[Bf-committers] Re: Blender and ATI

[Stephen]

I've yet to decide on the video card,  but your responses are very
helpful so thanks. I read everywhere about nVidia's Linux drivers
being better, more mature etc., with card performance approaching
their Windows counterparts (and being better with OpenGL), but I'm a
sucker for supporting the underdog too and would love to see ATI's
Linux presense grow in a positive way, especially for a product like
Blender. I'm just researching softmodding between the latest Radeon
and GeForce cards at the moment before I decide.

Thanks again,
Stephen

> Message: 5
> Date: Wed, 15 Jun 2005 11:37:38 +0200
> From: Johannes Langlotz <johannes.langlotz at gmx.de>
> Subject: Re: [Bf-committers] Blender and ATI
> To: Ryan Showalter <ryanshow at gmail.com>,        bf-blender developers
>         <bf-committers at projects.blender.org>
> Message-ID: <42AFF6E2.2000503 at gmx.de>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
> 
> Hi,
> 
> I can't agree! I used both - NVIDIA and ATI - and had problems with both
> :) . The latest linux ati drivers are quite good.
> 
> BTW: there are 64 bit ati linux drivers.
> https://support.ati.com/ics/support/KBAnswer.asp?questionID=1177
> IMHO: Just take the gfx card of your choice.
> 
> Johannes
> 
> Ryan Showalter schrieb:
> > nVidia has much better linux driver support for their graphics cards
> > than ATI does.  Not to mention they also provide 64 bit versions of
> > their drivers.  I don't believe ATI has linux driver support for the
> > x86-64 arch but I could be wrong.  nVidia also excels at OpenGL
> > support.  If you'd like to tackle some ATI issues that people have
> > been having then you could go for ATI, but I believe a lot of those
> > issues were solved in the big frontbuffer cleanup Ton did a while
> > back.
> >
> > (Yes I'm biased but that's because I've been treated well by my
> > geForce cards in the past :)
>  >
>  > On 6/14/05, Campbell Barton <cbarton at metavr.com> wrote:
>  >
>  >>Hey Stephen
>  >>I tried the recent (UI Installer) ATI Drivers for linux on my X800 and
>  >>couldent get them to work, (Didnt recognize my card even though it was
>  >>in the supported list in the error message that followed.) :P
>  >>Who knows, mabe it would work well if that didnt stop me, but its the
>  >>first release supporting Xfree 4.4 and Xorg - early days.
>  >>
>  >>I have an NV 6800 also and works nice in linux, NVidia have had linux
>  >>drivers for a while now, and 64bit drivers too. as well as being better
>  >>for OpenGL, Id say there better on linux too, Dual head/linux/nvidia
>  >>also works very well.
>  >>
>  >>- Cam
>  >>
>  >>
>  >>
>  >>>Hi,
>  >>>
>  >>>I've just joined the mailing group so this is my first communication.
>  >>>I'm in the process of building a PC/Workstation and right now trying
>  >>>to decide between an nVidia or ATI GPU. I've read in various posts of
>  >>>various issues regarding ATI cards due to their OpenGL driver support
>  >>>(I'll be running 64bit Linux also), and your efforts to help rectify
>  >>>these. I'm a software developer (mainly database applications) and
>  >>>would like to get involved in helping out with this project. I'm also
>  >>>looking to use the software to educate myself with 3D rendering etc.
>  >>>As a result would you recommend one or the other of nVidia or ATI
>  >>>(either a Radeon X800 XL or GeForce 6800 or similar)? I can possibly
>  >>>help with the development of ATI driver support, but I'd want to be
>  >>>using the software for rendering also (is there a big difference
>  >>>between nVidia and ATI cards, as far as OpenGL is concerned, with
>  >>>rendering in Blender on Linux?). From what I've read so far ATI seems
>  >>>to have come a long way regarding Linux driver support, but I don't
>  >>>know much about their OpenGL efforts compared to nVidia.
>  >>>
>  >>>Thanks,
>  >>>Stephen
> 
> ------------------------------
> 
> Message: 6
> Date: Wed, 15 Jun 2005 14:17:11 +0200
> From: Ton Roosendaal <ton at blender.org>
> Subject: Re: [Bf-committers] Blender and ATI
> To: Stephen <madcitybrit at gmail.com>,    bf-blender developers
>         <bf-committers at projects.blender.org>
> Message-ID: <2206a50ca0d92922576b77c0b7ea7ab0 at blender.org>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; delsp=yes; format=flowed
> 
> Hi,
> 
>  From my long past with opengl I only know there's always issues,
> regardless which brand you choose. Main disadvantage of ATIs is that
> several of their cards/drivers dropped proper (fast) frontbuffer
> drawing. That's a feature being dropped in the Blender UI anyway, and
> it has issues for more graphics cards too.
> 
> Apart from the frontbuffer issue, ATIs perform nice. BTW; ATIs in macs
> perform excellent on frontbuffer drawing, so it's really a driver
> issue...
> 
> In the Blender code we now have 2 hacks to bypass nvidia issues we
> discovered. At this moment there's a disturbing amount of reports on
> latest nvidia drivers crashing Blender...
> 
> Conclusion; it doesn't really matter, for as long our devs have same
> type of cards, so things get patched. :)
> I *really* still would like someone collecting a "actively supported
> HW" list.
> 
> -Ton-
> 
> On 15 Jun, 2005, at 6:44, Stephen wrote:
> 
> > Hi,
> >
> > I've just joined the mailing group so this is my first communication.
> > I'm in the process of building a PC/Workstation and right now trying
> > to decide between an nVidia or ATI GPU. I've read in various posts of
> > various issues regarding ATI cards due to their OpenGL driver support
> > (I'll be running 64bit Linux also), and your efforts to help rectify
> > these. I'm a software developer (mainly database applications) and
> > would like to get involved in helping out with this project. I'm also
> > looking to use the software to educate myself with 3D rendering etc.
> > As a result would you recommend one or the other of nVidia or ATI
> > (either a Radeon X800 XL or GeForce 6800 or similar)? I can possibly
> > help with the development of ATI driver support, but I'd want to be
> > using the software for rendering also (is there a big difference
> > between nVidia and ATI cards, as far as OpenGL is concerned, with
> > rendering in Blender on Linux?). From what I've read so far ATI seems
> > to have come a long way regarding Linux driver support, but I don't
> > know much about their OpenGL efforts compared to nVidia.
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Stephen