NVIDIA Wins Over AMD For Linux Gaming Ultra HD 4K Performance

Xonotic with high quality settings can easily handle 3840 x 2160 for all of the tested graphics cards using the proprietary AMD Catalyst and NVIDIA graphics drivers.

When cranking up Xonotic to ultra image quality settings is where a GeForce GTX 750 Ti or better would be needed for running the open-source first person shooter with an average frame-rate above 60 FPS.

Lastly, with ultimate image quality settings, a beefier graphics card is needed to handle Xonotic at the UHD 4K resolution... Except for the Radeon R9 290 as it locked up there with these settings.

Overall, for any Linux gamers wanting to pursue a 4K monitor right now, you need a rather powerful upper mid-range to high-end graphics card to run common open-source Linux games and even Valve's popular Source Engine titles. The GeForce GTX 780 Ti did the best while the Radeon R9 290 was running into a number of issues on the Catalyst 14.6 Beta driver at this resolution.

For those that haven't yet found an Ultra HD monitor that fit your requirements and budget, checkout the massive 60+ GPU open-source testing and 35-way proprietary driver comparison from earlier this month that was done at 1080p.