AMD's Open-Source Radeon Linux Driver: 2014 Was Incredible

[Rich Oliver]

The latest incident. I am updating my kubuntu 14.04 lts, kernel 3.13.0-43 comes and the system stops booting.

Why are you using the older distro? I run three monitors off an AMD HD 7790. I still found I needed the closed source drivers with 14.04. With Opensuse 13.2 and Kubuntu 14.10 I've finally been able to rely on the opensource drivers. However the 3.16 kernel on Kubuntu 14.10 seems notably better that the 3.13 kernel with Suse 13.2

[RedRaider]

Let's stop guessing then...

As it happens I do actually game with an AMD CPU and an AMD GPU together, but I am still not convinced by your assertion.

Let's stop guessing then... So far, I have more evidence of my assertion than you do because benchmarkers/testers such as yourself always test on Intel and don't even consider that that would be detrimental for AMD and report stuttering in the results, erroneously, I believe (won't know unless someone tests), acting like nothing can be done about it, while I have all AMD and don't see any problem.

Let's get hard results. Follow through with my suggestion and run your benchmarks with all AMD and some other non-Ubuntu based distribution as well. That will end all doubt, whether good for an all AMD system or not, OR good for Intel and Nvidia or not, OR good for Intel and AMD or not, OR good for with Slackware/[whatever OTHER than Ubuntu/Ubuntu based distribution you choose] with any of the hardware combos above or not. We will never know unless someone steps out of the Ubuntu/Intel robotic zombie rut and tests with something different. I'm not a tester, don't have the software or expertise. Are you and do you?

[darkbasic]

I did tons of tests with different distros and Michael did too. NOTHING changes if you disable compositing and use the very same version of the graphic stack (including mesa, kernel, xorg, etc..). Stop this bullshit.

[shinking]

Hopefully, we will see less improvments in radeon soon. Really good job on the site, Thanks for guide!

[Xwaang]

Will the Radeon HD 8790M be supported by amdgpu driver?
What is it the actual state of support of this card with the actual open source driver?
Is 3D acceleration active? Is it possible to activate in muxless hybrid systems (like the Dell Latitude E6540)?
Thank you,
Xwang

[bridgman]

Will the Radeon HD 8790M be supported by amdgpu driver?
What is it the actual state of support of this card with the actual open source driver?
Is 3D acceleration active? Is it possible to activate in muxless hybrid systems (like the Dell Latitude E6540)?
Thank you,
Xwang

The 8790M should already be supported by the radeon kernel driver and existing userspace stack, including 3D acceleration. Remember that amdgpu is just a different kernel driver, the rest of the stack is common across radeon & amdgpu. Believe it should work in muxless hybrid using PRIME but I haven't tried it myself.

[Xwaang]

The 8790M should already be supported by the radeon kernel driver and existing userspace stack, including 3D acceleration. Remember that amdgpu is just a different kernel driver, the rest of the stack is common across radeon & amdgpu. Believe it should work in muxless hybrid using PRIME but I haven't tried it myself.

Thank you!
I would like to know if this card will be in future supported by the amdgpu driver which, as far as I have understood, will become the most updated (the reference) one for the newer cards.
Is this card "new" enough for that?

[bridgman]

Thank you!
I would like to know if this card will be in future supported by the amdgpu driver which, as far as I have understood, will become the most updated (the reference) one for the newer cards.
Is this card "new" enough for that?

Not sure where you obtained that understanding from, but suggest you ignore them in future

There's no such thing as "the most updated for the newer cards". The radeon kernel driver will provide open source stack support up to CI, and the amdgpu kernel driver will provide open source stack support for VI and up. We can't have two kernel drivers upstream supporting the same hardware. The 8790M is an SI gfx core with some CI display features IIRC, so it would stay with the radeon kernel driver.

The userspace code (which is where most of the feature work happens) will be common. As new features are added to userspace both radeon and amdgpu drivers will be updated accordingly.

[Xwaang]

Not sure where you obtained that understanding from, but suggest you ignore them in future

There's no such thing as "the most updated for the newer cards". The radeon kernel driver will provide open source stack support up to CI, and the amdgpu kernel driver will provide open source stack support for VI and up. We can't have two kernel drivers upstream supporting the same hardware. The 8790M is an SI gfx core with some CI display features IIRC, so it would stay with the radeon kernel driver.

The userspace code (which is where most of the feature work happens) will be common. As new features are added to userspace both radeon and amdgpu drivers will be updated accordingly.

Thanks!