[gentoo-user] State of ATi drivers in Linux

[Hal Martin <hal.martin@gmail.com>]

Hello all,

I am contemplating building a new computer with an AMD/ATi graphics 
card. I've been following the subject of ATi driver quality in linux for 
a while, but I realize that the experiences I read on Google search 
results are, shall we say, biased, as many people who have perfectly 
working cards don't go out and comment on how great their drivers are.

So, do any of you have newer (HD series) AMD/ATi graphics cards?
What drivers (AMD closed source, or open source) are you using?
Are they stable?
How is the performance?
Any noise issues with your card when it's idle? Under load?

I'd just like to point out that I have an NVidia 7900GTX right now, and 
it's been working well for me, but I'd like to upgrade to something with 
stream processors and little more power. I've heard that NVidia 2D 
performance under linux suffers greatly if you have an 8000, 9000, or GX 
series card. Have any of your experienced poor 2D performance since 
upgrading your NVidia card?

Thanks,
-Hal