NVIDIA Open-Sources New I2C USB Type-C Turing GPU Driver In Linux 4.20

[phoronix]

Phoronix: NVIDIA Open-Sources New I2C USB Type-C Turing GPU Driver In Linux 4.20

The Linux 4.20 kernel has just received a new post-merge-window new driver: i2c-nvidia-gpu that is being contributed by the NVIDIA crew for their newest Turing graphics cards...

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=NVIDIA-I2C-GPU-Driver-Turing

[rhysk]

Phoronix: NVIDIA Open-Sources New I2C USB Type-C Turing GPU Driver In Linux 4.20

...But it does look like they seeded the developers with some hardware to get started with their reverse-engineering work....

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?pag...-Driver-Turing

To correct this, as I've seen it speculated in a couple of places, NVIDIA did not provide me early hardware for open source driver support efforts. I can't say whether hardware was provided to other developers.

[ssokolow]

To be honest, I wouldn't trust any of the dinky little port standards like HDMI or USB-C on something as expensive as video card to something that could get unintentionally yanked. If/when HMDs get to the point of having a sufficiently mature open-source stack to satisfy me, I'll find myself an extension that I can securely mount to the desk so, if anything breaks, it'll be the less-expensive extension.

[kaprikawn]

If you have no source preference, the GeForce RTX hardware has been supported since launch with NVIDIA's first-rate but closed-source driver stack

I don't think it's just a matter of preferring open source or being ok with closed source. If you're on something like Ubuntu, I'm sure Nvidia is fine. But if you're on rolling release like Arch, I think you're much more likely to run into problems on Nvidia. Or even something a bit more bleeding edge like Fedora who don't seem overly concerned about not supporting Nvidia IIRC.

I keep an eye on the Arch reddit page, and the frequency of people with issues with Nvidia cards is much higher than those with AMD cards. Then there's the whole Wayland thing, if you want to run Wayland, your options are limited if you're on Nvidia, whereas you can choose what you like if you're on AMD or Intel.

[rabcor]

NVIDIA Open-Sources...

Since when do they do things like that?

[rhysk]

Not too hard to at least support the identification of USB Type-C connectors in Turing GPU vbios': https://github.com/envytools/envytools/pull/176

[numacross]

Since when do they do things like that?

They do it only when it suits them. For example the entirety of Tegra support is open-sourced probably because their clients require it to be mainlined (for the automotive systems).