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ATI Releases Drivers for XFree 4.3.0
Kyouryuu writes "ATI has finally released official drivers for XFree 4.3.0 and updated their Linux drivers to 3.7.0 for supported XFree versions, several months after the originally proposed release date of April last year. Although Schneider Digital has previously made available unofficial drivers, Linux users who have ATI Radeon cards can now benefit from an official release. Unfortunately, ATI still insists on using RPM exclusively and keeping the drivers closed source."
from the readme:
Some notes for debian users:
The debian Linux distribution in most cases does not come with the
ability to handle rpm packages with the rpm tool. But there is a
tool called "alien" which allows you to convert rpm files into the
debian supported *.deb package format. Please consult your debian
documentation on how to operate this tool.
A typcial debian installation commandline will look like this:
dpkg -i <ati_package_name>.deb
In order to override complaints (which might be caused by an already
installed package "xlibmesa3" that also provides the file libGL.so.1.2)
please use this installation command line:
dpkg -i --force-overwrite <ati_package_name>.deb
Hopefully this helps!
There is always rpm2tgz
Setec Astronomy
1. ATI has offered drivers since last year.
2. the RPM has nothing to do with being closed source. It has a binary "IP" library that gets linked in when you compile it... if you want to install on a non-rpm system use alien or some other method of unrpming it, then compile and install. Yes, it's still closed source, but rpm the reason for this.
What I'm upset about is that they have all the hooks for 64bit amd support in the wrapper code, but the binary IP driver is not released for x86_64.
> So what if the drivers are closed source?
No porting to ppc. No fixing minor bugs if they come up. No customizing the drivers to a particular application. No tinkering. No learning.
> ATI cant and wont expose the low level details of their hardware's functionality to competitors.
They can but they won't. Their competitors have competent engineers that can reverse engineer the stuff if needed. It's all in software anyway.
> Whats the difference anyway?
see above.
> It is naive to think that you could even understand, let alone improve, what the engineers - who know the hardware intimately - have written?
I think you are naive. There are plenty of smart people that do alot of linux work. Surely they know linux better than ATI, and thus they may be able to improve the drivers since it's not just the hardware that these drivers are specific too. Also they may be able to port the drivers to PPC or BSD.
> And by the way, Nvidia does not publish its source either...
What's your point? It would be better if they did.
It has been statistically shown that helmets increase the risk of head injury.
Portage downloads the rpm, pulls the content out and puts the pieces where they need to go.
Douglas P. Price