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Nvidia Releases Updated Drivers for FreeBSD
brsmith4 writes "Nvidia has released their latest drivers for the FreeBSD platform. This release addresses a number of issues and has been anticipated for well over a year. You will need at least 4.9-STABLE or any of the 5.x-CURRENT releases to install them. Some of the new features include added support for the latest NVIDIA GPUs including GeForce 6800 Series and improved interaction with -CURRENT's new threading libraries, not to mention the fact that my Dell laptop no longer shuts off the LCD when the driver gets loaded. The driver also provides tighter integration with the linux execution environment, making it very easy to run your favorite linux game titles. You can pick up the driver here. Pay no attention to the date, August 13th, 2003. It was a type-o."
This kind of support for open source users is what keeps me coming back to certain hardware manufacturers. The more companies realize this, the better it is for everyone.
If it was a bad type-o, then was it a type-o negative?
Will this work on 5.2.1 release or will I have to wait til 5 stablizes?
Worked for me. Getting better frame rates on BSD than on linux.
Well cough up the numbers then.
Huh? What is wrong with it?
This same troll has been posted every time a *BSD story has been run on Slashdot in recent memory. It's always posted anonymously, never identifies the mysterious "500 person company" that has decided to "convert fully to Open Source software and OSes." There is no indication of what their line of business is, what their servers are used for, what the desktop machines are used for, who the users are, etc. The "conclusion" speaks volumes about the intent: "Having considered the above factors, all of which are vitally important when implementing a new system in a company, we decided to go with Linux (primarily Debian for the reasons mentioned)." Yeah. Right. Another Debian Linux fanboy.
Think about it:
1. There are damned few companies converting everything from desktops to multi-cpu servers to open source all at once. That's inviting trouble.
2. What most companies do is identify applications that support their business and then select an OS based on that. You'll note that nowhere here are any specific apps mentioned. There are comments about "Debian's package repository", but how many businesses are concerned about huge numbers of often obscure *nix apps? Yeah, the secretary will be thrilled with the Debian-supplied copies of awk, yacc, grep, etc.
3. The "unbiased" review went into gobs of detail about speed, but, frankly, most desktop machines are so fast now that the average office worker wouldn't know if you removed half of the RAM and cut the CPU clock speed in half.
4. There was no mention about remote administration capabilities. How many corporate IT guys have no concerns about remote administration?
5. There was no mention of ramp-up time for the (presumably) Windows users or courses available for non-technical staff to learn the UI and apps. Like that's not going to be an issue!
6. Any mention of laptop compatability? Gee, that's suspicious, isn't it? How many businesses have no laptops?
7. There was no discussion of moving data, converting data from the existing format to the new format, etc. What a joke!
The whole piece was written by some Linux fanboy trying to pretend that he's in a corporate IT role. Don't fall for it.
I don't mind running a few closed source binaries in otherwise open systems. As a result, I have a working video driver written by those who designed the hardware. I've personally had better luck with the nVidia cards, I'm just glad they made the effort.
/is/ good for the community.
Besides, more people deciding to run open source OSes because they work with a wide range of new video cards
An update every 6 months is welcome for sure ! I hope they will sync their release path with the Linux drivers, THAT would be awesome (ie when the Linux driver is avaiable, the FreeBSD one will be (or within days...)).
> One can only hope those "certain hardware manufacturers" aren't the ones that treat you like nVidia does. This is not "support", this is an opportunity to acquire a set of chains. Fans of the open source methodology ought to see how accepting proprietary code isn't going to make your system better--you're choosing to toss out the developmental advantages that open source advocates focus on (or instead not recognizing the limitations in ignoring software freedom for users). The free software community wasn't built by catering to software proprietors and it won't be sustained by giving into them.
That is all noice, and will appeal to people in the Linux/GPL world. FreeBSD does have a free and open source license, but has a different idea about development model, and don't try to express and pursue a political and social goal with their license.
This is not about the validity of your argument, but about the assumptions it is based on, which do not apply to everyone.
This is not about what you can currently do. This is about putting yourself in a position where independence is possible. If you choose to remain dependant when given enough information to behave otherwise, that's a choice that chiefly affects you (a freedom). But not having the information in the first place adversely affects everyone, even those with the skill and will to help themselves and others (a power). Some of us do read ingredient labels on food and cook from recipes because we care about what we eat. Some of us care about industrial processes that affect our air and water (such as plastic production) and, therefore, fight for an increased say in how we get plastic goods.
Digital Citizen
I think this was the most revealing part of your post -- don't dare express yourself politically because we can't handle any of that kind of discussion in here. One wonders then in what sense the user is in any way free with FreeBSD if one is relegated to backing such stifling anti-discussion.
Digital Citizen
Its just that no one cares, since it really isn't important.
Personally I fall into that category.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
I use linux, not BSD, but I imagine the two are close in some aspects. It took me literally a minute to install nVIDIA drivers on my gentoo box, whereas the "integrated graphics" I had prior to that took the better part of a day searching, patching various things, recompiling kernels, and installing. It is good to see that some hardware companies *do* care about open-source support. And I really don't care that the driver isn't open, as long as it's free (beer).
I'm pretty sure the submitter meant to say 5.x-release instead of 5.x current, since there's only one perpetual release of -current, not many.
===
Release Highlights:
> I think this was the most revealing part of your post
I think you cannot read.
> -- don't dare express yourself politically because we can't handle any of that kind of discussion in here.
Heh, no, just don't assume that everyone who is involved with writing open source software shares the same ideas that are very popular among GPL proponents.
Specifically, when looking at BSD licensed software, as is the case with FreeBSD (just in case you didn't notice yet, we were discussing FreeBSD, not Linux here), you may actually notice that the people designign and writing it don't care that much about 'the open source methodology' but about making something that is usable to everyone. You make closed source software? fine. Makign a card with closed source drivers? perfect, we don't care.
You make somethign wuith a closed source FreeBSD driver? great, if you want it will get listed as a FreeBSD supporting device.
If you think that pointing out the difference between that way of thinking, and the way of thinkign that is very popular among GPL 'fans' is stiffening the discussion, then well, too bad.
I do think tho that you are a bit oversensitive to statements that might be read as being negative with regards to the GPL, and thereby are doign the exact thing that you accuse me of, stiffenign discussion.
I did not do this. I would not do this because the GPL expresses a very different philosophy from the open source movement. I stated something that is true for all free software, including FreeBSD. Whatever motivates FreeBSD developers to continue their work isn't the point; the work they produce is licensed such that everyone (including users) gains software freedom. Therefore I'm grateful that FreeBSD's developers deliver software freedom to all of their users. Therefore I find it ironic that a user would choose to throw away this freedom and add on software which is completely uninspectable, unmodifiable, and possibly can't even be shared (the nVidia software). It seems more reasonable to me to get a different video card from a developer that doesn't treat you this way.
I understand that this is not a discussion of the Linux kernel. I'm looking at this situation in terms of what is being delivered, not why. But if I turn my attention to motivation it seems to me that you don't see the similarity between the motivations you're talking about.
The open source philosophy is a design methodology that aims to make more software available to businesses. For the open source movement, proprietary software is merely less technically efficient or sub-optimal than open source software. But the open source movement doesn't object to proprietary software. This movement can endorse software which doesn't qualify for being called "open source". Hence, delivering a gift of code on which anyone can build any other program (even proprietary programs) is compatible with what the open source movement aims to do. Also, Linus Torvalds' fork of the Linux kernel is developed with comparable motivation; Torvalds licensed the kernel under the GPL but he has made exceptions and given interpretations of the GPL which he believes allow for proprietary derivatives (such as the nVidia software).
Talking about software freedom rankles the open source movement because that movement was designed to get away from freedom talk. Freedom talk tends to make people think of user's rights which, in turn, leads to users distancing themselves from what proprietors offer. One famous software proprietor, Bill Gates, came to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign a few months ago and compared the GPL to the new BSD license along these lines stating how it was appropriate for universities to license under the new BSD license and inappropriate to license under the GPL. Gates was looking out for Microsoft's interests (and thus his own interests) essentially saying that it is a university's job to give Microsoft a gift of code.
I'm not against non-copylefted free software licenses. I think that programs licensed under them are a gift to everyone. Being a gift to everyone, there is a real risk that the developer and the free software community can suffer when a proprietor with superior advertising power makes a proprietary derivative and that derivative becomes accepted. A developer can end up competing against a derivative of their own code and the community can watch a proprietary incompatible modification make their version of the program functionally obsolete.
Digital Citizen
> I'm not against non-copylefted free software licenses. I think that programs licensed under them are a gift to everyone. Being a gift to everyone, there is a real risk that the developer and the free software community can suffer when a proprietor with superior advertising power makes a proprietary derivative and that derivative becomes accepted. A developer can end up competing against a derivative of their own code and the community can watch a proprietary incompatible modification make their version of the program functionally obsolete.
You see, that is where our difference lies, and where you do not seem to understand what many BSD developers seem to think.
They don't care if someoen does just what you described, and in fact Apple was very welcome to do so (that they made the result available with source is nice but not anything that was demanded in any way)
The simple difference is that for many who use the BSD license, it is a matter of making something to solve an issue for themselves, and simply not caring much for what others do with the result.
That is why while producing open source software, you will not find a strong care about it actually staying open when others do something with it, or for that matter about others taking a bit of it and making a binary only product that integrates nicely with it.
That Linus allowed the nVidia driver was with a specific explanation, and he has been far less willing to allow some other cases. It has to do with what you call a derivative work, and seeing how the nvidia driver doesn't exactly originate on the Linux platform, it is very difficult to consider it a derived work. The part that is a derived work is available under the gpl with source.
Btw, I am not endorsing one model over the other, merely pointing at an often occuring misconception.
Oh and in the BSD world you will also find people who care a lot about Freedom (Theo comes to mind), but you'll find that that freedom explicitly includes binary only derived works and binary only parts. They will often be unwillign to include those as standard part of the distribution, but that is another thing entirely.
These are all averages over five minute segments, same levels and scenes
Platforms: FreeBSD 5.2.1-CURRENT w/ ports/emulators/linux-base-8 (RedHat 8) vs. Fedora Core 2 w/ vanilla 2.6.7
Card: GeForce2Go 32Mb (Default CPU Clock and Mem Clock, obviously, since nvclock does not support mobile devices)
Quake 3:
Linux: 1024x768@32bit full detail settings 37.45fps
FreeBSD: 1024x768@32bit full detail settings 40.10fps
Endgame (chess screensaver):
Linux: 1024x768@32bit 42.78fps
FreeBSD: 1024x768@32bit 47.50fps
Return to Castle Wolfenstein:
Linux: 1024x768@32bit NVFog, 2xAniso, Full detail 33.40fps
FreeBSD: 1024x768@32bit NVFog, 2xAniso, Full detail 36.40fps
Atunnel Screensaver:
Linux: 1024x768@32bit 47.90fps
FreeBSD: 1024x768@32bit 43.74fps
Glxgears (obligatory):
Linux: 400x400@32bit window 724.20
FreeBSD: 400x400@32bit window 790.00
But I think I know why the (new) FreeBSD drivers are better than the linux ones released some time ago.
:-).
Simple - nVidia is trying out something new, and in order to get some testing they choose FreeBSD. If the drivers backfire, there will be less noise from the user-land. They can then always claim -well, its just some problem we encountered on BSD. Think of this as a beta-test. The new linux drivers should be just around the corner
But hey, nVidia has succeeded in making me give FreeBSD a test-drive.
Hey, YMMV. Don't call people liars if you can't prove the truth.
I'm pretty sure the proper interpretation of "4.x/-STABLE" would be "a 4.x release or -STABLE" and similarly for "5.x/-CURRENT" --> "a 5.x release or -CURRENT".
K.C.
Although the "Unix on the Desktop" market segment, as it relates to 3d cards and 3d games is small (but much more cooler) but they are making money, (just bought a 500 dollar 6800 Ultra from BFG, because of the GPU's Support for the Linux operating system I'm so fond of. Regardless, even if I did not make them any money the way NVIDIA is going about business is really smart. First off you have to realize their not all together a 3d card company. They do other things as well, Chipsets, Audio, Networks, etc. All these things work on... Windows NT6 95/98/ME 2000/XP XP_64 2003/2003-64 Etc (but we dont care about that) x86 Linux x86_64 Linux IA64 Linux and FreeBSD They'er optized chipset drivers are provided for the 2 Linux platforms they will usually be used for...x86 and x86_64. With all their products supported accross the board, it is clear that they are a company providing lean and mean technology across nearly the WHOLE computing spectrum. This kind of exposure shows how the company doenst just support all the little counter strike kiddies windows boxes with mid range graphics cards. God I hate valve. Nvidia's a real company providing excellent services for everyone. Screw ATI.