Driver Revolution -- How AMD can beat the Competition!

[Spydr4590]

What we want is functionality, but what does functionality mean? Functionality means a driver that you can install, being able to do common everyday activities on your computer. The common activities are watching videos, playing games, and a working 3D desktop.

What brought me to the Linux environment? The exceptional 3D desktop environments, that allowed me to manage tasks easier. Little to no viruses, light weight operating systems, and the lack of security on Windows. I foresee in the next decade Linux becoming an unstoppable force in small businesses and home use.

How can AMD ensure their dominance over every other video card manufacturer? It's pretty simple. We don't care how often you release a video driver or how many updates you've done. This means nothing. We want a driver that installs simply on multiple distributions, via single click. We want a driver that allows us to run 3D desktops, games, and videos without a hitch. Once you do this you will dominate the video card market via linux, windows, and apple. Thanks for your time.

[grantek]

We want a driver that installs simply on multiple distributions, via single click. We want a driver that allows us to run 3D desktops, games, and videos without a hitch.

Actually, we want an open-source driver so that you don't need to download one, it's already built into your OS.

A working driver is obviously what everyone's working towards. Regular releases help spur development, and give the benefit of letting users get features as they're developed. Otherwise, AMD would just be saying "come back in a year when we have a polished driver" - it takes time

[Heiko]

Actually I think installing a driver for an AMD card is already easier than for a nVidia card. For nVidia I have to shut down X (hmm, as I think of it, this might be only the case on older hardware, not sure about newer hardware) and I sometimes have the issue that the kernel module that is build doesn't match my kernel.

Last few times with AMD drivers no problems at all.

[trentgbs]

Actually, we want an open-source driver so that you don't need to download one, it's already built into your OS.

A working driver is obviously what everyone's working towards. Regular releases help spur development, and give the benefit of letting users get features as they're developed. Otherwise, AMD would just be saying "come back in a year when we have a polished driver" - it takes time

We want a open source driver so that we can actually use the expensive hardware that we payed for. Being tied to a semi-functional unpolished binary driver may just be an inconvenience right now. However in a few years when ati and nvidia have closed their doors all that we will have is that unpolished binary driver. With out a way to update the driver, all that hardware is useless. Take the older voodoo and matrox cards as an example, even though the hardware maybe outdated, the open source drivers can be updated for the current APIs. I can plug a 10 year old 3dfx Voodoo2 into a linux box running bleeding edge 2.6.27-rc4. Try doing that in Vista

[duby229]

Actually, we want an open-source driver so that you don't need to download one, it's already built into your OS.

A working driver is obviously what everyone's working towards. Regular releases help spur development, and give the benefit of letting users get features as they're developed. Otherwise, AMD would just be saying "come back in a year when we have a polished driver" - it takes time

Exactly. You hit the nail right on the head.