[mythtv-users] Motherboards: help me understand my choices

[Owen Townend]

2008/9/1 Brian Wood <beww at beww.org>:
> Owen Townend wrote:
>
>> It's a cheap, everything onboard mATX board which _should_ be perfect
>> for a frontend (HDMI audio+video, optical spdif, HDMI+dsub dual
>> screen, eSATA, gigabit, etc, etc) but it is let down (slightly) by
>> graphics driver support which though AMD has come a long way very
>> quickly with linux support (kudos!), but there's still more work to be
>> done...
>
> I agree AMD is doing well with Linux support, but remember that AMD
> recently bought ATI, so it would be reasonable to assume that they will
> concentrate on those graphics units.

yeah, I'm aware, I was meaning both that AMD support of AMD chipsets
as well as AMD support for ATI graphics under linux have been given a
huge push recently and are visibly progressing which is wonderful.

>
> Since ATI support is not as good as nVidia, it means that the AMD
> takeover of ATI will have the effect of slowing Linux support from
> moving forward, and will instead consist of ATI support moving forward
> at the cost of nVidia support for a while.
>
> Perhaps Intel has perceived this, which may be why Linux support for
> their graphics chips seems to be improving.
>

I can't agree with you here.  ATI support has historically been worse
than nVidia's but that is rapidly changing. AMD is now releasing
same-day drivers for Windows and Linux and linux drivers are much more
often included on the cds packaged with the graphics
cards/motherboards.  Far from slowing down Linux support it is
boosting it forward with there now being both an internal AMD/ATI team
creating drivers (fglrx) as well as the specifications being released
and an open source driver being created (radeonhd).

I can't see how you are linking AMD/ATI growth of linux support with a
downturn of nVidia support. nVidia support has historically been
better, as you yourself said. It hasn't gotten any _worse_. It simply
hasn't had any real competition from ATI in Linux until recently and
the concerted effort being put into ATI's support has brought us to a
point where Linux users are again recommending ATI cards. Until
recently this discussion would probably have ended after a single
dismissive 'pfft, ATI and linux?'.

This rapid support of ATI under Linux seems to me to be showing the
nVidia work to have been 'good enough' rather than an actual focus.
If the underdog here can come to simultaneous cross platform driver
releases this fast then nVidia must have simply been not _trying_.  If
nVidia wants to keep this from see-sawing to us dismissing it as we
used to ATI then it will have to at _least_ keep up its current level
of support.  Competition here is healthy and no matter which of them
comes ahead we will still end up with better support than we had
before.

The real trend-setter here is Intel.  They do not make discrete
graphics cards[0], they have always stuck to integrated workstation
graphics.  Their drivers are open source and work across _many_
platforms.  They're not renowned for 3D gaming etc, but they 'just
work'.  For 2D work such as mythtv not having great 3D support is like
(oblig car analogy) not having a spoiler and alloy rims on a dump
truck.

cheers,
Owen.

footnotes
--
[0] Though it looks like they may be trying.
http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/01/23/0235249