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Nvidia Releases Xserver and GLX for GeForce 256
rmmeyer writes "Looks like Nvidia has finally released a GLX driver and XFree86 server for their high performance video board, the GeForce 256.
I've been waiting with bated breath for this to come out since Linux support was announced WAY back before the chipset was released. Found the info on Linux Games "
I grabbed it at first sight ! :)))
.. I love my GL screensaver ... *grin* .. .. when trying to run some GL stuff .. but it's better then nothing :)
:)
Damn
It crashes my X once in a while
can't wait ot get unreal Tournament and Quake Arena on here
kudus to Nvidia
bain
Sanity is a majority vote.
Don't get too hyped up, these drivers are still very slow and don't nearly take advantage of the card, they are waiting for Xfree4.0 to write some decent drivers, they should have just wrote a fully accelerated GLX driver like the ones in Utah-GLX.
Hmmm. Anyone else besides me wish this were fully backwards compatible with the TNT2 and TNT cards?
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
As it said, this is not the holy grail DRI X 4.0 implementation yet obviously... and it still can't even take advantage of all of the card because of this. I just tried it out and the GL is slower the utah glx with X 3.3.3.1 ( nVidia's previous dynamic X server ). That was ok because I ditched 3.3.3.1 because licq would crash on a threading problem. So I started this up, but licq crashes even though it's supposedly 3.3.5. I can't work without licq unfortunately.... I'm running the regular 3.3.5 bin from xfree86.org now which is ok but I can't seem to get any of the ttf patches working with it ( i miss 3.3.3.1 only because nvidia's was patched to use ttf ). The new nvidia X bin isn't patched for ttf this time is it?
... glad to see that they got some more funding recently.
X 4.0 is basically the answer to all our 3d needs
rm -rf ~/.signature
Read the FAQ before asking -- it specifically says playing Quake3 on this preliminary driver is not recommended. XFree 4 will implement the DRI infrastructure needed for good Quake 3 performance. Quote:
Tell your friends about xenu.net
I was waiting impatiently for near SIX months for updated drivers from nVidia for this line of cards only to be let down once again. The improvements made to this set of drivers include 32bpp rendering an texturing improvements. The drivers are still slow and underdeveloped. The blame, so to speak, lies squarely on nVidia's refusal to release any register specs to their cards. They won't release DMA programming information either. John Carmack himself stated that if nVidia released their card specs, the utah glx list could probably hack together quality drivers in a few days. So what do we do? I guess we wait. In the meantime, we still don't have programming information, nor is nVidia likely to release it. What does this mean? I suspect it means that we'll be relying on nVidia for closed-source module addons to XFree for a while, until they become less paranoid about opening up.
Tom (from Tom's Hardware fame) just released a review of this card (DDR & SDR comparison), specs, and how it stacks up to the competition (G400 and MAXX). Worth a look here:
http://www6.tomshardwar e.com/graphic/00q1/000107/index.html
Woohoo! Only another year or year and half to take advantage of all that money spent! I can't wait. :)
They do give the sources to untar over your XFree86 sources. Looking at a couple of the files:
Copyright 1993-1999 NVIDIA, Corporation. All rights reserved.
NOTICE TO USER: The source code is copyrighted under U.S. and
international laws. Users and possessors of this source code are
hereby granted a nonexclusive, royalty-free copyright license to
use this code in individual and commercial software.
Hello,
It seems like they released accelereated 3d drivers not onl gor GeFORCE 256, but also for the rest of their product line. Including Riva 128, Riva 128ZX, TNT/2.
You can fetch these drivers from this link.
--
From the FAQ:
Q. What is new in the 3D acceleration module?
A. The 3D portion of the driver has been in updated to take better advantage of the RIVA TNT/TNT2 products. 3D rendering in 32bpp is now supported and textures are no longer limited to be square powers of 2. Support for NVIDIA GeForce 256 based products has also been added.
This is much better then the teaser they gave us in June. With the june driver and X 3.3.3.1 I would get around 14 fps in q3demo1. GLX module and X 3.3.5 gets me around 9. This driver with X 3.3.5 plays nice at 24. It doesn't sound like much, but its still an indirect rendering driver. I can settle with that till X 4.0 and DRI comes around. I'm just tired of nvidia getting a bad rep from the glx-dev folks.
And it is much more stable (though opening the register specs, ala 3dfx and matrox would be nicer) then the older driver. But still, I send my thanks. And you should too. Now.
Dave
--------
WWGD? (What Would Goku Do?)
I am the proud owner of both a TNT2 card (agp) and a voodoo3 2000 (pci). I use both of the cards and thanks to the fact that 3dfx has spent time and effort to have their video card work (and work well i might add) with linux, that is the main card that I use in my system. For my money, NVidia makes a better product (the GeForce rules all), but again does not have proper support for their product. So until I can get great (not mediocre) drivers for my TNT2 for linux, I will continue to support companies (3dfx) who do. And 3dfx makes a pretty decent product to boot.
~Jester
"I have great faith in fools: Self confidence my friends call it." ~Edgar Allan Poe
You can play quake 3, but I didn't notice any difference in speed from the drivers they released in the summer. The only major difference I can see from the TNT/TNT2 end is that they finally support 32bit color depth. On my K6-400, I'm getting about 15fps in quake3 on the "fastest" setting, which goes to about 8-10 when it counts, in a dogfight with someone else.
A friend of mine has an Athlon 500 with the same TNT2 as me, and he gets 20-30fps on the normal setting. So YMMV.
The explanation comes with installation instructions with the driver. The driver has not yet been optimised at all. The Glide API drivers used by the Voodoo Cards has had a lot more development time spent on it than nVidia has invested. Sure your framerate with the TNT was low at this time, but that will improve with the next major version of X.
By way of comparison, I get close 100fps in Q2 under Windows (NT 4 too, not the speedier 9x) on my Celeron 366. When we get better nVidia Linux drivers, the framerate and graphic quality will put the (now very out-dated IMO) Voodoo2 to shame.
I built myself an Athlon 500 machine with a GeForce (the highend version) Pro? I had consistent lockups in 3D Mode.
Ended up replacing it with a Voodoo3-3000 and had no more lockups. The Voodoo3-3000, while very nice, is no match for the video quality and speed of the GeForce card.
I'll probably go back to the GeForce card if these drivers turn out to be stable. The video quality is just... STUNNING!
Congrats to NVidia for getting on the ball and supporting their users!! Thank you.
Codifex Maximus ~ In search of... a shorter sig.
Linux is already a snappy server and it's becoming a wonderful desktop OS. I use it exclusively for Desktop and as a Server too.
As soon as Enhanced PnP and XFree86 4.0 are a reality, Linux will make new friends on the desktop. It's inevitable!
I think XFree86 4.0 will be the biggest leap for the desktop in quite some time. I'm not holding my breath but... I'm so excited I can hardly wait. (but I will).
Codifex Maximus ~ In search of... a shorter sig.
I couldn't play Quake2 under X with the previous release as it was too dark. Under NT, my Creative TNT drivers allow me to boost the gamma setting card (which I do before I play Q2). Before I waste my time trying out the new drivers (which apparently have caused some people to lock up), any word on whether this is still a problem?
Sorry nvidia but I want to drop my TNT2 for a G400 when I have enough money. I prefer to buy a more expensive video card having (almost) full Open specs even if on the paper the card has less power.
Have a look on ATI cards. Few months after saying that they help the OpenSource community, you can find a project for ATI on the Utah-Glx page. I found also a page on TV and Overlay for ATI [XFree team is planning overlay support for Matrox too].
I wanted to have a look on TNT spec to see how to use overlay for my TV card and .. I only found ugly software. I'm feed up of this open-closed specs you offer on your site.
Hey ! Friends ! Drop your nvidia card for a card of a compagny understanding the Open community.
"Hey, if anyone from nvidia is reading, I think it would take all of a single day or two to convert the existing nvidia glx driver to the same pseudo dma / real dma / direct rendering framework we have on the mga driver if some specs were released. It would be nice if we had unified functionality across all three chips, and it would be a major performance boost." http://list s.openprojects.net/pipermail/glx-dev/1999-December /002373.html is the link to the archive page for the message he posted. And he's right about that.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
The MGA driver, while it's not yet to the Beta level yet, is quality enough for them to ship the thing with Q3. That's going into a production release of a commercial product for sale. Isn't that quality enough for you? I'd consider it so, myself. It could take us a week or two max to get something in place. Shortly I plan on attempting to demonstrate this with the SiS or Trident chipsets (Yes, I KNOW the things are lame- but there's a lot of poor souls out there that are stuck with them because they're embedded on the motherboard of their cheap PCs.).
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
They may have come up with a real gem of an API (For Windows, maybe... I can't imagine an API that magically caters to the requirements of two radically dissimilar OS arch...), the problem with that is that without the specs, we can't fix the API- we're beholden to them for fixes, of which, NVidia has not been forthcoming, claiming they're waiting for the DRI release for the "real thing" from them (C'mon guys, DRI's out already- just make a DRI driver for 3.9.17!).
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
Oh, come on. For most people, it's not about bragging rights (though that would be a bonus, of course) or a blind anti-MS attitude; it's about people who genuinely prefer to do their computing in Linux, and like to play games, and don't want to be forced to dual-boot just to play games.
Personally, if I had the money for 2 high-end boxes (I have a Celeron 400 dual-boot, and a P-166 dedicated Linux box), and the space to set them both up at my desk, I couldn't care less about not having the 'Moral High Ground' of doing everything in Linux. I would just make one box into a game machine, and use the other for work. But dual-booting can be incredibly annoying, and Linux isn't inherently incapable of playing games, so why not try to have it all?
Afterall, progress never came from being satisfied with the way things are.
Chris
San Francisco values: compassion, tolerance, respect, intelligence