[gentoo-user] nvidia-drivers vs. nouveau

[Stefan G. Weichinger]

Just being curious:

I use my main workstation primarily for work.

Ok, gnome3 needs some graphic acceleration, aside from that I can only
think of the occasional mythfrontend running on my desktop.

I consider to chose nouveau drivers instead of the nvidia-drivers-package.

What are your recommendations?

Thanks, Stefan

[Nikos Chantziaras]

Unless you need to use the console (nvidia-drivers don't provide a KMS
fb console,) there's no reason to use Nouveau at the moment. The binary
drivers perform better and save much more energy. With Nouveau, your
GPU will be running full-on constantly. NVidia's drivers will reduce
clocks and voltages when the card is idle.

Other than that, you might want to use Nouveau in order to test it and
file bug reports for it.

[Alecks Gates]

The only reason I really use nvidia-drivers is because of VDPAU.  Otherwise I can't watch HD videos on my media center.  VDPAU works great, and I hope nouveau supports it or something equivalent eventually.  Mythtv probably uses it, though that's just a guess.

Alecks Gates, sent from Android on an HTC G2

On Apr 11, 2012 5:17 PM, <ny6...@gmail.com> wrote:

I use the nouveau drivers because they update themselves when you update the
kernel, and there's less work involved in keeping everything up to date. But
I can't comment on the nvidia drivers since I've never tried them. Nouveau
works well enough for me.

Terry

[ny6...@gmail.com]

On Wed, Apr 11, 2012 at 10:38:50PM +0200, Stefan G. Weichinger wrote:
>

[Stefan G. Weichinger]

Am 11.04.2012 23:14, schrieb Nikos Chantziaras:
>> What are your recommendations?
>
> Unless you need to use the console (nvidia-drivers don't provide a
> KMS fb console,) there's no reason to use Nouveau at the moment. The
> binary drivers perform better and save much more energy. With
> Nouveau, your GPU will be running full-on constantly. NVidia's
> drivers will reduce clocks and voltages when the card is idle.

thanks, Nikos ... that's a plain vote for nvidia-drivers ;-)

> Other than that, you might want to use Nouveau in order to test it
> and file bug reports for it.

ah, you know .... short of time etc .... :-)

Thanks!

[Stefan G. Weichinger]

Am 11.04.2012 23:16, schrieb ny6...@gmail.com:

> I use the nouveau drivers because they update themselves when you update the
> kernel, and there's less work involved in keeping everything up to date. But
> I can't comment on the nvidia drivers since I've never tried them. Nouveau
> works well enough for me.

See my other reply: Nikos hit the point.

S

[Nikos Chantziaras]

Note however that it's not obvious which version of nvidia-drivers to
use. NVidia provides various different series of drivers. The drivers
are versioned 96.*, 173.* and 295.*, and each version series is intended
for different cards.

If you have a relatively recent card (going back to approximately 2004),
the 295 series are for you. Better make sure though. Visit this:

http://www.nvidia.com/drivers

select Linux and your card model and it will tell you which drivers you
should use.

[Canek Peláez Valdés]

I actually changed to nouveau because the desktop performance of
nvidia-drivers sucked at the time. I still use nvidia-drivers in my
media center (because of VDPAU), but in my desktop I changed about
year and a half ago, and I'm pretty happy with it.

Before that, I used nvidia-drivers for many years, and it was always
full of ups and downs; some versions worked great, others were barely
usable. The nouveau drivers have been consistently good, even for
small 3D use (things like Blender).

If you don't use (modern) games, I highly recommend the nouveau
drivers. For a modern desktop they work great.

Regards.
--
Canek Peláez Valdés
Posgrado en Ciencia e Ingeniería de la Computación
Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México

[Stefan G. Weichinger]

Am 11.04.2012 23:14, schrieb Nikos Chantziaras:

> Unless you need to use the console (nvidia-drivers don't provide a KMS
> fb console,) there's no reason to use Nouveau at the moment. The binary
> drivers perform better and save much more energy. With Nouveau, your
> GPU will be running full-on constantly. NVidia's drivers will reduce
> clocks and voltages when the card is idle.

Additional question:

what do you have for VIDEO_CARDS?

my make.conf:

VIDEO_CARDS="nvidia nv vesa"

?

S

[Stefan G. Weichinger]

Am 11.04.2012 23:38, schrieb Nikos Chantziaras:

> Note however that it's not obvious which version of nvidia-drivers to
> use. NVidia provides various different series of drivers. The drivers
> are versioned 96.*, 173.* and 295.*, and each version series is intended
> for different cards.
>
> If you have a relatively recent card (going back to approximately 2004),
> the 295 series are for you. Better make sure though. Visit this:
>
> http://www.nvidia.com/drivers
>
> select Linux and your card model and it will tell you which drivers you
> should use.

It is never "easy" ?

;-)

# lspci

01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation GF108 [GeForce GT
430] (rev a1)


I currently run

x11-drivers/nvidia-drivers-295.33

... without any problems!

S

[Nikos Chantziaras]

Mine:

VIDEO_CARDS="nvidia"

"nv" is for the old, deprecated 2D-only driver that should not be used
anymore. "vesa" is for the generic VESA driver. It's still good as an
emergency backup.

Note that after changing VIDEO_CARDS, it's best to "emerge -uDN world &&
emerge -a --depclean".

[Dale]

Somewhat related question. I use the Nvidia drivers here and have not
had any issues in a while. How does one use VESA if the Nvidia drivers
fail? One used to change it in xorg.conf but most don't have a
xorg.conf any more.

Just curious.

Dale

:-) :-)

--
I am only responsible for what I said ... Not for what you understood or
how you interpreted my words!

Miss the compile output? Hint:
EMERGE_DEFAULT_OPTS="--quiet-build=n"

[Nikos Chantziaras]

On 12/04/12 01:55, Dale wrote:
> Nikos Chantziaras wrote:
>> On 12/04/12 00:32, Stefan G. Weichinger wrote:
>>> Am 11.04.2012 23:14, schrieb Nikos Chantziaras:
>>>
>>>> Unless you need to use the console (nvidia-drivers don't provide a KMS
>>>> fb console,) there's no reason to use Nouveau at the moment. The binary
>>>> drivers perform better and save much more energy. With Nouveau, your
>>>> GPU will be running full-on constantly. NVidia's drivers will reduce
>>>> clocks and voltages when the card is idle.
>>>
>>> Additional question:
>>>
>>> what do you have for VIDEO_CARDS?
>>>
>>> my make.conf:
>>>
>>> VIDEO_CARDS="nvidia nv vesa"
>>
>> Mine:
>>
>> VIDEO_CARDS="nvidia"
>>
>> "nv" is for the old, deprecated 2D-only driver that should not be used
>> anymore. "vesa" is for the generic VESA driver. It's still good as an
>> emergency backup.
>>
>> Note that after changing VIDEO_CARDS, it's best to "emerge -uDN world&&
>> emerge -a --depclean".
>>
>>
>>
>
>
> Somewhat related question. I use the Nvidia drivers here and have not
> had any issues in a while. How does one use VESA if the Nvidia drivers
> fail? One used to change it in xorg.conf but most don't have a
> xorg.conf any more.

You have an /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/ directory though. You can put
snippets in it with the *.conf extension and X.Org will read it when it
starts. For my GPU setting for example, I use
/etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/gpu.conf. It has a "Device" section in with:

Driver "nvidia"

This can be changed to "vesa" at any time.

[Dale]

Nikos Chantziaras wrote:

> On 12/04/12 01:55, Dale wrote:
>>
>> Somewhat related question. I use the Nvidia drivers here and have not
>> had any issues in a while. How does one use VESA if the Nvidia drivers
>> fail? One used to change it in xorg.conf but most don't have a
>> xorg.conf any more.
>
> You have an /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/ directory though. You can put
> snippets in it with the *.conf extension and X.Org will read it when it
> starts. For my GPU setting for example, I use
> /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/gpu.conf. It has a "Device" section in with:
>
> Driver "nvidia"
>
> This can be changed to "vesa" at any time.
>
>
>

So basically it is done the same way. If you don't have a *.conf file,
just create one and chose vesa. I was thinking this had changed and I
missed it. I guess I haven't missed anything. Weird. lol

Thanks.

[Nikos Chantziaras]

On 12/04/12 02:43, Dale wrote:
> Nikos Chantziaras wrote:
>> On 12/04/12 01:55, Dale wrote:
>>>
>>> Somewhat related question. I use the Nvidia drivers here and have not
>>> had any issues in a while. How does one use VESA if the Nvidia drivers
>>> fail? One used to change it in xorg.conf but most don't have a
>>> xorg.conf any more.
>>
>> You have an /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/ directory though. You can put
>> snippets in it with the *.conf extension and X.Org will read it when it
>> starts. For my GPU setting for example, I use
>> /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/gpu.conf. It has a "Device" section in with:
>>
>> Driver "nvidia"
>>
>> This can be changed to "vesa" at any time.
>>
>>
>>
>
>
> So basically it is done the same way. If you don't have a *.conf file,
> just create one and chose vesa. I was thinking this had changed and I
> missed it. I guess I haven't missed anything. Weird. lol

The thing that changed is that X.Org was unable to pick defaults in the
absence of a config file. Obviously you need a way to change the
settings if the defaults are wrong for you. This hasn't and, obviously,
will not change.

[Alan McKinnon]

On Wed, 11 Apr 2012 16:36:06 -0500
Canek Peláez Valdés <can...@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Wed, Apr 11, 2012 at 4:30 PM, Stefan G. Weichinger
> <li...@xunil.at> wrote:
> > Am 11.04.2012 23:16, schrieb ny6...@gmail.com:
> >
> >> I use the nouveau drivers because they update themselves when you
> >> update the kernel, and there's less work involved in keeping
> >> everything up to date. But I can't comment on the nvidia drivers
> >> since I've never tried them. Nouveau works well enough for me.
> >
> > See my other reply: Nikos hit the point.
>
> I actually changed to nouveau because the desktop performance of
> nvidia-drivers sucked at the time. I still use nvidia-drivers in my
> media center (because of VDPAU), but in my desktop I changed about
> year and a half ago, and I'm pretty happy with it.
>
> Before that, I used nvidia-drivers for many years, and it was always
> full of ups and downs; some versions worked great, others were barely
> usable. The nouveau drivers have been consistently good, even for
> small 3D use (things like Blender).
>
> If you don't use (modern) games, I highly recommend the nouveau
> drivers. For a modern desktop they work great.

I'll second that. I don't need blazing fast 3D performance, I do need
stable drivers that keep pace with kernel releases. I got tired of
having to remember to fully test nvidia-drivers every time I did a
kernel upgrade so switched to nouveau.

That was the previous laptop. This current one has an ATI card and I
use ati drivers rather than fglrx for the same reason.

The other killer was that I could never get nvidia-drivers to deal with
a multi-monitor setup in any kind of sane fashion. nVidia does do
multi-monitor, it just wants to present it in a way that made no sense
to me at all. Even something as simple as unplugging my desk monitor
and going to a meeting room to do a presentation on the projector
required an X restart.

--
Alan McKinnnon
alan.m...@gmail.com

[Helmut Jarausch]

On 04/12/2012 09:09:16 AM, Alan McKinnon wrote:
> That was the previous laptop. This current one has an ATI card and I
> use ati drivers rather than fglrx for the same reason.

What's the difference (in performance) between fglrx and xf86-video-ati
?
Do both of them support GPU usage?

Thanks for some info,
Helmut.

[Alan McKinnon]

To be truthful, I really don't know the details.

My major overriding need is for the video driver to be in sync with the
rest of my software at all times so that portage can just do the right
thing (exactly like all the other drivers I use).

As long as the right pixels light up at the right time on the screen
and X does not crash, then I do not care about super video performance.

The open source ATI drivers completely fulfil my needs.


--
Alan McKinnnon
alan.m...@gmail.com

[Nikos Chantziaras]

On 12/04/12 11:06, Helmut Jarausch wrote:
> On 04/12/2012 09:09:16 AM, Alan McKinnon wrote:
>> That was the previous laptop. This current one has an ATI card and I
>> use ati drivers rather than fglrx for the same reason.
>
> What's the difference (in performance) between fglrx and xf86-video-ati ?

There are some benchmarks at Phoronix. Overall, the radeon driver
offers about 20% of fglrx. There are some rare exceptions where the
open driver can reach fglrx performance.

I still prefer the open driver on radeon hardware though; fglrx is too
buggy (contrary to the NVidia driver.)

> Do both of them support GPU usage?

Yes.

[Stefan G. Weichinger]

Am 11.04.2012 23:14, schrieb Nikos Chantziaras:

> Unless you need to use the console (nvidia-drivers don't provide a KMS
> fb console,) there's no reason to use Nouveau at the moment. The binary
> drivers perform better and save much more energy. With Nouveau, your
> GPU will be running full-on constantly. NVidia's drivers will reduce
> clocks and voltages when the card is idle.

Although I like the aspect of open source drivers I also like the idea
of saving energy. So I stay with nvidia-drivers for now.

S

[Nikos Chantziaras]

Nouveau, slowly but surely, gets better over time, including power
management. A good place to keep up to date with the progress of the
open drivers is the Phoronix news feed:

http://www.phoronix.com

It almost always reports on new features of the drivers.

[ny6...@gmail.com]

Yes, nouveau is very adept at juggling monitors.

Terry

[Paul Hartman]

On Thu, Apr 12, 2012 at 3:06 AM, Helmut Jarausch
<jara...@igpm.rwth-aachen.de> wrote:
> What's the difference (in performance) between fglrx and xf86-video-ati ?

My experience with my first and only ATI video card (a Mobility Radeon
9700), is that the opensource drivers for my chipset are basically
useless for anything 3D. Slow, corrupt graphics, freezing the
computer. The ati-drivers/fglrx was several times faster and much more
stable.

Unfortunately, ATI removed support for my card from their drivers in
2009, leaving me no choice but to use the OSS driver unless I want to
downgrade my system to use kernel 2.6.28 or earlier.

[Canek Peláez Valdés]

On Wed, Apr 11, 2012 at 4:36 PM, Canek Peláez Valdés <can...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Wed, Apr 11, 2012 at 4:30 PM, Stefan G. Weichinger <li...@xunil.at> wrote:
>> Am 11.04.2012 23:16, schrieb ny6...@gmail.com:
>>
>>> I use the nouveau drivers because they update themselves when you update the
>>> kernel, and there's less work involved in keeping everything up to date. But
>>> I can't comment on the nvidia drivers since I've never tried them. Nouveau
>>> works well enough for me.
>>
>> See my other reply: Nikos hit the point.
>
> I actually changed to nouveau because the desktop performance of
> nvidia-drivers sucked at the time. I still use nvidia-drivers in my
> media center (because of VDPAU), but in my desktop I changed about
> year and a half ago, and I'm pretty happy with it.
>
> Before that, I used nvidia-drivers for many years, and it was always
> full of ups and downs; some versions worked great, others were barely
> usable. The nouveau drivers have been consistently good, even for
> small 3D use (things like Blender).
>
> If you don't use (modern) games, I highly recommend the nouveau
> drivers. For a modern desktop they work great.

Relevant to the thread, I believe:

"Open-Source NVIDIA Driver Approaches Stable State"
http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=nouveau_linux_stable&num=1