance and support extra hardware features like hardware accelerated shading languages and hardware accelerated transforms and lighting, but G965 driver support in Linux isn't matured yet. So get one if you want better performance, but expect a couple niggling issues for a while longer. With X.org 7.3 release and newer Linux kernel releases the G965 support should be pretty solid.
If you require high performance 3D graphics then Nvidia is the only game in town. Intel may be better supported, but Nvidia is the only people that offer decent drivers and high end 3D support for Linux.
Hopefully ATI will learn their lesson, but I am not going to hold my breath. - pepote, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5I hate Nvidia because they bought 3DFX... to never release a driver again.
You people don't see that if ATI falls, Nvidia will ***** us alive? Just as MicroSoft...
Saw this "the way is meant to be played" ad in EVERY GAME?
Scary...
Monopoly-no-good. - oliveroms, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5I for one am sticking with my card until the Intel ones start appearing, that'll be my next upgrade. AMD cpu with Intel graphics, interesting match.
- Daiken, on 10/12/2007, -6/+10Agreed. Unfortunately linux users are a small percentage of ATI's consumer market. It's simple supply and demand. The more linux becomes popular, the greater the demand, the more service you'll get.
- synthox, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4I am getting tired of reading daily about ATI linux drivers....
How about not putting an ATI card into a box? Slap a nvidia card in and move on with life and lets talk about somthing else for the love of Pete! - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -3/+7i brought a nvidia card after upgrading from a supportless 9500pro. (thats right the drivers that suck dont even work for that model!)
kthxbai ATI - Apreche, on 10/12/2007, -2/+5People. Just buy NVIDIA. If ATi isn't up to snuff, screw 'em. All these articles that say "Please ATi, please respect us", are not going to work. It shows that people will buy ATi cards whether they do it or not. We need to completely boycott ATi until they are doing as good a job as NVIDIA.
BOYCOTT ATI until it happens. That's the only way. - Wootery, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3nVidia would be too scared of frightening people off with the word "Linux".
- subxero37, on 10/12/2007, -2/+5Yeah, *that'll* solve the problem.
(Don't take it negatively -- I've done close to the same. Well, kinda. Ignore that sentence.) - loker269, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3lots of companies have close to the same number of bugs but do not keep a schedule like ATI so they go unfixed for months at a time.....It is not low quality coding its just a fact of life that software has bugs....
- hadak, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4how about better windows drivers? that's the entire reason i refuse to use an ATI card (is the drivers) and why i'm boycotting amd.
bastards made me switch to an intel/nvidia combo. i *liked* my amd/nvidia... - oliveroms, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3I still (4 years and going) my ATI 9500Pro. I've used linux for more then that time, and though all the driver complaints are valid, my card is now so old, that performance isn't a real issue for me anymore anyway.
- PimpL, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3Well you might get better performance out of the Intel 950 video if ATI keeps it up. I'm glad this was brought up since I was looking to buy a Laptop very soon and most of the ones I saw had either 950's or ATI standard (for mild upgrade) but I will definitely choose the i950 or nVidia cards over ATI. I've always liked the nVidia drivers on my desktop machine, but I was thinking about trying out the ATI since I had heard that the drivers had improved since my Radeon 7000 days.
In one sense I don't care which card I use, I just want it to work under Linux and truthfully hardware is one of the more serious issues, as a Linux user, that keeps me loyal to a manufacturer....even if I choose to run Redmond on it, I know I will for sure run Linux on it too and more often.
Don't get me wrong I could care less what ATI does as long as I have an alternative or two, but I hope they will come around for everyone's sake. Its always nice to see a Major player co-operate with the open source community. - nixfu, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3What are you smoking about ACPI? Your clueless.
- Varz, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3I just finished installing Fedora Core 6 and after all the ***** I had to go to, just to get buggy support, I can honestly say I'm never buying another ***** ATi card again.
Nvidia for the ***** win. - nubtard, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3What linux could use is a gaming champion to announce their support for linux. Who are the people to beat these days? What if somebody like fatal1ty started playing on linux at some of the high profile lans he attended?
- loker269, on 10/12/2007, -4/+6Saying ATI's Linux drivers suck is fine....I wont argue that point because well they do!
But their Windows drivers are top notch.....I have not seen another company that keeps a schedule of one update each and EVERY month.....
On the matter of ATI Linux support....its just not feasible....what they should do is just GPL their drivers and let the community take over..... - fgsfds, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2While their drivers did suck 6-8 years ago, that's not the case anymore. They aren't better than nVidia yet, but they've managed to make it into the same ballpark.
- Netrilix, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2To be honest, I can't stand ATI driver support even on Windows. Sure, I may be biased because I bought an HDTV Wonder back when those were being sold (they've since been recalled because the drivers and control center were complete *****), but I've had almost as much hatred for the rest of their products.
- spikes, on 10/12/2007, -5/+7Well at least ATI is trying, unlike Creative Labs and their X-Fi. I took my anger to my X-Fi tonight when I found out Creative "delayed" Linux support further.
http://www.spykes.net/spike/2007_04_15-00_28_03.jpg
Never again will I buy Creative products. Hopefully ATI's drivers continue to get better over time. - Wootery, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2So you can't trade it in for a low-end laptop with an integrated Intel graphics chip?
No pretty graphics for you. - GMorgan, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4Their Windows driver is the same as their Linux driver so your claim one is better than the other seems a bit dishonest.
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