NVIDIA Linux Display Driver Performance Analyzed

As we look back at the results, we see for a majority of the race, the performance level between the 1.0-7174 and 1.0-7167 on the Gigabyte 6600GT were neck and neck. In some of the benchmarks, the newer 1.0-7174 drivers managed to take the lead, while in other instances they fell slightly behind. As a whole for the 6600GT, the performance difference between the tested drivers was barley noticeable in our benchmarks with only a frame or two difference. However, this was definitely not the case when it came to the GeForce FX5900XT. When looking at all three drivers, there wasn't much difference between the 1.0-7174 and 1.0-6629 drivers, with the latest driver usually taking first place, there was however a interesting phenomenon that had occurred. When looking at the 1.0-7167 performance on the NVIDIA 5900XT these drivers usually fell into last place. The largest performance downfall had occurred in Unreal Tournament and SPECViewPerf. It is important to note the 1.0-7167 drivers had a life span of merely 20 days before being quickly replaced by the 1.0-7174 driver set, due to performance problems with AGPGART. Although we may not clearly see the boost in performance visible with these latest Linux NVIDIA display drivers as much as Windows users with their monthly ATI CATALYST updates or even NVIDIA drivers with all of the tweaks available, these drivers have definitely progressed performance wise if you look back at their performance in 2002 and 2003. Not only have these drivers advanced performance wise, but also the image quality has vastly improved along with the available features through the nvidia-settings GUI and NVIDIA installer. We can only anticipate what the future display driver releases will hold in store for Linux gamers and enthusiasts.