You've got to be joking. That is by no stretch of the imagination a suitable replacement for the VGA console. This is the perfect example of my last point about Free Software being no panacea.
Some jackass might suddenly take an Apple fanboy style approach and decide that you are obsolete.
Even with Free Software, the developers could decide to take the project off on some strange tangent that leaves you out in the cold. Unity and Wayland are both perfect examples of this. Having an ideologically pure solution is really no panacea.
Regardless of how smug you are, there's always some developer somewhere that can decide to screw you over and you will have limited recourse.
> My NVIDIA 8800GT card, I get the only resolution of 320x200
That's funny because my 8400 had no problem driving my monitor to it's native resolution. Even the libre drivers were able to do better than 320x200. Their main problem was performance.
> What I know is when nvidia came out, I was seeing > thousands of posts from people desperately seeking > answers on how to get them to work, and thousands > more on how to make their X Window survive upgrades.
Yeah, and they solved that problem. An entire module rebuild facility for kernel upgrades was probably developed just for Nvidia.
That benefits ATI blob drivers too. This is a good thing since you are unlikely to get suitable performance (if you care about that sort of thing) without the blob driver.
So that's why hardware on Windows isn't supported from one major release to the next?
Like anything else, what you are talking about sounds great in theory but doesn't actaully work out in practice. So the situation with the alternatives is not nearly as superior as one would be led to believe.
Every other major OS does not in fact have a "stable driver ABI".
So? The only relevant question is whether or not they work. This they do very well. They work because Nvidia decided to release a driver. The fact that Canonical or some power user decided to put a pretty bow on that driver really isn't relevant.
The drivers in the PPA has to come from somewhere.
> Linux doesn't offer a way to keep using the same binaries between releases
Sure it does. That's all automated now and has been for awhile. Hardware vendors don't have to be concerned about it beyond making sure they properly install stuff to use current features of Linux.
If they don't, someone else can. That's one way that different distributions can distinguish themselves. They can take up the slack in terms of integration work. They fill the role that Apple is reputed to for it's platforms.
So I can yank out one of my nvidia cards and put it in a Mac then and all will be sunshine and roses?
If some Lemming troll wants me to test his assertion that support for Linux lags, it's no problem for me to go down to Frys and prove him wrong. It's not quite so easy with a Mac.
Most of them simply aren't designed to accomodate any random video card I might pick up at a flea market.
They plain have plague warnings at the campgrounds in southern Utah. This stuff is by no means new. It's just relatively rare and pretty localized. It's unusual enough that it fits into the "man bites dog" category of the news. No one remembers that it happened before 5 or 10 or 15 years ago and nothing came of it then either.
The idea of a laptop only having one drive isn't set in stone either.
Although if you really care, chances are that you are going to just go full SSD. This kind of lukewarm product is really the worst of both worlds: higher cost and lower performance.
> MS brings computing to the masses and everyone gets pissed and cries.
MS brought viruses to the masses. They didn't do squat to bring computing the masses. The best they could do was ride IBM's coat tails and screw things up every step of the way.
Microsoft did it's best to DESTROY the companies that brought computing to the masses: Apple included.
No. What killed the other versions of NT was a total lack of commitment from Microsoft. They were token gestures that Microsoft never put any real ongoing effort into.
I don't even think Microsoft ported all of their stuff.
There's even proprietary stuff that shows up for weird versions of Linux. It's not just the Free Software and in-house stuff.
> Do you really think you'll ever see the day where you genuinely want to run a desktop OS and Office on such a small device?
Sure. Intel just announced a "desktop" system that's not much larger than an iPhone. Give a Phone an HDMI port and a USB port and a real OS and you can use it just like a desktop.
Size or what's built into the device in terms of input peripherals is really quite irrelevant. It's a red herring that only distracts the clueless.
Intel has not GPU? Are you kidding? Intel has a GPU. It may not be the greatest but they certainly have one. If you don't like it then you do the same thing with Intel kit that they do with ARM kit.
ARM isn't "magical" and its been needing more and more extras like HD decoder chips to share the load because it simply can't get enough IPC to do the job on its own.
The last time I checked, x86 needed extras like the GPU to offload HD decoding to as well.
When was that? 1999?
The x86 based AppleTV could manage HD decoding in software. Now while that was only true for MPEG2 and divx, it is still far beyond the ability of any CPU in subsequent ARM appliances.
You need to get into BluRay level stuff before something like an Atom needs a special decoder for video.
You can probably just get away with avoiding the relevant Microsoft-centric kernel modules. It's not their so-called contributions are very wide in scope.
> How is a service that started in 1999 relevant to 1994?
That which was debatable in 1994 was undeniable in 1999.
The market was ready.
The technology was ready.
The industry fought against the future tooth and nail just like they always have. They are an entrenched oligopoly. They have no self-interest in innovating. They guard the gates and take a large vig.
Many of us could claim that the market and technology were ready earlier. Rather than being mired in an argument about who has the better memory, a bold, clear, and undeniable example is far more efficient.
Slashdot Mirror
You've got to be joking. That is by no stretch of the imagination a suitable replacement for the VGA console. This is the perfect example of my last point about Free Software being no panacea.
Some jackass might suddenly take an Apple fanboy style approach and decide that you are obsolete.
There are simply no gaurantees.
Even with Free Software, the developers could decide to take the project off on some strange tangent that leaves you out in the cold. Unity and Wayland are both perfect examples of this. Having an ideologically pure solution is really no panacea.
Regardless of how smug you are, there's always some developer somewhere that can decide to screw you over and you will have limited recourse.
It's not even that. The driver will sort itself out automatically.
> My NVIDIA 8800GT card, I get the only resolution of 320x200
That's funny because my 8400 had no problem driving my monitor to it's native resolution. Even the libre drivers were able to do better than 320x200. Their main problem was performance.
> What I know is when nvidia came out, I was seeing
> thousands of posts from people desperately seeking
> answers on how to get them to work, and thousands
> more on how to make their X Window survive upgrades.
Yeah, and they solved that problem. An entire module rebuild facility for kernel upgrades was probably developed just for Nvidia.
That benefits ATI blob drivers too. This is a good thing since you are unlikely to get suitable performance (if you care about that sort of thing) without the blob driver.
> Every other major OS has a stable driver ABI.
So that's why hardware on Windows isn't supported from one major release to the next?
Like anything else, what you are talking about sounds great in theory but doesn't actaully work out in practice. So the situation with the alternatives is not nearly as superior as one would be led to believe.
Every other major OS does not in fact have a "stable driver ABI".
> Point 1. PPAs are not official nVidia's work
So? The only relevant question is whether or not they work. This they do very well. They work because Nvidia decided to release a driver. The fact that Canonical or some power user decided to put a pretty bow on that driver really isn't relevant.
The drivers in the PPA has to come from somewhere.
> Linux doesn't offer a way to keep using the same binaries between releases
Sure it does. That's all automated now and has been for awhile. Hardware vendors don't have to be concerned about it beyond making sure they properly install stuff to use current features of Linux.
If they don't, someone else can. That's one way that different distributions can distinguish themselves. They can take up the slack in terms of integration work. They fill the role that Apple is reputed to for it's platforms.
So I can yank out one of my nvidia cards and put it in a Mac then and all will be sunshine and roses?
If some Lemming troll wants me to test his assertion that support for Linux lags, it's no problem for me to go down to Frys and prove him wrong. It's not quite so easy with a Mac.
Most of them simply aren't designed to accomodate any random video card I might pick up at a flea market.
> When the OS is mostly a loss to the company. Linux then it's Linux's job.
Nvidia sells a lot of their high end gear to Linux customers.
That's why there's drivers for their consumer grade kit.
The idea that Linux doesn't make Nvidia any money simply ignores the facts. This seems to be more of a "purity" issue than a "support" issue.
They plain have plague warnings at the campgrounds in southern Utah. This stuff is by no means new. It's just relatively rare and pretty localized. It's unusual enough that it fits into the "man bites dog" category of the news. No one remembers that it happened before 5 or 10 or 15 years ago and nothing came of it then either.
Nope. We just did this kind of thing back when something as powerful as that ARM hardware was considered leading edge. We also did real work with it.
12 ARMs to replace a trailing edge x86? Funny.
The idea of a laptop only having one drive isn't set in stone either.
Although if you really care, chances are that you are going to just go full SSD. This kind of lukewarm product is really the worst of both worlds: higher cost and lower performance.
> MS brings computing to the masses and everyone gets pissed and cries.
MS brought viruses to the masses. They didn't do squat to bring computing the masses. The best they could do was ride IBM's coat tails and screw things up every step of the way.
Microsoft did it's best to DESTROY the companies that brought computing to the masses: Apple included.
Well then they need to advertise this fact better.
As a venue for highlighting interesting showcase applications, the Ubuntu Software Center sucks. This goes triple for the commercial stuff.
Just goes to show that a great idea isn't anything without a proper execution.
No. What killed the other versions of NT was a total lack of commitment from Microsoft. They were token gestures that Microsoft never put any real ongoing effort into.
I don't even think Microsoft ported all of their stuff.
There's even proprietary stuff that shows up for weird versions of Linux. It's not just the Free Software and in-house stuff.
> Do you really think you'll ever see the day where you genuinely want to run a desktop OS and Office on such a small device?
Sure. Intel just announced a "desktop" system that's not much larger than an iPhone. Give a Phone an HDMI port and a USB port and a real OS and you can use it just like a desktop.
Size or what's built into the device in terms of input peripherals is really quite irrelevant. It's a red herring that only distracts the clueless.
> i hear it is very popular this days to have low ID
That never ceases to amaze and amuse me whenever I hear it.
Slashdot chic? Hilarious!
Intel has not GPU? Are you kidding? Intel has a GPU. It may not be the greatest but they certainly have one. If you don't like it then you do the same thing with Intel kit that they do with ARM kit.
You grab 3rd party parts like Nvidia.
ARM isn't "magical" and its been needing more and more extras like HD decoder chips to share the load because it simply can't get enough IPC to do the job on its own.
The last time I checked, x86 needed extras like the GPU to offload HD decoding to as well.
When was that? 1999?
The x86 based AppleTV could manage HD decoding in software. Now while that was only true for MPEG2 and divx, it is still far beyond the ability of any CPU in subsequent ARM appliances.
You need to get into BluRay level stuff before something like an Atom needs a special decoder for video.
Use alien and treat it like a generic tarball if you need too.
Some people even call those "Slackware packages".
Modern Microsoft practices?
You mean like subverting standards bodies, patent trolling over vfat, and pushing ARM vendors to lock their bootloaders so Linux can't even start?
Those modern Microsoft practices?
Are you sure that's necessary.
You can probably just get away with avoiding the relevant Microsoft-centric kernel modules. It's not their so-called contributions are very wide in scope.
> How is a service that started in 1999 relevant to 1994?
That which was debatable in 1994 was undeniable in 1999.
The market was ready.
The technology was ready.
The industry fought against the future tooth and nail just like they always have. They are an entrenched oligopoly. They have no self-interest in innovating. They guard the gates and take a large vig.
Many of us could claim that the market and technology were ready earlier. Rather than being mired in an argument about who has the better memory, a bold, clear, and undeniable example is far more efficient.
Most of my MP3 collection predates Napster.
What's to buy or pirate?
Chances are that every Ubuntu and Windows user was force fed a copy of Windows with whatever PC they happened to buy.
"Buying" and "Pirating" are not really necessary here.
> Every system today required protection against malicious code and attacks. Wake up hippy, disco is over.
The best protection against malicious code is to learn from your mistakes and try not to repeat them.
Your proud ignorance is the best way to ensure that all of those past mistakes will be repeated over and over and over again.