Ubuntu Needs To Improve OpenGL Drivers For Gaming

[Kano]

Usually the libs are not the problem, but when they use something newer as u 11.10 then binaries will not work on Debian wheezy. Basically some Linux devs at Valve should know how to work around that, lets see if they did or not.

[kayosiii]

Let's make some sensible assumptions here

GL 2.x (es) will be a reccomendation. Games that need features available in GL 3 or 4 will use those versions (or GL2 and the relevant extensions).
PA is optimised for power usage rather than low latency, 20ms is concidered acceptable limit for pro audio production, Ideally I would like to see pulse below that. (is this with or without using pulse with realtime capabilities).

I don't think it's any great secret that Valve is targetting Ubuntu specifically rather than Linux in general. I personally think this is a sensible approach at least initially. It can't be that hard to package the library versions needed by steam needs in other distros.

[tweak42]

Well, Fedora will never make something like Jockey as it is opposed to shipping patented or proprietary drivers and codecs. Does that mean Steam will not work with it?

Now, they could just make Steam look for it and then not complain when it does not find it, but still.

I suppose it's kinda hard to say at this early juncture. They could make Steam check the proprietary drivers and if it only find the open ones just pop up a message that game performance will be limited, but allow you to continue. This probably would work fine for older or 2d games. The reason they would tie it to Jockey would be so a newbie user could install the proprietary drivers easily to get them working. I'm sure a Fedora user could do the same with few manual command lines.

[Hamish Wilson]

It doesn't seem so much as Ubuntu trying to make Valve/Steam a Ubuntu exclusive but more like asking what will it take to get Steam successfully launched on Ubuntu aka the most popular linux desktop distro. Once it's running on Ubuntu, other distros will have an idea of what it takes to get it working and possibly make their own simular design changes to make support it. Overall the outcome should be at least we'll know what works and what needs redesign.

Well, Fedora will never make something like Jockey as it is opposed to shipping patented or proprietary drivers and codecs. Does that mean Steam will not work with it?

Now, they could just make Steam look for it and then not complain when it does not find it, but still.

[tweak42]

What I find most disturbing about this is the idea of Ubuntu trying to tie Valve to an Ubuntu only service, which understandably will not be adopted by many other major distributions.

It doesn't seem so much as Ubuntu trying to make Valve/Steam a Ubuntu exclusive but more like asking what will it take to get Steam successfully launched on Ubuntu aka the most popular linux desktop distro. Once it's running on Ubuntu, other distros will have an idea of what it takes to get it working and possibly make their own simular design changes to make support it. Overall the outcome should be at least we'll know what works and what needs redesign.

[Hamish Wilson]

Valve possibly launching Jockey / Ubuntu Software Center directly when needed for prompting users to install the binary graphics drivers when needed for a game instead of using the slower, less-featureful, and buggy open-source graphics drivers.

What I find most disturbing about this is the idea of Ubuntu trying to tie Valve to an Ubuntu only service, which understandably will not be adopted by many other major distributions.

[Ancurio]

25 ms latency for PA vs 5 ms for pure Alsa....i knew that i was right and made the right choice

Yeah, this is the reason that to this day, people code everything in assembler for the additional 20 ms execution speed!

I'm so thirsty already for all the tears of people still using dmix and expecting Valve & co to give one flying shit about them

[NomadDemon]

Congratulations, using alsa instead of pulseaudio is equivalent of reducing your distance to the speakers by 6,806 meters. I imagine it is very hard for you to go to concerts because the sound doesn't sync up with the musicians's movements you see.

+1

you dont have lags, when you play even on 60 ping [60ms]

[ChrisXY]

25 ms latencyd for PA vs 5 ms for pure Alsa....i knew that i was right and made the right choice

Congratulations, using alsa instead of pulseaudio is equivalent of reducing your distance to the speakers by 6,806 meters. I imagine it is very hard for you to go to concerts because the sound doesn't sync up with the musicians's movements you see.

[r1348]

I am sure Ubuntu will be a great gaming platform with developers having to target OpenGL 2.

While the standard is up to OpenGL 4.3 and the competition is using DirectX 11.1.

It cant even compete with the stuff from a decade ago.

Most PC games out there are crappy console ports that target DirectX 9.
Maybe things will change with next-gen consoles, but we're talking 2014.

Also, graphical quality has little to do with the graphical backend you use and more to do with how good you are at using it.