Windows 10 vs. Ubuntu Linux With OpenGL/Vulkan On GTX 1060/1080 Ti & RX 580/Vega 64

Here are our latest benchmark numbers for looking at the performance of Windows 10 vs. Linux for OpenGL/Vulkan graphics driver performance for both NVIDIA GeForce and AMD Radeon hardware using the latest drivers as of June 2018 for OpenGL and Vulkan.

On the Windows 10 side was the NVIDIA 398.11 as the latest at the time of testing while on the Radeon side was the Radeon Software Adrenalin Edition 18.6.1. All of the tests were done on Microsoft Windows 10 Pro x64 Build 17134.

On the Linux side was Ubuntu 18.04 LTS with the Linux 4.18 Git kernel for the RX 580 (and Linux 4.17 for the RX Vega 64, the Vega GPU would lose display output when booting with the current 4.18 Git as of testing) and using the Mesa 18.1.1 stable display stack as the latest at the time of testing obtained via the Pkppa. On the NVIDIA driver side was the NVIDIA 396.24 display driver.

The Radeon RX 580 and NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 were tested given their popularity and competitiveness with one another. The Radeon RX Vega 64 and GeForce GTX 1080 Ti were then tested given they are the current highest-end desktop/gamer GPU from each company at the moment.

Via the Phoronix Test Suite a range of OpenGL/Vulkan benchmarks were carried out based upon time/resources available for some end-of-month driver comparisons. Tests were done on the same Intel Core i9 7980XE running at stock speeds with the ASUS PRIME X299-A motherboard, 16GB DDR4 memory, 256GB Intel Optane SSD, and 4K display.