[gentoo-user] 7800 GTX: opensource driver stable?

[gentoo-user] 7800 GTX: opensource driver stable?

[James]

Hello,

I'm looking at this NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GTX for a gentoo based
gaming system. Anyone have any experience with this card (or
a similar card) and any of the open source drivers?


Maybe just use the nvidia drivers?

I've googled my fingers off, but, I'm more confused about
which card to purchase than before.
I'm not very experienced with Graphics Accellerations issue under
Linux/X so any help or comments are most appreciated.


I did find this excellent resource for bencharks and stabiltiy of
 all sorts of video cards:

http://freestone-group.com/video-card-stability-test/benchmark-results.html
http://freestone-group.com/video-card-stability-test/


I'm not looking for the latest video card, just one with good performance
and open source drivers.


James

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Re: [gentoo-user] 7800 GTX: opensource driver stable?

[Richard Fish]

On 11/16/06, James <wireless@tampabay.rr.com> wrote:
> I'm not looking for the latest video card, just one with good performance
> and open source drivers.

You won't get hardware 3D with nvidia and open source drivers.  So
you'll either have to accept the proprietary drivers (which are pretty
good IMO) if you want hardware 3D, or prefer an ATI card supported by
the radeon driver.  But I have no current experience with ATI, so
others will have to comment about that side of the world.

-Richard
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[gentoo-user] Re: 7800 GTX: opensource driver stable?

[James]

Richard Fish <bigfish <at> asmallpond.org> writes:


> > I'm not looking for the latest video card, just one with good performance
> > and open source drivers.

> You won't get hardware 3D with nvidia and open source drivers.  So
> you'll either have to accept the proprietary drivers (which are pretty
> good IMO) if you want hardware 3D, or prefer an ATI card supported by
> the radeon driver.  But I have no current experience with ATI, so
> others will have to comment about that side of the world.

Hello Richard,

Yea, I guess that's why I suggested the nvidia. NObody seems to want to
state how well/poor opensource ATI drivers code is working. When I read,
what I can find from googling, it's either dated or confusing.
I'd go with an ATI card and opensource drivers, if somebody would 
indicate a card that gives reasonble performance, for less than $200.00 usd.

I leaning towards the nvidia 7800 based card. Good performance, reasonable
price.  Here is the best reference I found  on building a cost effective
 gaming system:

 http://compreviews.about.com/od/tutorials/a/DIYBudgetGamePC.htm

My other concerns are how well is the mobo supported under linux?  Since gaming
systems run hot, cooling and lm_sensors support seems critical in putting
together a gaming system. I not whether I should used a 'water cooler' or if
force air cooling is sufficient. If I used a water cooler, should it also cool
the gpu on the graphics card?  I do not intend to 'overclock' the graphics card
at this time. If I cannot determine that this mobo (MSI K9N SLI Platinum) is
linux (lm_sensors) friendly, then maybe somebody can/will recommend another
mobo that support's SLI and amd64 processors and is not too expensive?



James

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Re: [gentoo-user] Re: 7800 GTX: opensource driver stable?

[Richard Fish]

On 11/17/06, James <wireless@tampabay.rr.com> wrote:
> My other concerns are how well is the mobo supported under linux?  Since gaming
> systems run hot, cooling and lm_sensors support seems critical in putting
> together a gaming system.

I haven't run across any new system that actually supported lm_sensors
in about 5 years.  Most modern chipsets seem to expose processor
temperatures and some fan settings through ACPI.  Somehow gkrellm is
also able to detect the GPU temperature in my system, but I haven't
figured out how yet... :-)

> I not whether I should used a 'water cooler' or if
> force air cooling is sufficient. If I used a water cooler, should it also cool
> the gpu on the graphics card?

Air cooling is sufficient if you have a good case (/richard smiles at
his Antec P150).  The main reason to use water coolers is to reduce
the noise of the system, so you can use a much larger (and slower thus
quieter) fan to cool the GPU(s).  AMD procs run fairly cool, and both
the case and CPU fans on my AMD X2 4400 system are basically silent
even under high load.  But the system isn't anywhere near silent,
because of that damn GPU fan.

-Richard
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