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Dell Asking ATI For Better Linux Drivers
Open Source IT writes "According to a presentation at Ubuntu Live 2007, Dell is working on getting better ATI drivers for Linux for use in its Linux offerings. While it is not known whether the end product will end up as open source, with big businesses like Google and Dell now behind the push for better Linux graphics drivers, hopefully ATI will make the smart business decision and give customers what they want."
I must be the only person on Earth who hasn't had much problems with ATI's Linux drivers. Them dropping support for anything older than the 9600 series sucks, but I have been Thrilled with with the Linux performance of my Mobility Radeon x1600. Easily bests my Geforce 6800.
Beryl, XGL, Compiz, UT2003, Enemy Terrority, America's Army, all glass smooth and stable. I can run Beryl while playing high-def (1280p) x264 videos at the same time, too.
Still, better is better, and ATI's drivers do have some problems entering/leaving the console.
here just a couple days ago. Not sure how much better they are, but they are making some efforts.
Often, not as much is done in the hardware as is advertised. I have been told that examination of some modern graphics drivers reveals them to be very good implementions IN SOFTWARE of graphics libraries. If those companies were to release the source, their competitors drivers would gain in ability, and projects such as OpenGL might suddenly become a lot better.
Essentially, it is partly the case that graphics cards are hardware dongles for graphics libraries (drivers).
I would be nice if ATI released open source drivers, both for Linux and for Windows. However, none of the big graphics card manufacturers are likely to do that unless they believe that their own card can compete on a pure hardware basis alone. The fact that they don't do it, is evidence that these overpriced 3D watt-burning powerhogs aren't really all they are hyped up to be.
Even if ATI released 100% working, fast drivers, they would be useless if they weren't OPEN and FREE.
You people are all crazy about GPL/Open Source. "VIVA OPEN SOURCE WE WANT SOURCE CODES!". Seriously, how many *nix users contribute to OSS projects? How many contribute code? I bet a good bunch of people contribute because I've seen projects that have died and have been picked up by other developers to keep some applications alive so I won't deny the existence of contributors.
What I will say is that I would honestly prefer closed source drivers like Nvidia but that work correctly and perform great rather than open source drivers with the current ppl @ ATI. Call me crazy but why does every company that develop on Linux have to give in to this OSS idealogy, the idea of giving to the community in order to keep it alive? Seriously the company that do so are great but the companies that don't want to, it's their choice it's their product and it's their software.
Does ATI need to improve their drivers? Hell yes. Is the solution to open source their drivers? Maybe, maybe not. Get a good team of linux developers to regularly work on them at ATI and if the drivers perform great, you will see many happy ATI users who will not need to buy a Nvidia video card to simply to stay on Linux. Sure there will be a few pissed off GPL/OSS/Linux/Penguin zealots who will cry for the source code, too bad for them I guess.
I'm not holding my breath Me neither. I recently switched from ATI (on which I spent several days to get it to work but *still* suboptimal) to NVidia to get accelerated dualscreen and it Just Works. Never looked back. Sorry ATI, you're too late.
Visit http://ringbreak.dnd.utwente.nl/~mrjb/growingbettersoftware to download your free copy of the book
It's working. It's not fast and good karma isn't the motivation, but it IS working.
Lurking at the bottom of the gravity well, getting old
Haven't learned our lesson regarding security or portability have we?
Popular binary drivers had some unresolved, severe exploits and couldn't be bothered to address them for about two years. That's just an anecdote, but illustrates that the problem is real and not just theoretical. Anecdotes aside, there are inherent problems with binary-only drivers (or binary-only anything). For the obtuse, the interview with Theo de Raadt interview with Jonathan Gray and Damien Bergamini go into more details.
Production mistakes and design flaws aside, happen. That's why we get the effect that "given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow". But with binary-only that also means that nearly anything, from back doors to monitoring, can be piggybacked into the blob. You'd be hard pressed to find out. And depending on the vendor for the binary also leaves you dependent on their choice of architectures - not yours, and their lifecycle timeline - not yours.
Some, like the GP, may prefer the GPL, others may prefer other open source license. Whatever. Any of them is a far cry better than no source code.
Also, remember the open source is not just a license, but a development model. Popular hardware will gain development speed and quality for the drivers. It's not like the drivers have any inherent value without the hardware. Opening up the drivers would most likely boost the sales of the hardware they use.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.