Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

Quadro or GTX for Linux gaming? (Theory)

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • Quadro or GTX for Linux gaming? (Theory)

    Now with Steam for Linux beta I have been messing around and I asked myself, which NVIDIA graphics card would be THE BEST for Linux gaming? (Not considering the price of those graphics cards.)
    As far as I know, NVIDIA Quadro cards are made for OpenGL performance. NVIDIA GTX cards are made for Windows games, so that means Direct X performance, if I got it right. So technically a Quadro would outperform a GTX on Linux gaming? (Please correct me if I'm wrong)
    Let's assume I'd buy a Quadro K5000 (cuz I'm totally a rich guy), is the commercial Linux driver for a Quadro any good on the Linux platform, or doesn't NVIDIA care about Quadro users on Linux at all? Does Linux itself support NVIDIA Quadro cards, especially the new ones?

    I need answers. That's my mission.
    (oh and I was joking about being rich )

  • #2
    It's the same driver. Performance differences would likely come down to the magnitude of the hardware only.

    However I do think they have some hooks in the driver to only allow certain features on the Quadro cards... IIRC.

    Comment


    • #3
      As far as I know it matters for stereoscopy because on opengl you need "quadbuffering" for stereoscopy and only the nvidia quadro cards to that, not the consumer line.

      Comment


      • #4
        Originally posted by johannreko View Post
        Now with Steam for Linux beta I have been messing around and I asked myself, which NVIDIA graphics card would be THE BEST for Linux gaming? (Not considering the price of those graphics cards.)
        Geforce is gaming series.

        Originally posted by johannreko View Post
        As far as I know, NVIDIA Quadro cards are made for OpenGL performance. NVIDIA GTX cards are made for Windows games, so that means Direct X performance, if I got it right.
        Quadro series is made for precision OpenGL and CAD/CAM.
        Geforce is made for fast OpenGL.
        There is no mention of windows and directx here, that are simply driver calls.

        Originally posted by johannreko View Post
        So technically a Quadro would outperform a GTX on Linux gaming? (Please correct me if I'm wrong)
        I am nearly sure you are wrong, Quadro unlike Geforce has no profiles or "optimizations" for games.
        They share same driver. Have similar hardware. The scarcity of workstation customers and responsibility result in the extra high price for Quadro cards. You get better support.
        But it would be cool to compare them in real gaming applications. I would be extremely surprised if Quadro wins any benchmark.

        There was at least however one exception! I don't remember the details, but nvidia disabled (crippled) acceleration of specific OpenGL extension only for non-Quadro cards.
        That extension was widely used for CAD/CAM software, but also used in 3D and video editors and generic software - which resulted in immediate sudden slowdowns for users.
        I think nvidia didn't react at all to whole bunch of massive flame speeches, but the incident was set. If there is engineering software that uses specific graphic property, that property will be disabled for non-Quadro cards.
        This will never happen with opensource drivers.

        Originally posted by johannreko View Post
        Let's assume I'd buy a Quadro K5000 (cuz I'm totally a rich guy), is the commercial Linux driver for a Quadro any good on the Linux platform, or doesn't NVIDIA care about Quadro users on Linux at all? Does Linux itself support NVIDIA Quadro cards, especially the new ones?

        I need answers. That's my mission.
        (oh and I was joking about being rich )
        If you are rich guy, spend money to support opensource driver. For example, by purchasing various AMD or Nvidia cards directly from company shops, notifying them about the goal, and sending the cards to developers. Or donate the money to top developers. This is the best option.
        If you don't care about opensource, buy good gaming components (this means geforce, for nvidia) and spend the money to charity.
        Or invest the money to multiply it.
        Last edited by crazycheese; 18 December 2012, 12:09 PM.

        Comment


        • #5
          Thanks for the good replies!
          Okay, I'll be sticking to GTX then. I'm actually pretty poor right now so I won't be buying anything for my PC rig for the next 2 years I guess. (Gotta finish my apprenticeship first)
          I was just curious about which graphics card is better on Linux gaming. I don't have the money to send stuff around the world for free to devs and I do like open source, but I'm good with closed source too.
          Thanks again!

          Comment

          Working...
          X