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Gaming On Linux With Newest AMD Catalyst Driver Remains Slow
An anonymous reader writes The AMD Catalyst binary graphics driver has made a lot of improvements over the years, but it seems that NVIDIA is still leading in the Linux game with their shared cross-platform driver. Tests done by Phoronix of the Catalyst 15.3 Linux Beta found on Ubuntu 15.04 shows that NVIDIA continues leading over AMD Catalyst with several different GPUs on BioShock Infinite, a game finally released for Linux last week. With BioShock Infinite on Linux, years old mid-range GeForce GPUs were clobbering the high-end Radeon R9 290 and other recent AMD GPUs tested. The poor showing wasn't limited to BS:I though as the Metro Redux games were re-tested too on the new drivers and found the NVIDIA graphics still ran significantly faster and certainly a different story than under Windows.
Gaming on Linux is done with NVIDIA.
There isn't one single "Linux crowd", and not everyone, or even nearly everyone run Linux for political reasons. RMS Gnussolini's are very much minority.
I very much welcome any proprietary software on Linux that does the job better.
I jumped from nvidia to amd because nvidia drivers have become so bad if you're not on the "current flagship" card. There have been a hell of a lot of serious problems with nvidia drivers over the last two years on windows machines. Off the top of my head: TDR problem caused by drivers, the original thread on the nvidia forums was nearly 700k posts long, with 3m views. The fix apparently was due to them dropping voltages so low it caused the card to crash, that was fixed for about three releases and then right back to the beginning. The 400,500,600 series hard-crashes and lockups, that caused their driver to be revoked. A variety of HDMI audio bugs, probably the most famous was the "take over" of the system audio and resetting it to HDMI when no HDMI device was connected. The fan throttle bug that burned out video cards.
There are performance issues, but I haven't seen any earth shattering problems like that on the amd side. And most of those problems on the nvidia side have to do with them moving their core driver team too quickly to the most current cards, and failing to leave enough documentation for the "b squad" driver team.
Om, nomnomnom...
The new definition of hypocrisy:
When two or more people interested in the subject disagree on some areas of the subject in question.
Examples include:
Slashdotters commenting on RIAA discussion hate copyright. Slashdotters commenting on GPL discussion want stronger enforcement. Slashdotters are hypocrites.
People using Linux because open source say "F*ck you nVidia". People using Linux for gaming love nVidia drivers. People using Linux are hypocrites.
Peple driving Volvo trucks think Diesel is the only option. People driving Volvo cars think Diesel smoke cause lung cancer. Volvo drivers are hypocrites.
(I may or may not have made the last one up)
or perhaps techheads in general like to have their "special stuff".
When Windows 8 came out, I had 3 very nontechnical friends who found themselves "upgraded" to an interface which was completely foreign and confusing to them. They called me and said that their computers had "gone weird" on them. My solution was to put an xubuntu livecd into their drives and let them play with it for a bit. All 3 of them said that they preferred it because it "made more sense" and was "more like it used to be", all 3 agreed that I should wipe the windows partition and install xubuntu. All 3 are still using it.
(of which I am one)
LOL. A gamer is not a "techhead".
buy anything and it will work on Windows. Linux? I'd have to check first
Go buy a Packard Bell FastMedia Remote control and then come talk to me. You'll find it's simply impossible to use in anything newer than Windows me due to the WinNT line not allowing direct access to serial ports. Mine still works brilliantly in linux.
I literally can't remember the last time I plugged something into a linux machine and it didn't just work. It might have been around 2007, but I suspect it was more like 2003. And I get my hands on weird and wonderfully exotic hardware every now and then.
What does Linux in 2015 do that Windows does not?
Just a couple off the top of my head:
1. Shows you what it's doing when it's busy (assuming you bother to ask)
2. Mounts mounting volumes in virtually every filesystem ever invented
3. Supports loopback mounting (i.e mount an iso [or any disk image] without thirdparty software)
4. Supports more than 25 attached disks.
5. Boots into a live, usable environment from a USB stick or DVD
6. Has a themeable, customisable interface
7. Supports MUCH MUCH more hardware
8. Runs on ARM devices
9. Runs on a Space Station
10. Serves up most of the web's traffic
11. Provides virtually all of the world's supercomputing
12. Has tens of thousands of high-quality applications available for free and about 3 clicks away from being installed
13. Provides free, 1-click updates
14. Doesn't have any arbitrary limitations imposed based on how much you spent on it.
15. Doesn't need a virus scanner
16. Doesn't suck ass
Have you ever even used Linux? If you tried Red Hat 5.0 back in 1998, it's probably time you took another look. In 2015, it's superior to windows in every respect except one: available proprietary software. And that's changing.
Who needs Windows to run a word processor? Who needs Windows to run TurboTax when the preparation companies own web based products work just fine in almost any web browser? Who needs Windows for games when there's a BSD running PS4?
TurboTax via the web does work, but I still use the software program for various reasons. If you have a complex return (my return last year was 64 pages long), having it locally is easier to deal with. For simple returns, sure, use the web.
That being said, give it a try on Linux, it doesn't work without tricking it, since it is looking for a Windows or Mac based computer.
As for a word processor, not just any will do, it has to be MS Word. That is what the business world uses, if you do anything more than type simple notes, it needs to be in Word. Google Docs is nice, OpenOffice is nice. I've used both, neither compare to Word.
I don't need Windows
No, you don't, but you don't need a computer either. :)
You also don't need Linux, OS X would be just fine as well.