best AMD motherboard for Linux

best AMD motherboard for Linux

[Eugene]

  Sorry to bother you kernel hackers. I have a simple question.

I am about to buy a new AMD Athlon system and I want to make sure I get 
 the hardware that works best with Linux. I am wondering whether I 
should get a nForce 2 or KT600 based motherboard. Specifically, I am 
looking at

Asus A7N8X-X
http://usa.asus.com/products/mb/socketa/a7n8x-x/overview.htm
nForce 2
Realtek ALC650 sound card
Realtek 8201BL network card

and

Gigabyte GA-7VT600-P-L
http://www.giga-byte.com/MotherBoard/Products/Products_GA-7VT600-P-L.htm
Northbridge : VIA KT600
Southbridge : VIA VT8237
Realtek ALC655 AC97 sound card
Realtek 8101L NIC


My primary requiremnet is that it must work well with Linux. I can 
handle downloading & installing drivers. If it works out of the box 
(without downloading binary drivers) that's even better. I am also 
planning to get GeForce FX graphics card, if it makes a difference. So 
which board is more compatibile?

thanks in advance,

Eugene

Re: best AMD motherboard for Linux

[ynezz]

WTF! I'm going mad YOU ignorant. Why the hell do you ask
for such thing on LKML ? God bless mailing-lists...

ynezz

-- 
A.C.A.B.

Re: best AMD motherboard for Linux

[DervishD]

    Hi Eugene :)

 * Eugene <spamacct11@yahoo.com> dixit:
> Asus A7N8X-X

    Look for the chipset. I think all KT chipsets are supported.

    IMHO your worst problem will be the video card :(( If you can
live with binary-only drivers, you can use nVidia, things like that.
I don't know new video cards that provide open source drivers, or
which ones are natively supported by the stock kernels, sorry :(

> Gigabyte GA-7VT600-P-L

    This should be supported. KT400 is supported (AFAIK), so KT600
may work.

> planning to get GeForce FX graphics card, if it makes a difference.

    Ask here before if you are planning to change your video card.

>So which board is more compatibile?

    I would make my bet for the Gigabyte one...

 * ynezz@hysteria.sk <ynezz@hysteria.sk> dixit:
> WTF! I'm going mad YOU ignorant. Why the hell do you ask
> for such thing on LKML ? God bless mailing-lists...

    Oh, ye olde kernel hacker... who hasn't write a line of code in
the kernel... Have you tried to be polite and stop making noise in
the list? Eugene is not an ignorant, since he has asked. You, on the
other hand, don't even have a name. Since you are very clever, you
won't mind if I write in spanish, gilipollas tonto del culo, es gente
como tú la que hace que las listas sean lugares insoportables, los
gaznápiros mendrugos que se creen algo porque se saben de memoria las
últimas notícias de los lugares para enterados. Bravo por tamaña
expresión de estulticia. Ahora a ver si encuentras quien te traduzca
esto, and sorry to the list for the flame bit, but I can't stand such
gilipollas.

    Raúl Núñez de Arenas Coronado

-- 
Linux Registered User 88736
http://www.pleyades.net & http://raul.pleyades.net/

Re: best AMD motherboard for Linux

[Patrick Plattes]

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On Sun, Dec 28, 2003 at 06:48:28PM +0100, DervishD wrote:
>     Hi Eugene :)
>
>     Oh, ye olde kernel hacker... who hasn't write a line of code in
> the kernel... Have you tried to be polite and stop making noise in
> [...]

hey, be cool :)

and eugene: there are some websites, which are able to help you -
normally much faster and better than any mailing-list can do. normally
the distributor has a database with supported hardware. if you
distributer has no database online have a look at websites from other
distributors, maybe:
http://hardwaredb.suse.de/?LANG=en_UK
http://hardware.redhat.com/hcl/

or:
http://www.linuxhardware.org/

i think that you will finde an answer much faster, than anybody can
write an e-mail ;)

cu
pp


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Re: best AMD motherboard for Linux

[Tomas Szepe]

On Dec-28 2003, Sun, 18:48 +0100
DervishD <raul@pleyades.net> wrote:

> > planning to get GeForce FX graphics card, if it makes a difference.
> 
>     Ask here before if you are planning to change your video card.

nVidia translates to "trouble" around here.  Selected Radeon cards,
on the other hand, work perfectly with opensource drivers and should
perform comparably.

>     I would make my bet for the Gigabyte one...

Me too.

> expresión de estulticia. Ahora a ver si encuentras quien te traduzca
> esto, and sorry to the list for the flame bit, but I can't stand such
> gilipollas.

Ignore the idiots if possible, it will make your life easier.

-- 
Tomas Szepe <szepe@pinerecords.com>

Re: best AMD motherboard for Linux

[Shawn]

I run the Asus KT600 w/ SATA, and all is dandy here. I love it, as my
UP_IOAPIC works (is wired correctly) unlike on my Biostar board.

On Sun, 2003-12-28 at 15:10, Patrick Plattes wrote:
> On Sun, Dec 28, 2003 at 06:48:28PM +0100, DervishD wrote:
> >     Hi Eugene :)
> >
> >     Oh, ye olde kernel hacker... who hasn't write a line of code in
> > the kernel... Have you tried to be polite and stop making noise in
> > [...]
> 
> hey, be cool :)
> 
> and eugene: there are some websites, which are able to help you -
> normally much faster and better than any mailing-list can do. normally
> the distributor has a database with supported hardware. if you
> distributer has no database online have a look at websites from other
> distributors, maybe:
> http://hardwaredb.suse.de/?LANG=en_UK
> http://hardware.redhat.com/hcl/
> 
> or:
> http://www.linuxhardware.org/
> 
> i think that you will finde an answer much faster, than anybody can
> write an e-mail ;)
> 
> cu
> pp
> 

Re: best AMD motherboard for Linux

[Shawn]

Hi there, Mr. Dick. Such questions are relevant, and germane. This list
is surprisingly suited to answer such questions.

Methinks /you're/ ignorant.

On Sun, 2003-12-28 at 11:20, ynezz@hysteria.sk wrote:
> WTF! I'm going mad YOU ignorant. Why the hell do you ask
> for such thing on LKML ? God bless mailing-lists...
> 
> ynezz

Re: best AMD motherboard for Linux

[Derek Foreman]

On Mon, 29 Dec 2003, Tomas Szepe wrote:

> On Dec-28 2003, Sun, 18:48 +0100
> DervishD <raul@pleyades.net> wrote:
>
> > > planning to get GeForce FX graphics card, if it makes a difference.
> >
> >     Ask here before if you are planning to change your video card.
>
> nVidia translates to "trouble" around here.  Selected Radeon cards,
> on the other hand, work perfectly with opensource drivers and should
> perform comparably.

I'm not sure how you're defining "comparably".  If you mean they get
similar numbers from glxgears, that's possible.  But the feature sets are
not at all comparable.  Nvidia's linux driver actually exposes the
features available on modern graphics hardware.

If you're going to advise against the use of their products in a public
forum, I suggest you be a lot more specific.

Re: best AMD motherboard for Linux

[Joel Jaeggli]

On Tue, 30 Dec 2003, Derek Foreman wrote:
> I'm not sure how you're defining "comparably".  If you mean they get
> similar numbers from glxgears, that's possible.  But the feature sets are
> not at all comparable.  Nvidia's linux driver actually exposes the
> features available on modern graphics hardware.
> 
> If you're going to advise against the use of their products in a public
> forum, I suggest you be a lot more specific.

For me at least  the nvidia driver substantially increased effort involved 
in dealing with a driver thats internals are not openly available, in 
boxes the test lots of kernels. notwithstanding that I still have two them. 

When dealing with laptops and apm/acpi issues I'd vastly prefer to have a
radeon mobility m7 in the box than virtually anything else, and rv200s
have in general been extremely easy for us to support among our users
given the integration of their drivers.
 
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-- 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- 
Joel Jaeggli  	       Unix Consulting 	       joelja@darkwing.uoregon.edu    
GPG Key Fingerprint:     5C6E 0104 BAF0 40B0 5BD3 C38B F000 35AB B67F 56B2

Re: best AMD motherboard for Linux

[Tomas Szepe]

On Dec-30 2003, Tue, 12:32 -0600
Derek Foreman <manmower@signalmarketing.com> wrote:

> > > > planning to get GeForce FX graphics card, if it makes a difference.
> > >
> > >     Ask here before if you are planning to change your video card.
> >
> > nVidia translates to "trouble" around here.  Selected Radeon cards,
> > on the other hand, work perfectly with opensource drivers and should
> > perform comparably.
> 
> I'm not sure how you're defining "comparably".  If you mean they get
> similar numbers from glxgears, that's possible.  But the feature sets are
> not at all comparable.  Nvidia's linux driver actually exposes the
> features available on modern graphics hardware.
> 
> If you're going to advise against the use of their products in a public
> forum, I suggest you be a lot more specific.

The person asking for advice was very articulate in what their primary
concerns in choosing hardware were, and my suggestion was made with those
in mind.  Yes, I'm convinced that a binary only driver is not an adequate
solution in "supporting linux."

And by the way, you are not being specific in naming the "features
available on modern graphics hardware," either.

-- 
Tomas Szepe <szepe@pinerecords.com>

Re: best AMD motherboard for Linux

[Derek Foreman]

On Tue, 30 Dec 2003, Tomas Szepe wrote:

> On Dec-30 2003, Tue, 12:32 -0600
> Derek Foreman <manmower@signalmarketing.com> wrote:
>
> > > > > planning to get GeForce FX graphics card, if it makes a difference.
> > > >
> > > >     Ask here before if you are planning to change your video card.
> > >
> > > nVidia translates to "trouble" around here.  Selected Radeon cards,
> > > on the other hand, work perfectly with opensource drivers and should
> > > perform comparably.
> >
> > I'm not sure how you're defining "comparably".  If you mean they get
> > similar numbers from glxgears, that's possible.  But the feature sets are
> > not at all comparable.  Nvidia's linux driver actually exposes the
> > features available on modern graphics hardware.
> >
> > If you're going to advise against the use of their products in a public
> > forum, I suggest you be a lot more specific.
>
> The person asking for advice was very articulate in what their primary
> concerns in choosing hardware were, and my suggestion was made with those
> in mind.

His primary requirement was that it (the motherboard) work well with
linux.  He stated that he was capable of installing drivers if he had to,
but it would be even better if it wasn't required.

Open source drivers, or whether nvidia fits your idea of a "linux
supporting company" were not on the stated list of requirements.

In fact, the message wasn't even asking for an opinion on the graphics
card.

>            Yes, I'm convinced that a binary only driver is not an adequate
> solution in "supporting linux."

Paying people to write the driver, write documentation for the driver, and
provide technical support for the driver does not meet your requirements
for "supporting linux"...  Your requirements seem steep indeed.

There are a lot of drivers in the linux source tree itself that are
just as closed to you and I as the nvidia ones.  Lots of companies only
give out their documentation under NDA to "appropriate open source
developers" (I thought one of the great things about opensource was that
everyone was an "appropriate developer").  So while we can look at the
source code, we don't have enough information about it to provide adequate
peer review or to fix bugs in it ourselves.

We still have to contact whoever has the complete documentation, and we
still have to wait for them to make a fix available.

> And by the way, you are not being specific in naming the "features
> available on modern graphics hardware," either.

Vertex programs, fragment programs, vertex buffer objects, to name a few
things.  These are also available in the closed source ATI drivers.

Run glxinfo and look at the gl version strings and the supported
extensions.  I'll send you the output of mine off-list if you'd like to do
a comparison.

If you really do have specific complaints about nvidia's drivers, it
would be polite to email them first - they do reply to their linux-bugs
email address.

Just claiming "nvidia translates into trouble" is really nothing more
than FUD.

Re: best AMD motherboard for Linux

[Tomas Szepe]

On Dec-30 2003, Tue, 18:46 -0600
Derek Foreman <manmower@signalmarketing.com> wrote:

> > > > nVidia translates to "trouble" around here.  Selected Radeon cards,
> > > > on the other hand, work perfectly with opensource drivers and should
> > > > perform comparably.
> > >
> > > I'm not sure how you're defining "comparably".  If you mean they get
> > > similar numbers from glxgears, that's possible.  But the feature sets are
> > > not at all comparable.  Nvidia's linux driver actually exposes the
> > > features available on modern graphics hardware.
> > >
> > > If you're going to advise against the use of their products in a public
> > > forum, I suggest you be a lot more specific.
> >
> > The person asking for advice was very articulate in what their primary
> > concerns in choosing hardware were, and my suggestion was made with those
> > in mind.
> 
> His primary requirement was that it (the motherboard) work well with
> linux.  He stated that he was capable of installing drivers if he had to,
> but it would be even better if it wasn't required.
> 
> Open source drivers, or whether nvidia fits your idea of a "linux
> supporting company" were not on the stated list of requirements.

Indirectly they were, if you admit that opensource drivers are "better"
for Linux users.  The person's goal was, let me quote, "to make sure
I get the hardware that works best with Linux."  I suggested they avoid
nVidia, because _my opinion_ is that binary-only drivers do not "work best."

> In fact, the message wasn't even asking for an opinion on the graphics
> card.

Yes and no, it did mention graphics hardware, and somebody started
a subthread in which I reacted.

> >            Yes, I'm convinced that a binary only driver is not an adequate
> > solution in "supporting linux."
> 
> Paying people to write the driver, write documentation for the driver, and
> provide technical support for the driver does not meet your requirements
> for "supporting linux"...

Indeed it doesn't -- this approach doesn't work for Linux.  Might work
for other operating systems, but it certainly doesn't work for Linux.

> Your requirements seem steep indeed.

Yes.

> There are a lot of drivers in the linux source tree itself that are
> just as closed to you and I as the nvidia ones.  Lots of companies only
> give out their documentation under NDA to "appropriate open source
> developers" (I thought one of the great things about opensource was that
> everyone was an "appropriate developer").  So while we can look at the
> source code, we don't have enough information about it to provide adequate
> peer review or to fix bugs in it ourselves.

Now, excuse me French, _this_ is a big load.  Come back when you've tried
to find out how a piece of hardware works with and without working driver
sources.

> We still have to contact whoever has the complete documentation, and we
> still have to wait for them to make a fix available.

Ok, I might not be able to add support for a new revision of a chip,
true enough.  Somebody will do it, eventually.  The important thing
you're ignoring is -- if such a driver is oopsing my box, I will be
able to fix it.

> > And by the way, you are not being specific in naming the "features
> > available on modern graphics hardware," either.
> 
> Vertex programs, fragment programs, vertex buffer objects, to name a few
> things.  These are also available in the closed source ATI drivers.
> 
> Run glxinfo and look at the gl version strings and the supported
> extensions.  I'll send you the output of mine off-list if you'd like to do
> a comparison.

No I don't, but thank you.

> If you really do have specific complaints about nvidia's drivers,
> it would be polite to email them first - they do reply to their
> linux-bugs email address.

No, thanks, I've had my share with nVidia's oopsing drivers.

> Just claiming "nvidia translates into trouble" is really nothing more
> than FUD.

No, it isn't.  Search the lkml archives for "OOPS Tainted nvdriver."

-- 
Tomas Szepe <szepe@pinerecords.com>

Re: best AMD motherboard for Linux

[Derek Foreman]

On Wed, 31 Dec 2003, Tomas Szepe wrote:

> On Dec-30 2003, Tue, 18:46 -0600
> Derek Foreman <manmower@signalmarketing.com> wrote:
>
> > His primary requirement was that it (the motherboard) work well with
> > linux.  He stated that he was capable of installing drivers if he had to,
> > but it would be even better if it wasn't required.
> >
> > Open source drivers, or whether nvidia fits your idea of a "linux
> > supporting company" were not on the stated list of requirements.
>
> Indirectly they were, if you admit that opensource drivers are "better"
> for Linux users.  The person's goal was, let me quote, "to make sure
> I get the hardware that works best with Linux."  I suggested they avoid
> nVidia, because _my opinion_ is that binary-only drivers do not "work best."

I think we're just going to have to disagree on what "work best" means.  I
choose to interpret it as a measure of driver functionality and
performance.

Your definition of "work best" is based on a political agenda, and not on
technical merit.

> > There are a lot of drivers in the linux source tree itself that are
> > just as closed to you and I as the nvidia ones.  Lots of companies only
> > give out their documentation under NDA to "appropriate open source
> > developers" (I thought one of the great things about opensource was that
> > everyone was an "appropriate developer").  So while we can look at the
> > source code, we don't have enough information about it to provide adequate
> > peer review or to fix bugs in it ourselves.
>
> Now, excuse me French, _this_ is a big load.  Come back when you've tried
> to find out how a piece of hardware works with and without working driver
> sources.

Excuse you indeed.  I have.

> > We still have to contact whoever has the complete documentation, and we
> > still have to wait for them to make a fix available.
>
> Ok, I might not be able to add support for a new revision of a chip,
> true enough.  Somebody will do it, eventually.  The important thing
> you're ignoring is -- if such a driver is oopsing my box, I will be
> able to fix it.

You will be able to fix a certain subset of possible problems.  Maybe you
can fix an OOPS or BUG if they're obvious enough, and have to do with
kernel interfaces and not the hardware itself.

If the driver is not properly accessing the hardware, and you don't
have the documentation, it's as much a black box to you as nvidia.o.

> > Just claiming "nvidia translates into trouble" is really nothing more
> > than FUD.
>
> No, it isn't.  Search the lkml archives for "OOPS Tainted nvdriver."

Of course it is.  And you're doing it again.  Performing that search
doesn't give any evidence that "nvidia is trouble", or even that their
graphics driver is unstable.  But the implication is that nvidia's drivers
will cause me problems.

This is getting quite unfocused.  My intended point is that saying "<foo>
is trouble" without any detail at all is misleading.  It gives the
impression that <foo> may not operate correctly, when the real issue at
hand here is that it is closed source.

Re: best AMD motherboard for Linux

[Lionel Bouton]

Derek Foreman wrote the following on 01/01/2004 07:15 AM :

>On Wed, 31 Dec 2003, Tomas Szepe wrote:
>
>  
>
>>On Dec-30 2003, Tue, 18:46 -0600
>>Derek Foreman <manmower@signalmarketing.com> wrote:
>>
>>    
>>
>>>His primary requirement was that it (the motherboard) work well with
>>>linux.  He stated that he was capable of installing drivers if he had to,
>>>but it would be even better if it wasn't required.
>>>
>>>Open source drivers, or whether nvidia fits your idea of a "linux
>>>supporting company" were not on the stated list of requirements.
>>>      
>>>
>>Indirectly they were, if you admit that opensource drivers are "better"
>>for Linux users.  The person's goal was, let me quote, "to make sure
>>I get the hardware that works best with Linux."  I suggested they avoid
>>nVidia, because _my opinion_ is that binary-only drivers do not "work best."
>>    
>>
>
>I think we're just going to have to disagree on what "work best" means.  I
>choose to interpret it as a measure of driver functionality and
>performance.
>
>Your definition of "work best" is based on a political agenda, and not on
>technical merit.
>
>  
>

Linux isn't a closed-source system where binary APIs are frozen, so 
working best with a set of specific kernels (and I don't even say kernel 
versions, I *mean* kernels, just search for threads on nvidia with 
kernels built with some perfectly legit gcc flags) doesn't mean it is 
working best with Linux.
What if Nvidia goes bankrupt in the future like 3DFX did, what do you do 
with your card ? throw it away ?

I type this e-mail on a Sony PCG-GRT785B laptop which happen to use a 
Geforce Go 420 chip. Until the 5328 nvidia driver, I couldn't even 
switch to a text console after starting X (search for this type of 
problems and you'll see that the laptop support is really lacking in 
their drivers). Even now software suspend is out of the question when 
the nvidia kernel module is loaded (even with X stopped). I was aware of 
the fact that I could encounter these problems when I purchased the 
laptop and was ready to use the OSS XFree driver without 3D support 
(unfortunately I found out that the ones shipped with RH9 don't work), 
so I assume them, but it's hardly what I'll call "working best"...

There's nothing political in saying that binary drivers don't work best. 
In fact it assumes a minimum understanding of the technical aspects 
involved in a Linux kernel to understand *why* they can't work best...

-- 
Lionel Bouton - inet6
---------------------------------------------------------------------
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 \/  \/_  / /_/   Tel. +33 (0) 1 41 44 85 36
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Re: best AMD motherboard for Linux

[Diego Calleja]

El Thu, 01 Jan 2004 18:04:07 +0100 Lionel Bouton <Lionel.Bouton@inet6.fr> escribió:

> Linux isn't a closed-source system where binary APIs are frozen, so 
> working best with a set of specific kernels (and I don't even say kernel 
> versions, I *mean* kernels, just search for threads on nvidia with 
> kernels built with some perfectly legit gcc flags) doesn't mean it is 
> working best with Linux.
> What if Nvidia goes bankrupt in the future like 3DFX did, what do you do 
> with your card ? throw it away ?


Yeah! I own a voodoo 3 3000 card. I've 100% opensource drivers. Under
windows XP, I suffer from hangs while playing some games. And looking
at the memory dump, the reponsible is the graphics driver, which
isn't updated just because tdfx has dissapeared, hence my voodoo card
is condemned to hang my box forever under windows.
And if anyone had a tdfx card in a powerpc machine, they could use it.
Unlike the propietary drivers: you have to use the framebuffer in your
ibook (with linux) because you don't have drivers for PPC. However,
Mac OS X has them....

Re: best AMD motherboard for Linux

[Martin Schlemmer]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 4317 bytes --]

On Thu, 2004-01-01 at 19:04, Lionel Bouton wrote:
> Derek Foreman wrote the following on 01/01/2004 07:15 AM :
> 
> >On Wed, 31 Dec 2003, Tomas Szepe wrote:
> >
> >  
> >
> >>On Dec-30 2003, Tue, 18:46 -0600
> >>Derek Foreman <manmower@signalmarketing.com> wrote:
> >>
> >>    
> >>
> >>>His primary requirement was that it (the motherboard) work well with
> >>>linux.  He stated that he was capable of installing drivers if he had to,
> >>>but it would be even better if it wasn't required.
> >>>
> >>>Open source drivers, or whether nvidia fits your idea of a "linux
> >>>supporting company" were not on the stated list of requirements.
> >>>      
> >>>
> >>Indirectly they were, if you admit that opensource drivers are "better"
> >>for Linux users.  The person's goal was, let me quote, "to make sure
> >>I get the hardware that works best with Linux."  I suggested they avoid
> >>nVidia, because _my opinion_ is that binary-only drivers do not "work best."
> >>    
> >>
> >
> >I think we're just going to have to disagree on what "work best" means.  I
> >choose to interpret it as a measure of driver functionality and
> >performance.
> >
> >Your definition of "work best" is based on a political agenda, and not on
> >technical merit.
> >
> >  
> >
> 
> Linux isn't a closed-source system where binary APIs are frozen, so 
> working best with a set of specific kernels (and I don't even say kernel 
> versions, I *mean* kernels, just search for threads on nvidia with 
> kernels built with some perfectly legit gcc flags) doesn't mean it is 
> working best with Linux.
> What if Nvidia goes bankrupt in the future like 3DFX did, what do you do 
> with your card ? throw it away ?
> 

The point which you and some of the others that maybe did not use
2.5.* on systems with nvidia cards, is that only the very specific
hardware calls is closed source (nvidia.o), the rest (kernel interface,
agp, vm, etc) is done with source that you need to compile.  Thus we
already (thanks to great work from a few guys at minion.de) used
a 2.4 driver with 2.5.  Also, a lot of 2.5/6 bugs, and guess what,
even 2.4 vm bugs was fixed, because we had most the source.

I even used it later with 2.5 and NPTL (when the first versions of
the GLX part that supported TLS came out), and to be honest, I have
had very little problems.  If I could not fix something myself, it
was usually very quickly fixed minion.de side.  Sure, maybe I am
just lucky (or maybe its because I do not use AMD, or VIA chipset
mobo - bug that is another story :D), but the fact is that for a
_lot_ of us out there, we had nVidia cards going 3D, while the
DRM/DRI was in a state of flux.  To be honest, _I_ have not had
much success with DRI in general.  If I could get it to work (this
means it actually initializes, and glxgears/glxinfo seems to use
direct rendering) with the SIS box at work, or with an ATI card
I borrowed, it would create artifacts, lockup, or such.  You do
not hear me going off about DRI on the list?

On the other hand, it seems you had issues :/  Maybe check that
you did not use rivafb - I never had issues like yours *shrug*.

I guess the point Derek wanted to make, and where I want to fill
in, is that you cannot say for a fact that something will work,
or not for all.  For some, the nvidia drivers works great, and
if you are into games, it will prob give better performance.  For
some it wont.  For some DRI works, for others, not.  And the 'its
a binary driver, so you cannot debug/fix it' does not hold the same
as it used to these days with the new types of ati/nvidia drivers.

If you are a 'open source fanatic', please keep your wits with you,
and do not try to get everything into a 'closed source is evil'
argument.  I am sure most of us are to some extend fanatic about
open source, but there is a time and a place.  The fact is, unless
something drastically happens to the commercial sector, we will always
have companies that do not want to fully release all specs, as they do
not want to loose their 'edge' - but you do not have to support them,
right?

Hey, its Linux - we have the choice, right?  Unfortunately it seems
that some still want to take that choice from others :/

<ramble/>


-- 
Martin Schlemmer

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Re: best AMD motherboard for Linux

[Derek Foreman]

Thanks for cutting down on the CCs, this is getting out of hand.

On Thu, 1 Jan 2004, Lionel Bouton wrote:

> Linux isn't a closed-source system where binary APIs are frozen, so
> working best with a set of specific kernels (and I don't even say kernel
> versions, I *mean* kernels, just search for threads on nvidia with
> kernels built with some perfectly legit gcc flags) doesn't mean it is
> working best with Linux.

There are features available in both the ati and nvidia closed source
drivers that are not available in DRI.  If I want "full use" of my
hardware, then DRI is does not "work best" for me.

Regardless, I should not have used the word "political" in my response to
Tomas.

> What if Nvidia goes bankrupt in the future like 3DFX did, what do you do
> with your card ? throw it away ?

What would probably happen, as has happened with the aureal vortex, is
that someone would maintain the open source wrapper.  Possibly until
someone reverse engineered the driver (as happened with the aureal vortex)
- but I wouldn't hold my breath on that for something as complicated as a
graphics card.

> I type this e-mail on a Sony PCG-GRT785B laptop which happen to use a
> Geforce Go 420 chip. Until the 5328 nvidia driver, I couldn't even
> switch to a text console after starting X (search for this type of
> problems and you'll see that the laptop support is really lacking in
> their drivers). Even now software suspend is out of the question when
> the nvidia kernel module is loaded (even with X stopped). I was aware of
> the fact that I could encounter these problems when I purchased the
> laptop and was ready to use the OSS XFree driver without 3D support
> (unfortunately I found out that the ones shipped with RH9 don't work),
> so I assume them, but it's hardly what I'll call "working best"...

Is nvidia aware of this issue?  If you're forced to keep that laptop, it
might be worth your time to bring it up with them.

Better would be to return the laptop and follow Joel Jaeggli's advice
from earlier in this same thread, but unfortunately that's probably not an
option.

> There's nothing political in saying that binary drivers don't work best.
> In fact it assumes a minimum understanding of the technical aspects
> involved in a Linux kernel to understand *why* they can't work best...

The closed source modules "work best" for me, as some of the code I play
with uses vertex buffer objects.

I realize that tomorrow nvidia could drop linux support, next week someone
could discover that echo HI\ MOM > /dev/nvidiactl gives them a root shell.

But for my situation, these things are an acceptable trade for the added
toys.

Re: best AMD motherboard for Linux

[Lionel Bouton]

Derek Foreman wrote the following on 01/01/2004 10:44 PM :

> [...]
>
>There are features available in both the ati and nvidia closed source
>drivers that are not available in DRI.  If I want "full use" of my
>hardware, then DRI is does not "work best" for me.
>
>  
>

We could argue endlessly on that subject. Let's agree that what 
*practically* works best for one doesn't automatically for another. My 
"best" in "they can't work best" conclusion referred to the utopic 
bug-free, adaptable to whatever changes in new kernels happen during the 
21st century driver.

>
>What would probably happen, as has happened with the aureal vortex, is
>that someone would maintain the open source wrapper.
>

You can't bet on it. You don't know which assumptions the binary code 
part makes on kernel structures' layouts.

> Is nvidia aware of this issue?


Yes they are, a bug report was already filed to them when I searched 
before posting mine. For the text mode, according to the nvidia people 
answering on their support forums this seems to come from the various 
ways hardware are initialised depending on the actual VGA BIOS. For the 
software suspend problem that bites me now this is probably the lack of 
ACPI support in their driver they are already well aware of but as 
swsusp is a patch to the 2.4 (and now 2.6), I don't think they'll take a 
bug report seriously anyway.

>Better would be to return the laptop and follow Joel Jaeggli's advice
>from earlier in this same thread, but unfortunately that's probably not an
>option.
>
>  
>

This laptop was the best hardware I could buy for the money and my 
needs. In fact my problems with the nvidia driver weren't even supposed 
to exist as I first planned to go the XFree86 nv driver way (without 3D 
support as I don't need it). Unfortunately, the LCD panel isn't setup 
properly by the OSS driver version distributed with RH9. I didn't have 
time to try XFree86 CVS so proprietary I went...

>The closed source modules "work best" for me, as some of the code I play
>with uses vertex buffer objects.
>
>I realize that tomorrow nvidia could drop linux support, next week someone
>could discover that echo HI\ MOM > /dev/nvidiactl gives them a root shell.
>
>But for my situation, these things are an acceptable trade for the added
>toys.
>
>  
>
As I said I agree that "work best for me" is obviously a variable...

My e-mail was only meant to bring some facts to the discussion 
describing the problems with proprietary drivers not a "burn all unholy 
hardware without proper OSS driver" flamewar starter.
In the hope that will help cool things down a little, best regards and 
happy new year,

-- 
Lionel Bouton - inet6
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Re: best AMD motherboard for Linux

[Yaroslav Klyukin]

Diego Calleja wrote:
> And if anyone had a tdfx card in a powerpc machine, they could use it.
> Unlike the propietary drivers: you have to use the framebuffer in your
> ibook (with linux) because you don't have drivers for PPC. However,
I have iBook with ATI video. IMHO, the use of framebuffer in _text_ mode is required, because of lack of fonts.
As for graphical mode, ati.2 AKA ?gatos? drivers work just fine.
It took me some struggle, before I could make this video card play movies with mplayer. Standard ati or radeon drivers, which
come with 4.3.0 XFree86 had have poor performance. Now I can play fullscreen on 600Mhz PPC CPU.
> Mac OS X has them....