AMD Launches Pitcairn GPUs, Open-Source Not There

[crazycheese]

Lack of open-source driver is basically what is keeping me back from buying a new video card.

That was stated mirriad of times. AMD is completely NOT interested in selling their cards!

[Ancurio]

They don?t care about your questions or needs.
They focus on windows and they have agreements with microsoft to a) hinder linux b) hinder opensource c) keep windows implementation best.
They don?t care about you.
If you ask this question here, you will be fed with a lot of excuses and reasonings, which make no sense. Because those who wants to create, finds ways. Those who is lazy, finds excuses.
Your question can be answered very briefly - use those who you appreciate, use intel.

Hmm, that's weird, because bridgeman's explanation above about why they can't open source fglrx made somewhat sense to me.
I also can't really appreciate intel until they create graphics hardware on par with current nvidia/amd tech, at which point they will be probably forced to close down on specs as well anyway.

[crazycheese]

Hmm, that's weird, because bridgeman's explanation above about why they can't open source fglrx made somewhat sense to me.
I also can't really appreciate intel until they create graphics hardware on par with current nvidia/amd tech, at which point they will be probably forced to close down on specs as well anyway.

Intel has not done it with current hardware, it won?t even if hardware gets faster. Intel driver on windows is a blob, so on linux they focus everything on opensource driver. Its good you found the explantations reasonable enough, because if you?ll start to seek ways to improve the situation, you will be confronted with absolutely completely zero interest soever. This is not how business is done, this is how people do the hobby.

[DaemonFC]

Could I take the chance and ask why you are restricted on releasing the specs for interfacing with the hardware you sell? Because, to me it doesn't really seem like that would expose either your software parts or the hardware architecture.
Just curious.

AMD's bosses at Microsoft have their hollywood paymasters who don't want their Digital Restrictions Malware exposed.

Bridgman refuses to cut the crap and state frankly that this is the only reason why you can't fully use your own property.

[DaemonFC]

Peter Gutmann actually has a pretty good explanation of why AMD isn't allowed to tell you how your property works.

http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.html

Elimination of Open-source Hardware Support

In order to prevent the creation of hardware emulators of protected output devices, Vista requires a Hardware Functionality Scan (HFS) that can be used to uniquely fingerprint a hardware device to ensure that it's (probably) genuine. In order to do this, the driver on the host PC performs an operation in the hardware (for example rendering 3D content in a graphics card) that produces a result that's unique to that device type.

In order for this to work, the spec requires that the operational details of the device be kept confidential. Obviously anyone who knows enough about the workings of a device to operate it and to write a third-party driver for it (for example one for an open-source OS, or in general just any non-Windows OS) will also know enough to fake the HFS process. The only way to protect the HFS process therefore is to not release any technical details on the device beyond a minimum required for web site reviews and comparison with other products.

This potential “closing” of the PC's historically open platform is an extremely worrying trend. A quarter of a century ago, IBM made the momentous decision to make their PC an open platform by publishing complete hardware details and allowing anyone to compete on the open market. Many small companies, the traditional garage startup, got their start through this. This openness is what created the PC industry, and the reason why most homes (rather than just a few offices, as had been the case until then) have one or more PCs sitting in a corner somewhere. This seems to be a return to the bad old days of 25 years ago when only privileged insiders were able to participate.