Blender 2.81 Benchmarks On 19 NVIDIA Graphics Cards - RTX OptiX Rendering Performance Is Incredible

[blacknova]

That's funny. Let me guess: You haven't tried a more recent AMD hardware, have you? I have and what can I say - my RX 5700 excites me every day. I've written up my whole frustration with it here:

https://www.gamingonlinux.com/forum/topic/4128

TL;DR: AMD drivers with more recent hardware (i.e. less than a year old) are utter crap. I don't care whether ray tracing doesn't look perfect with current games. I want drivers which don't crash my system while I'm browsing. Or instant-freeze my system because of a kernel upgrade.

That is pretty much my major frustration with Linux, you either forced to run bleeding edge, which would possibly support your hardware, or you stuck on stable distro, but miss on most of desktop projects updates - i.e. drivers, DEs and even software that is not updated in the distro. In the end what is the point of advertising distros as something convenient if it works against your needs?

[vsteel]

I find it interesting that people are calling the proprietary driver crap. In my case the open source driver is the one I fight with and gives me no end of frustration. I fight through it so I can get the Nvidia proprietary driver installed so things will just work. I have not had issues with the Nvidia driver in a couple of years now. I will add the caveat that I have never messed with the ray tracing stuff, but I look at that as half gimmick and half feature that might be cool someday but it needs a few revs to make it practical.

[Volta]

That's funny. Let me guess: You haven't tried a more recent AMD hardware, have you? I have and what can I say - my RX 5700 excites me every day. I've written up my whole frustration with it here:

https://www.gamingonlinux.com/forum/topic/4128

TL;DR: AMD drivers with more recent hardware (i.e. less than a year old) are utter crap. I don't care whether ray tracing doesn't look perfect with current games. I want drivers which don't crash my system while I'm browsing. Or instant-freeze my system because of a kernel upgrade.

Well, I'm using RX480 and it's rock solid with AMD Open Source drivers.

[Tuxee]

Well, I'm using RX480 and it's rock solid with AMD Open Source drivers.

Oh, how lovely - a 3+ year old GFX card is supported properly. Amazing.
I'm using an RX5700 and the drivers are utter crap. They might be good, even "rock solid" some time in the (distant) future. But then another generation of graphics cards will already be available. Bottom line: If you want to use state-of-the-art GPUs steer clear from AMD.

[schmidtbag]

I find it interesting that people are calling the proprietary driver crap. In my case the open source driver is the one I fight with and gives me no end of frustration. I fight through it so I can get the Nvidia proprietary driver installed so things will just work. I have not had issues with the Nvidia driver in a couple of years now. I will add the caveat that I have never messed with the ray tracing stuff, but I look at that as half gimmick and half feature that might be cool someday but it needs a few revs to make it practical.

I find it interesting anyone has as many issues as they claim to have. Half the time someone reports on such issues I'm like "so where did you screw this up?" because whether you're using closed drivers or Mesa drivers, they're usually pretty easy as long as you stick within their guidelines. If you don't want to stay within their guidelines, that's fine - one of the great things about Linux is how you're free to do whatever you want. But don't complain when it doesn't work. If it's really that important to you to diverge from the drivers and/or kernel+headers that your distro provides, maybe do more research on the matter before you have the audacity to point fingers at developers who aren't supporting your choices (not you, specifically).

Is Nvidia's closed approach needlessly cumbersome? Yes, of course it is. But it's pretty easy to deal with if you just stick with your distro's repos. This is coming from someone whose best Nvidia GPU is a Quadro 4000, that is also used in the same PC as 2x FirePro GPUs with a very outdated kernel. So, I'm no Nvidia shill, and I'm using a very unconventional setup where you don't hear me complaining.
</rant>

[Termy]

Oh, how lovely - a 3+ year old GFX card is supported properly. Amazing.
I'm using an RX5700 and the drivers are utter crap. They might be good, even "rock solid" some time in the (distant) future. But then another generation of graphics cards will already be available. Bottom line: If you want to use state-of-the-art GPUs steer clear from AMD.

it's been a while since i've had driver issues with my 5700XT - since 19.3 git and 5.3 RC, i can't complain ^^
Given, that's not really launch day support, but i take this kind of support anyday over being forced to tinker around with a blob...

[artivision]

Not everyone likes to use proprietary crap when there's great Open Source driver available on AMD side. Nvidia pushes tech forward in some areas, but it's usually too early to treat them seriously. Nvidia hair works, ray tracing and say goodbye to performance. Furthermore, ray tracing doesn't look perfect with current games, because they weren't made with ray tracing in mind.

That's because NV doesn't have RT. Their solution does 2 and 4 samples per pixel and in order to see something you need at least 8. They just did it one or two generations early for marketing reasons.

[Volta]

Oh, how lovely - a 3+ year old GFX card is supported properly. Amazing.
I'm using an RX5700 and the drivers are utter crap. They might be good, even "rock solid" some time in the (distant) future. But then another generation of graphics cards will already be available. Bottom line: If you want to use state-of-the-art GPUs steer clear from AMD.

It was well supported since I bought it (2 - 3 years ago). However, if there are such problems with newer GPUs it's quite depressing. They're doing great job overall, because they support Open Source, but for end users it matters how things work in the end. However, I won't buy nvidia anymore and I had few nvidia cards already.

[Volta]

That's because NV doesn't have RT. Their solution does 2 and 4 samples per pixel and in order to see something you need at least 8. They just did it one or two generations early for marketing reasons.

Thanks for clarification. Another reason to stay away from those cheaters.

[Ribs]

The Nvidia hardware is indeed just fine... the driver is a piece of shit I won't ever deal with again though.

I've just gone from AMD (RX580) to Nvidia (1660ti).

Other than an initial hiccup with the login screen being blank (which in hindsight was my fault) I've had less issues with Nvidia than AMD.

When I initially bought my RX580, I didn't have sound through displayport with the kernel drivers, freesync simply didn't work (despite AMD claiming it would on the closed driver and me getting near zero support when I asked for help). Kernel 4.15 came out and I got sound (several months after buying the hardware whilst kernel devs and AMD devs argued about DC), and finally 5.0 and the right MESA update came along and I could get free-sync working, but not without editing files by hand and using a guide on this very site (two years after I bought the card!). Some games had weird glitches and some games through wine were simply unplayable due to glitches unless I turned the settings all the way down to low.

Switching to Nvidia, which I did on Sunday, one login issue which I promptly resolved (and I think I caused) and it's been fine. "Adaptive sync" just worked first time with my monitor; I didn't switch on anything. Sound over display port; no problems. Glitches in Hitman and other games; Gone. And I know I get day one support from Nvidia with the driver whenever new hardware comes out.

I've heard pretty poor things about system hangs and whatnot with Navi. I really don't want to go down that road again. I'm a user, not a dev, not a tester. I want fast-ish modern-ish hardware that works first time every time. I don't want to wait several months whilst things are fixed; I just want it to work.

I like to underclock/volt my hardware if possible when I can as this is a small build. On AMD this meant kernel flags, compiling software, running scripts at login. On nvidia, one quick call to nvidia-smi and it's done forever. No scripts, no rebooting, no compiling. Just works. Wonderful.

I would absolutely prefer free and open source drivers. But in all honesty, the end user experience is objectively better on Nvidia than AMD as a regular end user who likes to game a bit from time to time. At least for me, anyway. I might change my tune in the future, but for now, this is fine and I feel a much nicer experience. Most distros handle the nvidia driver problem without any drama these days. For the average user, it's a non issue.