GeForce 700 vs. Radeon Rx 200 Series With The Latest Linux Drivers

[oleid]

Is there any plan to give fglrx a better 2d performance so we can use composite desktops without performance loss? Again, I give the example of window resizing in ubuntu 14.04 with Unity DE.

That sort of stuff works fine on Gnome 3.12 with fglrx on ArchLinux (Antergos) -- as does the radeon driver.

[mmstick]

That's why many here are getting Nvidia cards or switching to them, right?

There's so many posts regarding the poor support of the binary drivers even though those should be easier to support compared to the FOSS drivers (which seem unsupported on two year-old hardware - VI aka R7/R9 etc. cards). Nvidia in Linux is close to the ones in Windows. Not so with the Catalyst.

I was looking at the R7 cards (mostly 260X and 265) but it looks like AMD is taking too long to support it as usual. This goes for the Catalyst drivers, too. 2D reportedly sucks. How can AMD not get a similar quality of driver comparable to the Windows one while Nvidia can? The work is separate between the binary and open source drivers yet there's complaints of bugs and the binary driver being unstable.

Glamor sounds like it's excessively buggy. So, with all these problems no matter if you use the blob or the FOSS driver, why use AMD and get headaches? Even if the Nvidia blob is a pain, it sound like the experience is more smooth when everything is set up properly. But, AMD doesn't support the Linux drivers despite $300+ cards being out over a year ago, already. :-(

I've got a R9 270X I just bought a month ago for $200 that runs perfectly fine in Unigine Valley in Linux with the FOSS drivers. Support isn't that bad. Glamor isn't excessively buggy, or buggy -- there are just codepaths that aren't optimized so rendering performance isn't nearly as high as it could be. Sticking with the FOSS driver gives better results, since it has significantly less bugs than Catalyst, and faster 2D rendering which benefits the desktop.

The issue I've had with NVIDIA drivers is I've never been able to figure out how to install one manually in Ubuntu. Even if you boot into single user mode, it doesn't seem to want to install correctly. At least with Catalyst you don't need to boot into single user mode to initiate the driver install phase -- just make a deb package from the installer and install it.

[deppman]

Why waste time with AMD?

The issue I've had with NVIDIA drivers is I've never been able to figure out how to install one manually in Ubuntu. Even if you boot into single user mode, it doesn't seem to want to install correctly. At least with Catalyst you don't need to boot into single user mode to initiate the driver install phase -- just make a deb package from the installer and install it.

I've installed NVIDIA drivers manually numerous times. The last I remember, I just stopped my X display manager, entered a pseudo-terminal, and typed in 'sudo ./install-nvidia.sh' or something similar and it stepped me through the process, no muss, no fuss. And the results after installation (compared to Catalyst) is ... priceless. I've never seen a need to boot into single user mode over years of manual installation. Perhaps that is your equivalent of pressing <crtrl>-<alt>-<f1>? I haven't manually installed an NVIDIA driver for a few years, though, as the Ubuntu support has been very, very good.

In any event, I refuse to buy power-hungry, hot, noisy cards with second-rate drivers for my OS of choice. So that means no ATI cards for any of the boxes I manage. Both NVIDIA and Intel do a better job.

[mmstick]

I've installed NVIDIA drivers manually numerous times. The last I remember, I just stopped my X display manager, entered a pseudo-terminal, and typed in 'sudo ./install-nvidia.sh' or something similar and it stepped me through the process, no muss, no fuss. And the results after installation (compared to Catalyst) is ... priceless. I've never seen a need to boot into single user mode over years of manual installation. Perhaps that is your equivalent of pressing <crtrl>-<alt>-<f1>? I haven't manually installed an NVIDIA driver for a few years, though, as the Ubuntu support has been very, very good.

In any event, I refuse to buy power-hungry, hot, noisy cards with second-rate drivers for my OS of choice. So that means no ATI cards for any of the boxes I manage. Both NVIDIA and Intel do a better job.

Simply stopping X was never enough to install the NVIDIA drivers on my grandfather's machine. The only way to get the installer to work is to boot into single user mode from grub. Even then, after installing it again and again, I had problems getting it to boot correctly even after blacklisting nouveau drivers. I'm not the only one with the problem either, as one of my friends is currently having the exact same problem in one of his older machines with a similar model, the 8600 GTS. The only way I could ever get the NVIDIA driver to function in Ubuntu is to use the drivers that are already packaged in xorg-edgers and the official repositories. As for AMD, I've never had a problem installing Catalyst using the preferred method that creates a deb automatically, and installs via APT without needing to kill X or anything crazy like that. However, I see no point in installing Catalyst when the open source drivers handle the desktop smoother. I'd rather stick to using mesa.

Claiming AMD cards are power-hungry, hot and noisy is what amateur gaming kids like to say -- it has no evidence to stand upon and is therefore really a ignorant to claim. Don't like noise? Stop buying graphics cards with reference heatsink designs. Manufacturers use the same designs for both AMD and NVIDIA, so whatever noise you get on one is also the noise you'll get on the other. Power? They are roughly the same, which therefore means they produce an equivalent level of heat. The main difference other than architecture design is that AMD is packing more transistors per square mm than NVIDIA in SI, which means it costs less to manufacture their chips, and the transistors are more sensitive to heat than NVIDIA's larger, more expensive design. Heat's never been a problem though, as I've never had a problem with it. At this moment, a machine next to me with a $200 R9 270X has temperatures ranging from 24C at idle to 65C in a small micro-ATX case with the default case fans, depending on how heavy the load the graphics card may be under. Considering it is roughly equivalent in power to my 7950, that's a pretty good accomplishment. Most desktops don't even need half that level of power, let alone a quarter.

[deppman]

Simply stopping X was never enough to install the NVIDIA drivers on my grandfather's machine....

I don't think your grandfather's machine is representative of the state of hardware and drivers today. How old is the board? Generally, NVIDIA have been very good at supporting boards for 3-4 years. I think that is quite generous, especially compared to the competition.

Claiming AMD cards are power-hungry, hot and noisy is what amateur gaming kids like to say -- it has no evidence to stand upon and is therefore really a ignorant to claim.

If you read as many video card reviews as I do, you can't help but come to that conclusion for the most recent ATI cards. Don't believe me? Check out any comparo over the last 12 months at a reputable site like Tom's Hardware or Anandtech or Phoronix. The ATI cards are almost always dinged on these attributes when compared to the NVIDIA competition.

Don't like noise? Stop buying graphics cards with reference heatsink design (... more ATI mitigation advice follows )

Yes, you can mitigate the mistake of buying an ATI card, but why bother? Of course, you might be that lucky person that buys just the right ATI card that (a) has support at launch, (b) has 100%+ the performance of the WHQL drivers, and (c) doesn't regress every 3-6 months. Unfortunately, over my 16 years of experience with Linux, I have never seen this combination with an ATI board.

Or you can do what industry does: buy from a vendor who has a proven track record of meeting all the above requirements on virtually all their hardware. I use Linux on 3 workstations for to earn all my income over multiple industries. I do not dual-boot. Failure - and tinkering - is not an option. I use NVIDIA cards for a reason.

I wish this weren't the case, because I always have been an AMD fan; but my 4.2GHz OC'd Phenom II Black is running with an NVIDIA GTX660 for a reason. I hope that AMD can give me a good reason to change that in the future.

[Panix]

I agree with deppman except for the ' no muss, no fuss' part. Imho, it's quite the YMMV situation and depends on a lot of variables. I've had it go smooth and other times, had to run through hoops until it works. But, for the most part, if you have a recent card, it should be okay with either the driver your distro's repo provides or with the Nvidia installer.

But, sometimes things go wrong and you need a clean install. Upgrading the driver requires the 'old stuff' removed and I'm not sure the installer always does a good job that way.

As for powerful hardware cards that run hot/high power, I think they are both comparable. However, Nvidia has the lower end cards being more efficient than AMD. Their Maxwell cards are more efficient. I guess if you are running the high-end gamers card, it depends but I read a lot of complaints about the Catalyst drivers.

But, not sure FOSS drivers are going to be optimal for gamers/games. Also, there's a few complaints about GLAMOR and questions whether hardware acceleration works or not. I also would like to get an AMD card but I already have some trouble with Nvidia but it's liveable. It sounds like AMD is a more frustrating experience regardless of which driver you go with. There's pros/cons with either driver or missing features with FOSS and major bugs/headaches with the blob.

I want a card that I can watch video on with all features working but that would allow me to play a game or two if I wanted. I read of some complaints when rendering the desktop or just doing basic tasks but noticing bugs. I think the Nvidia driver install is really annoying but once it's installed, it's okay. It doesn't sound like Catalyst is much smoother and people here seem to be really disappointed each time a new update is released. There's always some bug that remains or something that frustrates a user so that they exclaim they're switching to a Nvidia card.

I'd like to just slip the card in and run an open source driver but I haven't read enough info/posts showing that the experience is really good yet. Always missing features and that's a deal breaker for me.

[tomtomme]

I want a card that I can watch video on with all features working but that would allow me to play a game or two if I wanted. I read of some complaints when rendering the desktop or just doing basic tasks but noticing bugs. I think the Nvidia driver install is really annoying but once it's installed, it's okay. It doesn't sound like Catalyst is much smoother and people here seem to be really disappointed each time a new update is released. There's always some bug that remains or something that frustrates a user so that they exclaim they're switching to a Nvidia card.

I'd like to just slip the card in and run an open source driver but I haven't read enough info/posts showing that the experience is really good yet. Always missing features and that's a deal breaker for me.

I agree with most stuff you wrote and I can maybe give you the info you need to decide.
If I knew wihich kind of games you play... if it is not heavy load like metro last light or other AAA titles through WINE you might want to go with an last generation APU like richland 6700 or 6800 and fast RAM. The OSS driver is very mature here.

My experience:

I had a nvidia gtx 260 over 3 years on opensuse with recent kernel and sometimes the blob just installed, sometimes not and it broke X, but I always could figure out a way to get it back.

2 years ago I went for an amd radeon HD 7950 and used catalyst because OSS driver was not supported. Performance was good, some bugs here and there, I don?t know if more than with nvidia because gaming on linux was not an option at that time. so catalyst was more tested / used for 3D stuff on linux than nvidia ever was, so I obviously had to find more bugs.

9 months ago I switched to OSS driver because I just wanted to try and to see if the improvements I read about are true. And because XBMC 13 alpha was said to have superior video (and HD audio) support through OSS driver than with blob. So I switched my desktop and also my HTPC with AMD APU E350 to the OSS driver and what was promised came true:

the pros:
- no fuss with kernel updates anymore, no need for manual installs, it just works
- less bugs with gaming and video accel / watching
- openGL 3.x compliance, which is enough for all native linux games out there I have (I own 93 linux-steam games, which I all tested); I encountered some bugs with serious sam 3 and the X3 series in the earlier days but those are gone since some weeks
- HD audio
- less lag / stutter in some games (e.g. source engine)
- higher video acceleration performance and MORE features through VDPAU (like some deinterlacing stuff) than catalyst
- on glamor (HD 7950) same felt 2d desktop performance than with catalyst, on r600 the performance is only ok, but I only have this very slow e350 apu, so thats to be expeced.

the cons:
- with HD7950 raw / peak performance with OSS is lower than with catalyst, but still less micro-stutters.
- no openGL 4 (if you need it)
- no overclocking, no crossfire
- no catalyst control center, only simpler tools, but enough for me
- you have to run a recent stuff: kernel >3.11 and mesa >10.0 and XBMC 13 RC1
- on openSUSE this means rolling distribution through tumbleweed repos which is a bit more buggy than the stable serious of course; I don?t know the ubuntu situation by experience but read that 14.04 should be ok.
- I don?t know about WINE gaming, because I don?t do it.

The conclusion:
If you go for an older card (HD 6xxx series) you can use the faster / more mature r600 foss driver and then you will never want to get back to catalyst.
If you go for HD 7xxx or R7/9 series this might also be the case but not 100%, depending on the exact card / software combination.
So I will definitely upgrade my E350 to an 6700T APU soon when the prices dropped a little, which I expect in 2 months when the new 45W APU 7600 will be shiped.
I hope this was helpful information

cheers tomme

[deppman]

recommended nvidia boards

... I want a card that I can watch video on with all features working but that would allow me to play a game or two if I wanted. ... I'd like to just slip the card in and run an open source driver but I haven't read enough info/posts showing that the experience is really good yet. Always missing features and that's a deal breaker for me.

The other post recommending ATI hardware is very nice. And if you insist on an OSS driver, going that route is probably best.

But it is a bit at odds with your other goal of features and performance. If that is more important, the nv 750ti is probably your best choice right now. For $160-180 or so you can pick up an over clocked model (see Fudzilla for some great reviews) and Linux support has been great and immediate from what I understand - although I do not own one, and would recommend a little due dillegence to make sure people aren't having any problems with any specific brand you might consider. You can get a nice, cool, and quiet board with no need for an external power supply or larger PSU. I would expect gtx650ti boost -level performance which is actually quite good with about half the power draw. Although if you can find a gtx650ti boost, and have the PSU headroom, that is a very impressive board too, and since I own one, I can vouch personally for its great performance and low noise levels (I can look up the mfg if you want, but I believe that model has been discontinued).

I not only do all my work on Linux, but also all my tinkering and play - although in the form of Android for mobile devices. On the desktop, I can vouch personally for the gtx660 running at 2560x1440 for games like Portal 1 and 2, the Half Life series, and many other titles. I use my G650Ti boost on my office rig with dual 1920x1200 monitors on a system 76 box and it runs great, with frame rates at that resolution rivaling the 660 - there is at most a 10% advantage to the 660.

I hope that helps. In summary, if you want to play the newest Steam titles with the best performance and value, one of these cards is the best bet.

I use kubuntu and have a nice public spreadsheet that lists my recommendations for software. I will add that in a bit.

Good luck!

PS I do hear great things about the higher end cards too if you can justify the budget. I may upgrade to a 4k display with a 780ti in the near future. Just don't tell my wife - its a "surprise"

[deppman]

I use Kubuntu and have a nice public spreadsheet that lists my recommendations for software. I will add that in a bit.

Here is that link.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?key=0Ak6s-8up66hRdEw5RkxVcDhwM0xiU0dUaDZBU1ptdkE&output=html

[Panix]

Thanks for the input and info! But, I decided, on impulse, to buy a used GTX 750. I think these cards are pretty popular. It's the EVGA brand and they're nice, short htpc calibre cards that can game a bit. I will take your info in mind if I ever go AMD. Maybe driver quality will be better by then. I am planning on sticking it in a SFF case and mini-itx build so I liked that I don't need the 6-pin power.

So, it is my 2nd video card purchase and again, used. LOL. The only time I've bought brand new cards is when I've bought them for other ppl.

I'll keep an eye out for how the 260X and 265 does in Linux.