Do you use hardware 3D acceleration in Linux?

aardwolf · 2010-03-07 15:29:04

I'm wondering, how many Linux users use hardware 3D acceleration drivers (for OpenGL) in Linux, and if not, why not

-no hardware that supports it (do such video cards even exist today?)
-ideological reasons
-no need for it
-no drivers available
-other reason?

By 3D hardware acceleration I mean true drivers that use the graphics cards 3D hardware to render anything (even 2D textures), such as the NVidia or ATI drivers.

Mesa Software Rasteriser drivers appear to be the alternative if you don't have 3D accelerated drivers, so if you have these, please answer No.

I'm asking this to figure out how many Linux users I'm excluding if I create software that requires hardware 3D acceleration.

barzam · 2010-03-07 15:52:39

I use the xf86-video-intel driver. I don't know if that counts as 3d or not.

evr · 2010-03-07 15:58:05

i would think the majority of linux users use 3d, i use the nvidia driver on my laptop. what kind of software are you creating?

aardwolf · 2010-03-07 16:08:05

evr wrote:

i would think the majority of linux users use 3d, i use the nvidia driver on my laptop. what kind of software are you creating?

A painting program where the GUI uses OpenGL, and it runs slow without hardware acceleration.

toxygen · 2010-03-07 16:14:13

I use the nvidia proprietary drivers (which have 3d) but I think the only use I make of 3d is for compositing in kde. no games, no opengl based things (except the occassional google earth tour which is rare)

Last edited by toxygen (2010-03-07 16:14:32)

Themaister · 2010-03-07 16:50:16

I use it a lot, as I play lots of emulators, which use accelerated OpenGL.

radiomist · 2010-03-07 20:56:35

i use in emulators and kde composition.

anonymous_user · 2010-03-07 21:36:00

I use the proprietary drivers for NVIDIA. Must have my games.

flamelab · 2010-03-07 21:43:21

3D with Nvidia proprietary drivers. For KDE composition and games.

aardwolf · 2010-03-07 21:50:22

I also use the NVidia proprietary drivers.

Nobody has got ATI?!

JHeaton · 2010-03-07 21:58:47

aardwolf wrote:

I also use the NVidia proprietary drivers.
Nobody has got ATI?!

Nvidia proprietary drivers for me, too.

I tried ATI with Linux a while back with my Radeon HD 4870, but the results weren't so good. I couldn't get an acceptable level of performance from the card, so I switched back to my 9800GT. Haven't bothered trying since, though, because it's a hassle to change cards in all honesty. Since moving to Arch, I've had far less interest in, and time for, tinkering inside my computer and more with making my operating system do what I want.

flamelab · 2010-03-07 22:07:05

aardwolf wrote:

I also use the NVidia proprietary drivers.
Nobody has got ATI?!

If you want severe headaches, you use ATI

Kaeso · 2010-03-07 23:34:59

aardwolf wrote:

I also use the NVidia proprietary drivers.
Nobody has got ATI?!

There are plenty of us using ATI, but most are too busy to reply because they're trying to get their xorg.conf configured properly.

I use the radeon driver, which is actually usable these days and (at least for me) seems to work out of the box without any headaches. The Catalyst drivers give better performance, but for me they're not worth the endless trouble which they inevitably seem to cause.

Ultraman · 2010-03-08 01:13:13

Running an HD4850 on the open-source xf86-video-ati drivers, so thats the "radeon" driver.
I run without a xorg.conf, so getting that configured properly... No need

2D works splendidly. Besides the normal apps on your desktop I also play Battle of Wesnoth from time to time, and I recently installed StarCraft using Wine. To get in the mood for StarCraft II, my little bro is a beta tester.
3D works, I run a composite desktop which works great. I also tried QuakeLive, runs terrific.
I haven't been able to get Sauerbraten to run properly. Well the game runs properly, but the graphics doesn't (a lot of stuff is see-through for me). But as the drivers improve, I expect things to get better. Performance optimizations would come after that. So that is still a work-in-progress but the basics are there.

For serious 3D gaming I hop over to the Win7 install. Set that up that specifically for the purposes of gaming. Helps to keep my productivity up

Bralkein · 2010-03-08 01:15:36

After early bad experiences with ATI I now only use NVidia for performance graphics (though I'd be happy to go with Intel on a netbook or something). I play the odd game from time to time so AFAIK NVidia is the only choice, since ATI has way too many problems and Intel doesn't have the power.

I think you should consider the route the Gnome project is taking with its new Gnome Shell. Obviously they think that enough of the userbase is well-supported in terms of 3D accel, otherwise I can't imagine that they would be relying on it so heavily for their new tech. Perhaps you could check and see if they did any research into 3D accel availability before starting their project.

umpalumpa1985 · 2010-03-08 01:46:07

I have an Nvidia card and don't use the proprietary driver, I use nouveau, so no 3d acceleration. I only use it to support the open source driver, and KMS, though.

Snakeye · 2010-03-08 03:06:41

I use 3d acceleration (nvidia). Gotta have my WoW and Penumbra fixes.

smakked · 2010-03-08 07:50:13

I use Nvidia's driver, gotta have my Nexuiz

bgalakazam · 2010-03-08 08:06:13

I use NVIDIA with 3D acceleration. I simply gave up on ATI with Linux. Every since I don't use my computer for Windows gaming, I have been with NVIDIA.

jarryson · 2010-03-08 08:09:55

ATI oss driver, of couse i use 3d acceleration..

i am using compiz

Fungyo · 2010-03-08 10:41:26

Using proprietary Nvidia drivers, works great.

axel668 · 2010-03-08 11:51:39

Intel Driver for some games

mrunion · 2010-03-08 14:01:05

nVidia. I use 3D in Blender, some games, etc.

snack · 2010-03-08 17:32:15

I use Ati Catalyst, 3D only for kwin compositing. Since Vi0l0 (the maintainer of the catalyst package on AUR) set up a catalyst repository it has been much simpler to make them work in an (almost) bleeding-edge system. BTW, I have a Mobility Radeon HD 3470.

wuischke · 2010-03-08 18:20:52

Yes, with an Intel GMA950. Works fine for the occasional game (The likes of Osmos, World of Goo, Quantz) and even moderate 3D modelling.

Arch Linux

#1 2010-03-07 15:29:04

Do you use hardware 3D acceleration in Linux?

#2 2010-03-07 15:52:39

Re: Do you use hardware 3D acceleration in Linux?

#3 2010-03-07 15:58:05

Re: Do you use hardware 3D acceleration in Linux?

#4 2010-03-07 16:08:05

Re: Do you use hardware 3D acceleration in Linux?

#5 2010-03-07 16:14:13

Re: Do you use hardware 3D acceleration in Linux?

#6 2010-03-07 16:50:16

Re: Do you use hardware 3D acceleration in Linux?

#7 2010-03-07 20:56:35

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#8 2010-03-07 21:36:00

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#9 2010-03-07 21:43:21

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#10 2010-03-07 21:50:22

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#11 2010-03-07 21:58:47

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Re: Do you use hardware 3D acceleration in Linux?

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