Goodbye ATI

[artivision]

I write in favour of Nvidia a lot in this forum, but not just because they have better cards. Actually I can make a 16 times more efficient card myself using opencores, a card with 1m transistors per 48-macs/hz when Nvida using 16m transistors (but the hardware must be open). The problem is that Amd cards are a failure on Linux, bad OpenGL, bad D3D to OGL translations, bad gpGpu. It is part of what I do to convince people to use Linux, but with an Amd card and Wine, usually they regret it and they fall back on Windows or a dual installation. That is the only bad thing for me, to be forced to use proprietary garbage. Closing knowledge and make it your property (patents for example), it is a crime against humanity and it is the battle of our century that we must win.

[crazycheese]

For what is worth, i am of the opinion that if someone wants to play the latest AAA PC games properly should have and AMD gpu paired with a Windows 7 desktop computer. Anything else is a waste. AMD simply has better hardware, and no amount of usual NVIDIA trickery will convince experienced gamers otherwise. But with todays gaming industry, even that is a total waste. Just buy an XBOX 360 and you are set. No need for a gaming pc anymore, all games are ports.

If you have Linux and want to game, then you are doing it wrong. Even the latest Wine doesn't support properly all games, has bugs, and a big performance hit compared to native Windows. Native Linux games suk and you don't need a 560Ti for them.

Your opinion is result of your experience. IF you use AMD, *this* is the opinion that comes out. *This* is what microsoft wants.

For what is worth, i am of the opinion that if someone wants to play the latest AAA PC games properly should have and AMD gpu paired with a Windows 7 desktop computer.

Wrong.
There is no such thing as "AAA PC games".
Also "AAA" does not mean it is anywhere good. Most of good games were not AAA.
AAA only means massive corporate resources were split on keyboard, which very often means closed platform, short life-time, lots of repeatitions, lack of anything original.

Windows 7 desktop computer.

Wrong.
Windows 7 is not a computer.

Just buy an XBOX 360 and you are set. No need for a gaming pc anymore, all games are ports.

Wrong.
Not all games are available on Xbox, maybe 10% of all.

AMD simply has better hardware, and no amount of usual NVIDIA trickery will convince experienced gamers otherwise.

Wrong.
AMD hardware is highly dependent upon driver (pre GCN) and GCN is not opensourced properly (was it ever?). Also, you are looking for good GFX bindings to graphics hardware, that is good working OpenGL. OpenGL within AMD drivers is worse than nvidia implementation.
So AMD is less compatible with Linux than Nvidia, no visual trickery.

If you have Linux and want to game, then you are doing it wrong.

Wrong.
You can game on DOS, Mac, Android, Linux, Windumbs, Iphone, SEGA.
Games are programs, so there are two ways to run them: native game is available or game is running emulated. Linux has native and can run games emulated, several thousands of titles.

Even the latest Wine doesn't support properly all games, has bugs, and a big performance hit compared to native Windows.

Wrong.
WINE supports MORE games than windows itself.
And as a bonus, the OS does not suck.
No performance hits.

Native Linux games suk and you don't need a 560Ti for them.

Wrong. No, but you. And a lot!
You do need very good card, if you want to play Xonotic or Alien Arena maxed.

For every other Linux use case, the open source radeon drivers are fine. And are becoming better with every new release. Plus will enable amd users to jump to Wayland as soon as it is ready. So unlike the OP, i will continue to buy only amd GPU/APUs in the near future and will promote those to people, both for Windows and Linux usage.

Wrong.
Which "other" Linux use case?
video acceleration was supported by nvidia long ago.
power managent too.
cuda too.
You mean for "frame buffer", like browsing your internets or office work? You dont need discrete card for this at all.

Plus will enable amd users to jump to Wayland as soon as it is ready. So unlike the OP, i will continue to buy only amd GPU/APUs in the near future and will promote those to people, both for Windows and Linux usage.

Wrong.
Noveau does not support Wayland?!
Or AMD catalyst supports Wayland?

So unlike the OP, i will continue to buy only amd GPU/APUs in the near future and will promote those to people, both for Windows and Linux usage.

Wrong.
Unlike the OP your are zombie, because all your "Linux usage" means basically - AMD sucks.
You should really try to "compare" instead of seeing linux in AMD-eyeglasses(tm).
Go spend like 150$ on nvidia hardware just to compare it with amd, then talk.

[TemplarGR]

@RealNC

No one censored you as far as i can tell. We just expressed the opinion that we don't give a fsck what you choose to buy.

@Crazycheese

Just lol. Just because i am bored doesn't mean i have to write a text wall to address the obvious wrong points you make. People in the forums have their own brains, they will use them. Have a nice day...

[RealNC]

@RealNC
No one censored you as far as i can tell. We just expressed the opinion that we don't give a fsck what you choose to buy.

By "we" you mean all three of you. The discussion in this thread pretty much proves that your team of three is actually what the others don't give a fsck about.

But I'm sure you'll continue to reply even though you pretend to not care.

[crazycheese]

Just lol. Just because i am bored doesn't mean i have to write a text wall to address the obvious wrong points you make. People in the forums have their own brains, they will use them. Have a nice day...

This is not windows forum, fyi. Go anandtech or somewhere else where you can dump your boredom to between game sessions. To me, every AMD user who has windows because of his crappy card, and who thinks its ok, just sucks. Have a nice day.

[Kano]

Well if you want a system with ati graphics you can buy now xbox 360 and next year a ps4 (even x86 compatible). But if you want to buy a gfx card for Linux gaming ati is maybe not the best choice. But even if 1% of ati users would not buy ati but would choose nvidia because of better linux drivers that would not change anything. Linux is definitely a small market, however nvidia seems to be more successfull (and even has got drivers for fbsd). Basically ati could learn from nvidia if they would not be so fixed in their decision they made in the past. And there are several examples of what could be better:

a) nobody needs 12 drivers release a year. not even win users, those need drivers with specific fixes for games if problems are there. ati cares about those bugs and releases many preview/hotfix drivers for win. in case of rage it took very long to fix it for any arch on any card, most likely because of limited opengl knowledge. in that area nvidia seems to shine much more.

b) in case of regressions and with the scheduled driver releases as exuse it takes ages to fix those. something introduced in 11-12 will be fixed 12-4, that is "normal", sometimes it can be 11 month as well. best: forget all prepared releases in advance, those will be outdated the day of release. if nobody would wait for a bugfix then all drivers would be the same more or less, then you don't need updates. if somebody really wants a fix then this time frame is too long.

c) if there IS a bug fixed driver then this is usally without signature file. Ok, i know how to workaround that since the beginning, but why use it at all? absolutely nobody will use a driver with a permanent logo. next is the pci-id list embedded in the control file and the aticonfig tool which show a slightly different logo/watermark. if you are lucky you can use a control file from another "supported" driver for your hardware to get rid of it, but if you have got absolutely latest graphics cards which are usually even pretty expensive then you really ask yourself why on earth is there a logo which was never seen on win? It should be known since the introduction of atom bios into the oss drivers that fglrx is a generic driver for a certain range of chips. even if a driver was not tested on a specific card there is no reason to show a HUGE warning that it was not tested. thats useless as it usually "works" if tested or not before.

d) new xserver / kernel support. well this is not covered by a-c but has to do which distro is a first class citizen in the ati universe. ubuntu seems to be the preferred distro and as long as ubuntu runs. sometimes u got a prelease driver that nobody else gets, is that the correct way? when you look at u 12.04 it looks that u fears that they will not get a fglrx release suitable for xserver 1.12. therefore u uses a really frankenstein xserver which allows fglrx to run. If u would ship 1.12 fglrx would most likely already have got support for it.

so what ati should do: follow upstream! nvidia is a good example that it could be done in reasonable time. ati does not even manage to patch the kernel module for newer point releases of 3.2.x (and 3.3). also new xservers should be supported at least since rc1 (if the changes are bigger maybe rc2). it is nice to see that the oss developers push upstream changes but it is bad to see that fglrx holds back those improvements for the masses just by ignorance. if fglrx would adopt faster to xserver changes (kernel changes could be patched in serveral cases using community patches) everything would be better. ubuntu is one huge distribution but it is not the only one. fglrx is definitely unfair that way. so please follow upstream development and now just ubuntu releases, that does not make sense for generic linux drivers.

ati cards could be much better for linux users if all issues would be corrected.

[D0pamine]

I don't understand...what if i pull a laptop out of the bin which has an amd gpu? should i put it back in the bin and post a rant on a forum? Wouldn't it be more productive to file/post bugs than write over dramatic cries of goodbye?

stay tuned for next weeks episode of the thread that wont die.....

[EDIT] I seem to be a senior member now - i demand a pension!

[elanthis]

This is not windows forum, fyi. Go anandtech or somewhere else where you can dump your boredom to between game sessions. To me, every AMD user who has windows because of his crappy card, and who thinks its ok, just sucks. Have a nice day.

You have the perfect username. I'm a bit jealous, actually. Mine's just a silly character name I used in a MUD once. Yours, sir, is a poetic masterpiece. Never have I seen a username that impeccably embodies the spirit of the entirety of one's posts.

[RealNC]

I don't understand...what if i pull a laptop out of the bin which has an amd gpu? should i put it back in the bin and post a rant on a forum? Wouldn't it be more productive to file/post bugs than write over dramatic cries of goodbye?

Bugs have been filed, of course. They stay for about a year, then they get closed because the driver is considered outdated and you're asked to try a new driver version. The bug is still there in the new version. This continues for 6 years, at which point you stop being their customer.

Any further questions?

[kraftman]

You have the perfect username. I'm a bit jealous, actually. Mine's just a silly character name I used in a MUD once. Yours, sir, is a poetic masterpiece. Never have I seen a username that impeccably embodies the spirit of the entirety of one's posts.

The difference is his posts makes sense and are more than bunch of FUD mixed with theory.