Two things have to happen here.....
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| Author | Content |
|---|---|
| helios Jul 26, 2012 9:44 AM EDT |
This has been a long time coming but it will make or break us, depending upon two entities. The Linux gaming folks and the video card manufacturers. The Linux Community has a long history of apathy. They want specific things but when it comes time to get it done, often the challenge is answered by crickets chirping and an ominous howling wind. I think this move by Valve will act as the defining moment to find out whether Linux is indeed a vialble gaming platform, as Linux Users will define it. Simply, but rudely put, it's time for us to put up or shut up. While there has been great wailing and gnashing of teeth over the quality of drivers for video cards, Nvidia has done a decent job of at least supporting us with blobs that work more often than not. Sure, the ideal thing would be for them to open their code but if they haven't done so by now, I doubt that they ever will. Maybe this act by Valve will at least spur Nvidia to fill in the gaps that exist with the newer cards. Valve does have some juice in that arena. ATI/AMD for me, seems like a lost cause. How long has some of the driver source code been "open" now....what, going on 5 years? And still, performance on most cards is pathetic, if you can get fglrx to work at all. To their credit, I've just built a quad core AMD 64 640 with a Radeon 670 HD that works extremely well. Solus OS has written a script that downloads the drivers for you and when I did a reboot after installation, I fully expected the dreaded black screen telling me it couldn't boot with said driver. It worked flawlessly, so maybe in some ATI areas, there is hope. But in the end, I think this is a defining moment for Linux, as a viable platform and the graphics card makers to step up. I have my own doubts on each front but given I am wrong way more than I am right, I can only hope. |
| jacog Jul 26, 2012 10:00 AM EDT |
"quality of drivers for video cards" This is where Valve is being our friend (even if it is with their self-interest in mind). They flew some developers out to hook up with Intel, to see how they can work together to improve Intel open-source drivers, and have been in contact with the nouveau guys to ask how they can help. Valve have also identified a bug in the Nvidia driver, which has been fixed by Nvidia now. All 'n all Valve will do whatever they need to make this work for them. |
| BernardSwiss Jul 26, 2012 12:37 PM EDT |
Well, soon Win 8 will actually be out in the real world, and we'll see what actually happens... |
| caitlyn Jul 26, 2012 3:29 PM EDT |
In case you haven't read the news, Fedora's implementation of UEFI secure boot will preclude using the proprietary NVidia or ATI drivers. The system won't boot if they are installed. Considering the comparatively poor performance of the Open Source drivers that pretty much precludes gaming on Fedora. |
| BernardSwiss Jul 26, 2012 4:25 PM EDT |
But will Fedora insist you install/use Secure Boot, or just include the option? (I got the impression that it's the latter) |
| helios Jul 26, 2012 5:06 PM EDT |
Should they decide it is the the first option, I would wonder if Valve's move to port Steam to Linux will cause an exodus from Fedora. Not sure how many gamers use Fedora but it's a popular distro. Adding anything to a distro that refuses the user access to software, proprietary or not, is stupid beyond belief. To be honest, I use my share of proprietary software and found Fedora just too much work to bring it up to usable, but then again, that's just me. Fortunately, there are folks that saw a need in the market and created a respin called Fusion. I am running it on one of our machines at the shop and it's pretty nice. I would wonder if the move to implement UEFI spells the end of the Fusion Project. |
| caitlyn Jul 26, 2012 8:25 PM EDT |
@BernardSwiss: Fedora will install their shim bootloader and UEFI Secure Boot support by default. That means, even if there is an option to not include that during install (and it's not clear that there will be), the end user has to be knowledgeable enough to make that choice and has to have hardware that will work without that support. If they just drop in the CD/USB image and install they are in for a world of hurt, either in non-functional or poor graphics performance on a lot of hardware. |
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