NVIDIA Starts Publishing GPU Hardware Documentation To Help Open-Source Drivers

[azdaha]

NVIDIA, please stop doing this "I'm gonna open but with a big exception" crap!

When you announced PRIME support, it wasn't for Bumblebee-like behavior.
When you announced Wayland support, you didn't adopt GBM but rather brought EGLStreams up.

F**k those guys.

[dragon321]

Might be decision by shareholders, keen to hold what they see as critical know-how to their business interests. Ideological side of "open software/closed software" does not even enter in their minds. Unless someone in Nvidia does very compelling argument pro-open source and proves it by hard numbers that releasing info is actually useful to their business-forget it. And Nvidia would have to follow that decision to the letter too.

On BSD it does not make any difference installing-wise. You have to install something and you won't have any besides basic by default. So it does not matter if I have to install Radeon's or Nvidia's. Effort is equal for either. But Nvidia's has proven to be more problem-free throughout the years. On FreeBSD at least. On OpenBSD, DragonFly and NetBSD using proprietary Nvidia's driver is impossible, there is Radeon the only way.
Well, NetBSD has Nouveau support too but you know how Nouveau is - forget 3D in general. So, best way is to just forget ideology and buy stuff according to what works where and does it better. When I get to choose I ditch Radeon, have had much more issues with it. Currently using FreeBSD and DragonFly at home.
Want example: Radeon's HDMI audio required source edit and kernel recompile last time I used it, Nvidia's works OTB.

Yeah, this makes sense. I'm not going to hate them because I have choice. I don't need Nvidia stuff like CUDA or NVENC so I can buy AMD. When Intel release good dedicated GPU - it might be good choice for open source too. Maybe something will change now, we'll see. I'm not against closed source software in general, I just prefer open source (especially drivers) for my comfort. That's all.

Neither Intel or AMD supports BSD. Their drivers on these platforms are ported by community from Linux. This community is not very big and porting drivers to another OS is very difficult task - so it's obvious it's gonna have some bugs. Nvidia supports FreeBSD and writes drivers for it that's why they are usually less problematic. But on Linux (platform supported by AMD) I actually don't see differences in usability between Nvidia and AMD. Well, hybrids are more problematic on Nvidia because they don't support PRIME render offload (you can't run some app on dGPU while having rest of the desktop on iGPU) and unofficial solutions have some cons but hopefully this will change since Nvidia implemented PRIME render offload in their drivers. Radeon for me works without problems and I don't have to install drivers because they are come with kernel. I don't know about HDMI audio because I have audio in old fashioned way by Jack output on motherboard. Maybe it works because HDMi is detected as audio output, I don't know because my monitor doesn't has speakers. Let me give Wayland as example - You can't run all compositors on Nvidia drivers because they don't support GBM. Some compositors implemented EGL Streams but not all. If you are using AMD or Intel you can run all compositors without problems.

I like FreeBSD too and I had it some time as desktop but it's not very ideal in this role for me. It was working pretty good (no crashes or problems) but lack some software which Linux has (Linux compat it's not always good solution). I would choose BSD now only on server or devices like router or NAS because it's lightweight, reliable and pretty safe. I respect FreeBSD for being full operating system, not just kernel and foreign software (developed by another developers) like Linux distros. Of course I don't mean Linux is bad - it's great piece of software which I use everyday. It's just pragmatic choice, not ideological.

[jonwil]

Has NVIDIA made any statements about publishing the the firmware blobs required for re-clocking? (e.g. an explanation of why they can't/haven't/won't publish those blobs)
Is there information out there (leaks from insides, educated guesses from people in the know or something like that) that might explain why they aren't publishing these blobs?

[aht0]

You are probably right. As I know AMD Vulkan is common between platform too.



Well, I wanted good open source driver and that's why I've bought Radeon GPU. It works on many systems - Windows, Linux, FreeBSD (Yeah, I tried), probably DragonFlyBSD too. I understand Nvidia position about something like AMDGPU but I can't understand why they block Nouveau development. If you don't like word "block" - what is better word for "refusing to release all needed firmware without reason"? They doesn't want to be open source - I understand, It's their choice and my choice to buy antoher GPU, but why they block open source driver?

PS: I won't agree with "AMD's drivers break more". For me it's working perfectly fine with nice performance and unlike Nvidia users: i don't care about installing drivers.

Might be decision by shareholders, keen to hold what they see as critical know-how to their business interests. Ideological side of "open software/closed software" does not even enter in their minds. Unless someone in Nvidia does very compelling argument pro-open source and proves it by hard numbers that releasing info is actually useful to their business-forget it. And Nvidia would have to follow that decision to the letter too.

On BSD it does not make any difference installing-wise. You have to install something and you won't have any besides basic by default. So it does not matter if I have to install Radeon's or Nvidia's. Effort is equal for either. But Nvidia's has proven to be more problem-free throughout the years. On FreeBSD at least. On OpenBSD, DragonFly and NetBSD using proprietary Nvidia's driver is impossible, there is Radeon the only way.
Well, NetBSD has Nouveau support too but you know how Nouveau is - forget 3D in general. So, best way is to just forget ideology and buy stuff according to what works where and does it better. When I get to choose I ditch Radeon, have had much more issues with it. Currently using FreeBSD and DragonFly at home.
Want example: Radeon's HDMI audio required source edit and kernel recompile last time I used it, Nvidia's works OTB.

[dragon321]

I believe DAL is used in Windows too, so is a lot of their Vulkan code.

You are probably right. As I know AMD Vulkan is common between platform too.

Nvidia has universal driver, which at it's very core is identical for all platforms. What Nvidia itself terms "our common code". Just "glue" connecting to kernels of different platforms differs. It's way better model than porting to 2 non-POSIX-compliant platforms and then leaving the "figuring-out how the hell you port few millions LoC" to the POSIX-compliant OS's devs themselves.

OpenBSD has trouble with Radeon driver updates because they threw out Linux ABI support for security reasons and devs just dread having to work through millions of LoC trying to port it over to BSD kernel. Do it often and your whole time is spent on nothing but that. Fine, when you are paid for it, not so fine, when it's your free time you could use for developing something else - instead of rooting out linuxisms and trying to find alternative ways evening after evening..

So, quit crying about it. Linux has Nvidia driver afterall. While it's not just ideologically "acceptable" for bunch of fanatics, it's still better than not having driver at all.

Well, I wanted good open source driver and that's why I've bought Radeon GPU. It works on many systems - Windows, Linux, FreeBSD (Yeah, I tried), probably DragonFlyBSD too. I understand Nvidia position about something like AMDGPU but I can't understand why they block Nouveau development. If you don't like word "block" - what is better word for "refusing to release all needed firmware without reason"? They doesn't want to be open source - I understand, It's their choice and my choice to buy antoher GPU, but why they block open source driver?

PS: I won't agree with "AMD's drivers break more". For me it's working perfectly fine with nice performance and unlike Nvidia users: i don't care about installing drivers.

[aht0]

I need stuff that actually works without maintenance issues so that rules out NVidia. Only AMD and Intel care to sell me a working product. NVidia likes to sell doorstop products.

Demagogic false argument.

Nvidia's drivers generally work OTB unless you are trying to install bleeding edge kernels on your own - when you do that, what maintenance issues you even should dare talk about? You brought it on yourself when something broke. It was to be expected.

Most distros are not shipping with the very newest kernel, so when you need minimal maintenance, use LTS distros. End of angst. When speaking about averages, AMD's drivers break more, be those open or not. Intel I would avoid, still more expensive and you never know what new CVE's could yet again make appearance.. End of the story.

[brad0]

Buying AMD GPU as a matter of principle? Might do that, just to get working graphics on some particular platform ignored by Nvidia (with most Ryzen processors you won't be having iGPU option either). It's sadly no-go when you need powerful card for gaming. Too many driver issues.

I need stuff that actually works without maintenance issues so that rules out NVidia. Only AMD and Intel care to sell me a working product. NVidia likes to sell doorstop products.

[brad0]

OpenBSD has trouble with Radeon driver updates because they threw out Linux ABI support for security reasons and devs just dread having to work through millions of LoC trying to port it over to BSD kernel. Do it often and your whole time is spent on nothing but that. Fine, when you are paid for it, not so fine, when it's your free time you could use for developing something else - instead of rooting out linuxisms and trying to find alternative ways evening after evening..

So, quit crying about it. Linux has Nvidia driver afterall. While it's not just ideologically "acceptable" for bunch of fanatics, it's still better than not having driver at all.

Porting issues are not specific to OpenBSD and the other part you just pulled out of your ass.

Worthless drivers a lot of users won't touch. I'm not putting a binary blob in the middle of my 100% open source OS. Only dipshit morons do that. I'll take other vendors with HW that works unlike NVidia garbage.

[brad0]

Maybe, but until they actually prove it that is just a claim without any foundation whatsoever.

There are mainly two reasons why it took AMD so long:
1. IP idiocy (they had to go through all of the tech docs and all of the code to ensure they didn't violate any IP when releasing that)
2. Untangling the whole thing so it can be integrated into the Linux kernel, which in completeness only started to happen last year

Actually 3..

3. A lot of work on Mesa code and infrastructure which is not specific to any particular driver

Drivers are not completely isolated re-implementing all the same bits over and over again with overlapping code.

[brad0]

meanwhile people are still waiting for their AMD powered gaming laptops.

I'm still waiting for an NVIDIA based computer I can actually use. Maybe it will happen before I die but I'm not betting on it.