Slashdot Mirror
AMD Releases 900+ Pages Of GPU Specs
An anonymous reader writes "Ending off the X Developer Summit this year, Matthew Tippett handed off ATI's GPU specifications to David Airlie on a CD. However, the specifications are also now available on the X.org site. Right now there is the RV630 Register Reference Guide and M56 Register Reference Guide. Expect more documentation (and 3D specifications) to arrive shortly. The new open-source R500/600 driver will be released early next week."
Linux kind of carried the Opteron for the first year or so, since it had 64-bit and NUMA support, while M$ obligingly waited to release any such thing until Intel had an offering as well. Maybe AMD learned something from that.
Oh, you're not stuck, you're just unable to let go of the onion rings.
"They've actually done it. It's time to buy an ATI card."
I've been recommending nVidia cards to everyone who asks, simply because their Linux support has been leagues ahead of ATI (now AMD, for those who haven't been paying attention). If the specs are credible enough to create a quality Free driver, then I'll switch to AMD in a heart beat.
They've released the specs, this doesn't mean anything yet. People forget just how complex graphics cards are. Writing a driver for something like a network card or SCSI controller is fairly easy, and that's also evident from how small the drivers are. There's just little to do. 3D cards are extremely complex, hence the massive amount of documentation. It isn't like there was just some magic number that needed releasing and the OSS drivers would be perfect with full support. There's now a ton of work to be done, since it sounds like it is just specs, not code, they are releasing.
So you'll probably want to wait and watch until the driver is ready to go and up to whatever performance and stability standards you need for your application. Switch now and you are likely to find yourself in essentially the same situation as before: ATi's binary driver, or an OSS driver that doesn't do what you want.
It'll be some time before this information can be transformed in to a fully functional, stable, fast driver. After all, if it were so easy, ATi and nVidia would have perfect drivers out on the launch of a new card and never need to do anything but minor updates.
It's about fucking time that companies realize the trickle-down effect of abusing nerds. Who do the ignorant masses go to when they need advice? Their nerdy friend...
ATI lost market share for almost the exact reason that IE did (albeit to less extent).
Buckle your ROFL belt, we're in for some LOLs.
For the record, Nvidia says otherwise.
You all should be grateful instead of pissing in their Cheerios."Thank you, oh benevolent masters, for supplying the software required to use the hardware that you gave me in exchange for money." Was that suitably deferential, or should I bend my knee more?
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?