There was no comparison of Linux vs. OS X on the same hardware. IBM has the fastest servers around, I really doubt those numbers are a result of the hardware and the article pretty much pointed to the same conclusion. OS X is the hindrance in the "server" benchmarks, context switching and I/O latency kills OS X.
Those special purpose machines probably would NOT run the linpack test very fast. They are very much tailored to special computing (such as sound wave analysis:).
I don't know about other chipsets, but the new MGA driver outperforms AcceleratedX. Not only that, but there are more optimizations that are going to be made before the final release that should speed it up even more. Don't always believe the marketing drivel. Though, some of the cards will never be fully supported by XFree86 because the manufacturers refuse to release proper documentation. These cards will always run slower. My advice is to just not buy them.
Right now the Gx00 GLX drivers are being done on the XFree86 3 codebase. It is likely that the first public release of the accellerated GLX will be released on that codebase. Once optimizations are done on that codebase then porting to the new architecture will begin. There are some fairly substantial changes in how things are set up between the two architectures that could make it a fairly large port. On the plus side, 4.0 probably won't ship for a while so having something on the old server platform before 4.0 ships is good.
I definitely don't want this to turn into a chipset war, but a fast summary of who's making what, whose drivers are being open sourced or will be (3dfx, nVidia, Matrox, etc.), the state of 2D support and potential for 3D would be very helpful.
nVidia seems to be committed to supplying an XFree86 server, not just binary but also source. At this point they have a server that will do 16bit color with hardware accellerated GLX (no direct rendering yet). There is also a very good Matrox G200 GLX XFree86 server where most new development is happening. The nVidia server is based on the work done with the G200 server. DMA support is being added right now and will make the transition to PI's DRI smoother (John Carmack has been doing a lot of the DMA work for the G200). As soon as we can squeeze Intel for more AGP info we'll be able to take advantage of AGP texturing as well. At this point there is no support for any of AGP's enhanced features, it is just another PCI interface as far as the driver is concerned.
As for other cards, you can probably expect support for any new nVidia cards and the new Matrox G400 as well. It would be nice if 3DLabs showed some support for the Permedia 3, I think all they have given XFree86 is the 2D specs, no 3D. We'll see how things pan out in the next 6 months, there is definately growing support from a number of manufacturers.
You're talking about the XF86 4.0 architecture, right? The current 3.3.1 stuff has plenty of good support for nVidia, I used to run a Riva 128 and recently swapped in a TNT2 and the 2D X server is great.
Yeah, the DRI stuff only works with 4.0 architecture. The nVidia GLX drivers are based on the G200 work that has been going on for some time. There is a G200 driver for XFree86 4.0 so I would expect the G200 to have DRI support before any other card unless PI is actually working on doing a driver for another card themselves.
The first step in making the nVidia (or any other driver for that matter) work with the DRI is to write a 2D driver for the new XFree86 architecture. As far as I know, this hasn't happened with any of the Riva stuff yet.
Slashdot Mirror
There was no comparison of Linux vs. OS X on the same hardware. IBM has the fastest servers around, I really doubt those numbers are a result of the hardware and the article pretty much pointed to the same conclusion. OS X is the hindrance in the "server" benchmarks, context switching and I/O latency kills OS X.
Yes, I believe Diamond is going to be developing the drivers.
nVidia seems to be committed to supplying an XFree86 server, not just binary but also source. At this point they have a server that will do 16bit color with hardware accellerated GLX (no direct rendering yet). There is also a very good Matrox G200 GLX XFree86 server where most new development is happening. The nVidia server is based on the work done with the G200 server. DMA support is being added right now and will make the transition to PI's DRI smoother (John Carmack has been doing a lot of the DMA work for the G200). As soon as we can squeeze Intel for more AGP info we'll be able to take advantage of AGP texturing as well. At this point there is no support for any of AGP's enhanced features, it is just another PCI interface as far as the driver is concerned.
As for other cards, you can probably expect support for any new nVidia cards and the new Matrox G400 as well. It would be nice if 3DLabs showed some support for the Permedia 3, I think all they have given XFree86 is the 2D specs, no 3D. We'll see how things pan out in the next 6 months, there is definately growing support from a number of manufacturers.
Yeah, the DRI stuff only works with 4.0 architecture. The nVidia GLX drivers are based on the G200 work that has been going on for some time. There is a G200 driver for XFree86 4.0 so I would expect the G200 to have DRI support before any other card unless PI is actually working on doing a driver for another card themselves.
The first step in making the nVidia (or any other driver for that matter) work with the DRI is to write a 2D driver for the new XFree86 architecture. As far as I know, this hasn't happened with any of the Riva stuff yet.