AMD's UVD2-based XvBA Finally Does Something On Linux

[gbeauche]

It sounds like you didn't read my post properly. Please look at my last line again.

I have both type of cards and I do also have problems with my nvidia driver. Can you specify the problem you might have with fglrx?

You did not mention either the problems you had with the nvidia driver. Only that it was not FOSS, which is a non-(technical) problem. Besides, fglrx is not FOSS either.

FWIW, I have reported more than 50 bugs related to a specific use of the GPU for fglrx. There are 30 left, some for more than 6 or 12 months. One bug required only a 10 characters change, but it was fixed 8 months later. I reported only 3 bugs to NVIDIA and those were fixed within a week. I also reported 5 bugs to Intel and they were even faster for one: over the night! Though, one lasts for two months...

[Hans]

You did not mention either the problems you had with the nvidia driver. Only that it was not FOSS, which is a non-(technical) problem. Besides, fglrx is not FOSS either.

FWIW, I have reported more than 50 bugs related to a specific use of the GPU for fglrx. There are 30 left, some for more than 6 or 12 months. One bug required only a 10 characters change, but it was fixed 8 months later. I reported only 3 bugs to NVIDIA and those were fixed within a week. I also reported 5 bugs to Intel and they were even faster for one: over the night! Though, one lasts for two months...

If you would please read my post from yesterday. At least I mentioned 1 problem I also mentioned a bug with the fglrx driver.

Well again. I'm not for or against fglrx or nvidia. All I am saying is that the drivers have bugs on both sides. For what I am using the drivers, the bugs are not crucial to get my work done.

I just think that the oss approach seeing from AMD/ATI is the right one.

[monraaf]

If you would please read my post from yesterday. At least I mentioned 1 problem

That's impossible! Everyone here at phoronix knows that Nvidia drivers are perfect, LOL.

Seriously though, when I was still using an NVidia video card a couple of years ago I also had problems with the drivers.

* Tearing in videos.
* Xv not properly working with compositing.
* Random screen blanking when using DVI output.
* Really slow scrolling with Firefox on some websites.
* After suspend-to-ram, resume would reboot the machine.

To name a few. But I guess all is fixed and the drivers are perfect now

[mugginz]

Well again. I'm not for or against fglrx or nvidia. All I am saying is that the drivers have bugs on both sides. For what I am using the drivers, the bugs are not crucial to get my work done.

Are you suggesting the nVidia and ATI drivers are comparable though? Your statement suggests to a casual onlooker that it might be the case.

I just think that the oss approach seeing from AMD/ATI is the right one.

The FLOSS way is certainly the best way in the long run, but whether a card works as advertised and expected is a different issue than whether FLOSS or closed development is best.

[mugginz]

That's impossible! Everyone here at phoronix knows that Nvidia drivers are perfect, LOL.

Seriously though, when I was still using an NVidia video card a couple of years ago I also had problems with the drivers.

* Tearing in videos.
* Xv not properly working with compositing.
* Random screen blanking when using DVI output.
* Really slow scrolling with Firefox on some websites.
* After suspend-to-ram, resume would reboot the machine.

To name a few. But I guess all is fixed and the drivers are perfect now

I can personally vouch that the following graphics cards from nVidia don't display the above except for the suspend-to-ram as I don't use that feature myself.

• 6600GT
• 7600GS
• 8600GT
• 9800GT
  and now, from this afternoon,
• 8400GS

From the casual use of other systems that I don't own,

• GTX 260
• 7950 GTX

Also, general observations from recent benchmarks for ancient hardware (between about 8 and 10 years old) go, the following cards also worked very well (for their age) with compositing enabled. (Using Ubuntu 9.10 and 10.04 Beta)

• GeForce2 MX-400
• GeForce4 MX-440

[Hans]

Are you suggesting the nVidia and ATI drivers are comparable though? Your statement suggests to a casual onlooker that it might be the case.

Well if there are comparable depends on your usecase.

- If you game a lot in wine, fglrx might not by the one to chose. I have heard nvidia is better in this area, but haven't really tried it myself.

- If you want to watch movies in your computer, one might suggest nvidia as the best option because of its vdpau api. Well I don't have any problems watching movies with my fglrx either, but you have to use opengl as output. Radeon could also me a good choice. The xv quality in the oss drivers are very good. I don't need gpu accelerated decoding, because of my fast cpu.

- If you game native 3d games in linux, fglrx might be as good as nvidia. My hd 4560 rocks in native games.

- If you are "only" use your computer with 2d related tasks, I would recommend you to use the radeon oss driver. The radeon driver is a lot faster than both my nvidia and fglrx driver. Ofcourse its only subjective to say that, but I wont lie when I say radeon feels a lot faster.

Basically if you are not gaming in wine, I would recommend you a fglrx solution. Okay vaapi decoding is not that mature, but I don't miss it. I hardly use vdpau even if I see a lot of movies.

[QUOTE=mugginz;122838
The FLOSS way is certainly the best way in the long run, but whether a card works as advertised and expected is a different issue than whether FLOSS or closed development is best.[/QUOTE]

When the powermanagement is ready for the oss driver, I would mark it as almost ready. The only thing we need now is prober opengl 2.1 support.

[gbeauche]

- If you are "only" use your computer with 2d related tasks, I would recommend you to use the radeon oss driver. The radeon driver is a lot faster than both my nvidia and fglrx driver.

That's true.

Okay vaapi decoding is not that mature, but I don't miss it. I hardly use vdpau even if I see a lot of movies.

Both VAAPI and VDPAU are mature API. Implementations are also mature on many platforms. Please don't mix API and implementations. XvBA and the AMD implementation are just not mature. It could in two years if bugs are still fixed at the rate one per month, though. On the other hand, competitors would also have evolved by then. This is what I deeply regret. The ATI HW is very good, but the drivers are far from being usable in a real world, on Linux. And I'd prefer they focus on only one driver, but making it good.

[Hans]

Both VAAPI and VDPAU are mature API. Implementations are also mature on many platforms. Please don't mix API and implementations. XvBA and the AMD implementation are just not mature. It could in two years if bugs are still fixed at the rate one per month, though. On the other hand, competitors would also have evolved by then. This is what I deeply regret. The ATI HW is very good, but the drivers are far from being usable in a real world, on Linux. And I'd prefer they focus on only one driver, but making it good.

Sorry you are right. XvBA is not that mature. The vaapi api might be mature.

[mugginz]

Well if there are comparable depends on your usecase.

- If you game a lot in wine, fglrx might not by the one to chose. I have heard nvidia is better in this area, but haven't really tried it myself.

- If you want to watch movies in your computer, one might suggest nvidia as the best option because of its vdpau api. Well I don't have any problems watching movies with my fglrx either, but you have to use opengl as output. Radeon could also me a good choice. The xv quality in the oss drivers are very good. I don't need gpu accelerated decoding, because of my fast cpu.

- If you game native 3d games in linux, fglrx might be as good as nvidia. My hd 4560 rocks in native games.

- If you are "only" use your computer with 2d related tasks, I would recommend you to use the radeon oss driver. The radeon driver is a lot faster than both my nvidia and fglrx driver. Ofcourse its only subjective to say that, but I wont lie when I say radeon feels a lot faster.

Basically if you are not gaming in wine, I would recommend you a fglrx solution. Okay vaapi decoding is not that mature, but I don't miss it. I hardly use vdpau even if I see a lot of movies.



When the powermanagement is ready for the oss driver, I would mark it as almost ready. The only thing we need now is prober opengl 2.1 support.

It's good to hear that there are people having success with ATI cards, even if that means using different drivers depending on what you want to do at a given moment.

For your garden variety end user, you can't be asking them to switch to and back from one driver or another. Which driver is the best over all in your view and if sticking to just that driver, do you think it'd be viable for watching video, playing games, etc with no fuss? Also, would you be able to accomplish this with a distros standard driver set?

[Hans]

It's good to hear that there are people having success with ATI cards, even if that means using different drivers depending on what you want to do at a given moment.

For your garden variety end user, you can't be asking them to switch to and back from one driver or another. Which driver is the best over all in your view and if sticking to just that driver, do you think it'd be viable for watching video, playing games, etc with no fuss?

Well I am only using fglrx at the moment, because of my need of opencl. I don't have issues watching movies and playing native games.

If you want, I can test fglrx with wine. I might have some old windows games in a box somewhere.

Also, would you be able to accomplish this with a distros standard driver set?

Fglrx in the ubuntu lucid repo works fine.