Gpu for Linux

[Gannam]

So I'm needing to upgrade anyway because of my monitor resolution, and from what I saw the nvidia support driver wise and experience was really really bad.

 

Do yall think it will get better with stuff like valve using Linux in upcoming devices like the steam handheld, or do yall think it doesn't matter, nvidia will still have a pole shoved up the ass for support?

 

Also how well does amd gpus work with Linux? Just like bad reviews, I never hear anything good, I only hear what doesn't work I.E Nvidia features.

[creesch]

It is my understanding that AMD support is better on the Linux side of things. Furthermore the steamdeck uses AMD hardware so it will not make nvidia suddenly more willing to support Linux unless something else happens. 

 

AMD drivers are part of the Linux kernel so natively supported these days. I personally tried it the last time (in regards to gaming) a few years ago with a somewhat older card and managed to get things working with a bit of thinkering. But like I said any modern AMD card will have support baked into the kernel.

 

So yeah generally speaking AMD cards are considered the better choice for Linux. 

 

 

edit: See also this thread on reddit for example https://www.reddit.com/r/linux_gaming/comments/inybzn/is_amd_open_source_drivers_good/

 

[Chunchunmaru_]

NVIDIA support is NOT bad, it just requires you to install non-free drivers which need to be installed afterwards, as for the software support, NVIDIA is just a bit behind when speaking about Optimus support, GSYNC/Freesync (not anymore in the future releases) and Wayland support (still, not anymore in future releases)

AMD support on the other hand, is all open source and then integrated in the kernel and there is no need to fuss with anything at all

[EphraimK]

Here is a trustworthy source:

https://www.addictivetips.com/buying-guides/best-graphics-card-for-linux/

[creesch]

4 minutes ago, EDKTech said:

Here is a trustworthy source:

https://www.addictivetips.com/buying-guides/best-graphics-card-for-linux/

 

Sorry but how is a website that says things like "Based on our extensive testing we found these to be the top graphics cards for Linux." without disclosing what these extensive tests entail trustworthy? Not to mention that they basically listed two top end cards and two budget cards from the only two players in town and called it done without actually disclosing what makes these cards actually good for gaming on Linux. 

 

Sorry but you linked to a fluff piece that is only written to work well with Google and resemble content. The same is true for many of the "guides" on that website as they often simply are slightly reworded documentation pages of the software they pretend to write guides for. 

 

[Gannam]

16 minutes ago, Chunchunmaru_ said:

NVIDIA support is NOT bad, it just requires you to install non-free drivers which need to be installed afterwards, as for the software support, NVIDIA is just a bit behind when speaking about Optimus support, GSYNC/Freesync (not anymore in the future releases) and Wayland support (still, not anymore in future releases)

AMD support on the other hand, is all open source and then integrated in the kernel and there is no need to fuss with anything at all

How bad is the cost? Assuming it's a software license they usually aren't that cheap

 

Edit ignore this, my reading skills are not comprehensive 

[creesch]

1 minute ago, Gannam said:

How bad is the cost? Assuming it's a software license they usually aren't that cheap

Sorry, but software license? Where did you get the idea that you would need a license for something? 

[Gannam]

Just now, creesch said:

Sorry, but software license? Where did you get the idea that you would need a license for something? 

My dyslexia kicked in the wrong time, I for some reason thought someone referring to a non open source gpu as not free, implying a cost

[EphraimK]

8 hours ago, creesch said:

 

Sorry but how is a website that says things like "Based on our extensive testing we found these to be the top graphics cards for Linux." without disclosing what these extensive tests entail trustworthy? Not to mention that they basically listed two top end cards and two budget cards from the only two players in town and called it done without actually disclosing what makes these cards actually good for gaming on Linux. 

 

Sorry but you linked to a fluff piece that is only written to work well with Google and resemble content. The same is true for many of the "guides" on that website as they often simply are slightly reworded documentation pages of the software they pretend to write guides for. 

 

Because of the website. It's like reading PC Mag, know-it-all.

They're just trustworthy. Based on past articles.

[creesch]

1 minute ago, Gannam said:

My dyslexia kicked in the wrong time, I for some reason thought someone referring to a non open source gpu as not free, implying a cost

Ah like that. Yeah it has nothing to do with cost and everything with Nvidia drivers being closed source and Nvidia even actively hindering development of open source drivers (see also my previous reply). 

 

Also please do not take information from that "addictivetips" websites linked earlier. It really isn't a trustworthy source as it is outdated and not written to provide good information but rather to do well in google searches and have seemingly enough substance so they can make money of ads. There is nothing about the cards they linked that makes them especially good for Linux gaming as they just took four random cards to put there to make more money as the links are amazon affiliate links.  

[creesch]

Just now, EDKTech said:

Because of the website. It's like reading PC Mag, know-it-all.

They're just trustworthy. Based on past articles.

That is not an argument at all and what past articles? Looking through the website it is all optimized SEO content aimed at holding people long enough to make ad money or by tricking them into clicking amazon affiliate links. 

 

The link you provided basically says nothing of substance about the actual difference between the open source drivers of AMD and closed source drivers of Nvidia and the cards linked really are just random popular graphic cards that were available at the time the article was written. There is however nothing about those specifically linked cards that makes them particular suitable for Linux. They are just Amazon affiliate links intended to let them make money of those cards. 

Not to mention that you linked to an article from more than a 1 and a half year ago meaning that information in there likely would be outdated if accurate and that given the current GPU market none of these cards will be available anymore regardless as none of the previous generation cards have been available for a long time. 

 

So even if it was at some trustworthy (Which it wasn't) you still are providing people with very much outdated information. 

 

You might not have been aware and that is okay but you really ought to be more critical of where you get information, certainly if you give that information to other people. A rule of thumb to look for in regards of software is that if your source of information is an article and it is over a year old it is very likely some if not all information is outdated. This is basically true for subjects like: 

 

Linux related information in general. If it is about a specific distro check what version the information is for and what version you (or the person you are helping) needs the info for. If it is not the same then assume the information is not compatible. If an article mentions a specific distro without mentioning what version it is for then you should be suspect of the information in it to beging with. 

Same goes for programming related things though that really depends on the language and how specific. Rule of thumb is once again to look for versions, it often matters more once you are talking frameworks and libraries. 

Also for windows this is true to a certain degree, windows 10 has had a lot of updates over the years and a lot of the guides from a few years ago for stuff simply don't hold up anymore as stuff moved for example from the control panel to the new settings thing. 

 

And in general if an article makes claims but doesn't provide information in regards to those claims you should be suspect of it as well. In this case they claim extensive GPU testing without providing any test results, that is suspect. 

Same goes for an article writing around a subject without ever going into detail. This article for example mentions the Nvidia drivers are closed source and the AMD ones are open source but never actually tells you about what that means in a practical sense. 

 

 

[EphraimK]

8 hours ago, creesch said:

That is not an argument at all and what past articles? Looking through the website it is all optimized SEO content aimed at holding people long enough to make ad money or by tricking them into clicking amazon affiliate links. 

 

The link you provided basically says nothing of substance about the actual difference between the open source drivers of AMD and closed source drivers of Nvidia and the cards linked really are just random popular graphic cards that were available at the time the article was written. There is however nothing about those specifically linked cards that makes them particular suitable for Linux. They are just Amazon affiliate links intended to let them make money of those cards. 

Not to mention that you linked to an article from more than a 1 and a half year ago meaning that information in there likely would be outdated if accurate and that given the current GPU market none of these cards will be available anymore regardless as none of the previous generation cards have been available for a long time. 

 

So even if it was at some trustworthy (Which it wasn't) you still are providing people with very much outdated information. 

 

You might not have been aware and that is okay but you really ought to be more critical of where you get information, certainly if you give that information to other people. A rule of thumb to look for in regards of software is that if your source of information is an article and it is over a year old it is very likely some if not all information is outdated. This is basically true for subjects like: 

 

Linux related information in general. If it is about a specific distro check what version the information is for and what version you (or the person you are helping) needs the info for. If it is not the same then assume the information is not compatible. If an article mentions a specific distro without mentioning what version it is for then you should be suspect of the information in it to beging with. 

Same goes for programming related things though that really depends on the language and how specific. Rule of thumb is once again to look for versions, it often matters more once you are talking frameworks and libraries. 

Also for windows this is true to a certain degree, windows 10 has had a lot of updates over the years and a lot of the guides from a few years ago for stuff simply don't hold up anymore as stuff moved for example from the control panel to the new settings thing. 

 

And in general if an article makes claims but doesn't provide information in regards to those claims you should be suspect of it as well. In this case they claim extensive GPU testing without providing any test results, that is suspect. 

Same goes for an article writing around a subject without ever going into detail. This article for example mentions the Nvidia drivers are closed source and the AMD ones are open source but never actually tells you about what that means in a practical sense. 

 

 

Would you happen to know of a Youtube channel called Linus Tech Tips?

They have Amazon affiliate links too...

[creesch]

Just now, EDKTech said:

Would you happen to know of a Youtube channel called Linus Tech Tips?

They have Amazon affiliate links too...

Please don't cherry pick what I said It is fine to provide affiliate links to things that actually are relevant in regards to the article etc. This is however not that certainly not in combination with the other things I mentioned. Honestly, it is fine if you thought it is a reliable article but doubling down with just a one line cherry picked response after I took the time to explain in detail why that might not be the case doesn't do you any favors. If I was a bit more cynical I'd think that you are not interested in providing reliable information or learning how to be more critical towards sourcing your information. I am still assuming you really acted in good faith and were just trying to be helpful. So I am also going to assume that cynical me is wrong and guess you just didn't appreciate my first rather direct response and saw it as a personal remark toward you as a person. Which it was not intended to be, I do however think the internet is already full enough with misinformation which is why I provided you pointers on how to recognize misinformation for a future time you are trying to be helpful. 

[EphraimK]

8 hours ago, creesch said:

Please don't cherry pick what I said It is fine to provide affiliate links to things that actually are relevant in regards to the article etc. This is however not that certainly not in combination with the other things I mentioned. Honestly, it is fine if you thought it is a reliable article but doubling down with just a one line cherry picked response after I took the time to explain in detail why that might not be the case doesn't do you any favors. If I was a bit more cynical I'd think that you are not interested in providing reliable information or learning how to be more critical towards sourcing your information. I am still assuming you really acted in good faith and were just trying to be helpful. So I am also going to assume that cynical me is wrong and guess you just didn't appreciate my first rather direct response and saw it as a personal remark toward you as a person. Which it was not intended to be, I do however think the internet is already full enough with misinformation which is why I provided you pointers on how to recognize misinformation for a future time you are trying to be helpful. 

I agree, the internet is full of misinformation, but please understand, this website is not. 

[creesch]

20 minutes ago, EDKTech said:

I agree, the internet is full of misinformation, but please understand, this website is not. 

I literally explained to you why it is not and yet you keep responding to me with these one liners as if they are arguments. Please understand that you either unknowingly are spreading bad misinformation and are now stubbornly doubling down or that you make it very much look like you are involved with that website. So, do you have any involvement with the website in question? If the answer to that is a no then I strongly urge you to go back to what I wrote here and actually read why I think so as it factually is misinformation for a variety of reasons you so far have ignored.  

 

I am not going to bother responding further here as I made my point abundantly clear. I do however hope that you actually do attempt to go back and actually try to understand what I said instead of doubling down as you have done so far. 

[EphraimK]

I've said what I need to say.

[GDRRiley]

6 hours ago, Gannam said:

Also how well does amd gpus work with Linux? Just like bad reviews, I never hear anything good, I only hear what doesn't work I.E Nvidia features.

AMDs been great on the cards I've tested. Nvidia treats linux like a 2nd class citizen so both their own and the community drivers are kinda meh for non compute workloads.
Level1techs normally mentions if there are issues with linux drivers

[Xiee]

As another famous "Linus" has said, "**** Nvidia". Seach Youtube for that video you'll see what I mean.

Also, I"ve had no issues with Nvidia cards on Pop!_OS. I have a 1060 and a 2070 running both on Pop!_OS out of the box with no installation required. It may be different with other distros though, so choose at your own risk.

AMD has been spot on for every distro that I've used. I'm currently sporting an AMD RX5700 and I've relatively had no issues when I was on Arch, Manjaro and now Pop!_OS.

[10leej]

6 hours ago, Gannam said:

So I'm needing to upgrade anyway because of my monitor resolution, and from what I saw the nvidia support driver wise and experience was really really bad.

 

Do yall think it will get better with stuff like valve using Linux in upcoming devices like the steam handheld, or do yall think it doesn't matter, nvidia will still have a pole shoved up the ass for support?

 

Also how well does amd gpus work with Linux? Just like bad reviews, I never hear anything good, I only hear what doesn't work I.E Nvidia features.

It's not that nvidia is bad, it's just a pain to setup and the driver config gui is missing

But amd probably had the best support supper of the two performance brands.

Intel has the best video driver be ause it's the one that supports every feature of the iGPU

[Alexeygridnev1993]

Using RX570. Open source drivers work perfectly for gaming out of the box without any extra installs needed, but you would still need a proprietary driver if you're a filthy miner who needs OpenCL

[D-reaper]

On 11/24/2021 at 6:03 PM, Alexeygridnev1993 said:

Using RX570. Open source drivers work perfectly for gaming out of the box without any extra installs needed, but you would still need a proprietary driver if you're a filthy miner who needs OpenCL

Filthy miner... lol

 

Miners are part of the reason why there's more global warming. They consume a lot of electricity for their mining crap. Like as if the electrical consumption wasn't bad enough by the people in Vegas for all their lights and extra bling-bling.

 

But yeah, I'm an RX 570 user too. Best thing I could have done after using a 750 Ti for over 5 years with endless hassle due to Nvidia's shit support for Linux. The best my old 750 Ti can be used for is with GPU passthrough (It presently works great for that scenario). But I'm never buying a Nvidia GPU again.

[D-reaper]

On 11/24/2021 at 8:33 AM, Gannam said:

So I'm needing to upgrade anyway because of my monitor resolution, and from what I saw the nvidia support driver wise and experience was really really bad.

 

Do yall think it will get better with stuff like valve using Linux in upcoming devices like the steam handheld, or do yall think it doesn't matter, nvidia will still have a pole shoved up the ass for support?

 

Also how well does amd gpus work with Linux? Just like bad reviews, I never hear anything good, I only hear what doesn't work I.E Nvidia features.

Simple. If you want ease of use, where you just plug and play, then forget it, go with AMD. If you want to problem solve, go with Nvidia; because Nvidia being the shit company that it is, doesn't have your back if you're a Linux user. I mean, even Linus in a LTT video said that Nvidia pretends to care about gamers in general. Given this, Nvidia has been a shit company.

 

I can say this confidently after using Nvidia on Linux for over 5 years. Then I switched to an RX 570 and the nightmare was over. Therefore, I am staying clear of all Nvidia GPUs.

 

So if you want to make life easy, go with AMD. All things considered, AMD is slightly cheaper than Nvidia. Because miners mostly use Nvidia. Nvidia knows this. So they are more focused on selling to miners. Hence the soaring prices for Nvidia GPUs.

[igormp]

On 11/24/2021 at 12:33 PM, Gannam said:

So I'm needing to upgrade anyway because of my monitor resolution, and from what I saw the nvidia support driver wise and experience was really really bad.

It's not. It's as good as their windows counterpart, you just need to install the driver yourself (like you also have to do on windows).

 

On 11/24/2021 at 12:33 PM, Gannam said:

Do yall think it will get better with stuff like valve using Linux in upcoming devices like the steam handheld, or do yall think it doesn't matter, nvidia will still have a pole shoved up the ass for support?

It won't make a difference.

 

On 11/24/2021 at 12:33 PM, Gannam said:

Also how well does amd gpus work with Linux? Just like bad reviews, I never hear anything good, I only hear what doesn't work I.E Nvidia features.

Go with a system with an updated kernel and it should work out of the box for any recent AMD gpu (as in, rx470/480 or newer) since the drivers are built into the driver.

As long as you don't need to do any compute workload, you should be good to go.

 

On 11/24/2021 at 7:24 PM, Xiee said:

As another famous "Linus" has said, "**** Nvidia". Seach Youtube for that video you'll see what I mean.

That video is really old, and AMD drivers were even worse than nvidia's back then.

As you said yourself, nvidia GPUs work without problems nowadays.

On 11/24/2021 at 7:58 PM, 10leej said:

It's not that nvidia is bad, it's just a pain to setup and the driver config gui is missing

It has a driver config gui, it's ugly af and basic, but it's there, unlike AMD or Intel:

 

22 hours ago, D-reaper said:

But yeah, I'm an RX 570 user too. Best thing I could have done after using a 750 Ti for over 5 years with endless hassle due to Nvidia's shit support for Linux. The best my old 750 Ti can be used for is with GPU passthrough (It presently works great for that scenario). But I'm never buying a Nvidia GPU again.

Also anecdotally: I've used a gt840m, gtx 1050ti and 2060 Super without any issues on linux (and I'm currently waiting a 3060 on the mail), whilst my previous rx280 and rx480 gave me tons of headaches.

[D-reaper]

23 minutes ago, igormp said:

Also anecdotally: I've used a gt840m, gtx 1050ti and 2060 Super without any issues on linux (and I'm currently waiting a 3060 on the mail), whilst my previous rx280 and rx480 gave me tons of headaches.

You have to realize that AMD made great strides with Linux support in recent years though (it started to get better after 2015). It's part of the reason why I switched to AMD; ironically, the AMD drivers for Windows are worse. How long ago did you use those AMD cards? What kind of headaches are you referring to? If you were using the fglrx driver and not the open source driver provided by Mesa, that would explain it. AMD GPUs on Linux are plug and play today for the most part. There's nothing to configure either. So there's no need for a driver config UI.

 

For me, Nvidia was crap on Linux. I had to go fix screen tearing. Also, I had to edit the xorg.conf file to fix a microscopic text issue (after installing the proprietary driver). And sometimes, if I upgraded to a new kernel, the proprietary driver wouldn't work with it.

 

Recently, I also chucked out an old laptop that had Nvidia (Which my mom used). Because the laptop was so old, the legacy drivers were not going to work with the newer kernel. It wasn't performing that great also. But with an AMD laptop, which is just as old, I never had an issue. It still runs smoothly. So another thing to take away from this is that, the older the Nvidia GPU, the harder it will be to use on Linux; if not impossible.

 

So yeah. In a nutshell, Nvidia has been a nightmare for me. Now, because I use an AMD GPU, my KDE desktop is smoother than ever. Fluid even. Especially while gaming.

[igormp]

3 minutes ago, D-reaper said:

You have to realize that AMD made great strides with Linux support in recent years though. It's part of the reason why I switched to AMD; ironically, the AMD drivers for Windows are worse.

I do realize it, and I recommend it for anyone that just wants to play games and nothing else since it works out of the box. However, for anything compute AMD is still a joke, and even getting their open source compute stack to work is a mess. Their closed source one works, but then you end up in the same level of nvidia.

 

5 minutes ago, D-reaper said:

How long ago did you use those AMD cards? What kind of headaches are you referring to?

3 years ago I used my rx480 and had a shit ton of issues with HDMI sound, displayport output, shitty performance and kernel panics. I understand that AMDGPU was still being heavily developed there, but as I noted before, that was just my anecdotal opinion. 

Nowadays (I'm currently using the same rx480 until the 3060 arrives since I sold my 2060 Super) it works okay for basic usage and some games, but it's a major PITA to get anything compute done. I can't work with it, their ROCm stack took me over 8 hours of compiling to just throw errors around, whilst with Nvidia it just werked OOB.

 

9 minutes ago, D-reaper said:

For me, Nvidia was crap on Linux. I had to go fix screen tearing. Also, I had to edit the xorg.conf file to fix a microscopic text issue (after installing the proprietary driver).

I never had tearing issues, nor had to mess with xorg.conf, luckily 

10 minutes ago, D-reaper said:

if I upgraded to a new kernel, the proprietary driver wouldn't work with it.

That's a given since it's a kernel module. You need to have the dkms driver for that, then it'll work magically and rebuild itself after a new kernel update. Same goes for any kernel module that's not on the mainline tree.

 

11 minutes ago, D-reaper said:

Recently, I also chucked out an old laptop that had Nvidia (Which my mom used). Because the laptop was so old, the legacy drivers were not going to work with the newer kernel. It wasn't performing that great also. But with an AMD laptop, which is just as old, I never had an issue. It still runs smoothly. So another thing to take away from this is that, the older the Nvidia GPU, the harder it will be to use on Linux; if not impossible.

Legacy drivers are a shit with any GPU. I had an older AMD APU (llano) and it was awful. Even my previous 280x barely has any support on AMDGPU, and the older radeon driver is still a piece of shit.

 

12 minutes ago, D-reaper said:

So yeah. In a nutshell, Nvidia has been a nightmare for me

In my personal experience it was the other way around, but I try to be impartial whenever giving an opinion online, unless their use cases are similar to mine.