From owner-freebsd-x11@FreeBSD.ORG Wed May 8 10:04:11 2013 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-x11@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.FreeBSD.org [8.8.178.115]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 81416B34 for ; Wed, 8 May 2013 10:04:11 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from ml@netfence.it) Received: from smtp.eutelia.it (mp1-smtp-5.eutelia.it [62.94.10.165]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 0CB712CA for ; Wed, 8 May 2013 10:04:10 +0000 (UTC) Received: from ns2.biolchim.it (ip-188-188.sn2.eutelia.it [83.211.188.188]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by smtp.eutelia.it (Eutelia) with ESMTP id 2B6BE157F37 for ; Wed, 8 May 2013 12:04:08 +0200 (CEST) Received: from soth.ventu (adsl-ull-72-236.41-151.net24.it [151.41.236.72]) (authenticated bits=0) by ns2.biolchim.it (8.14.7/8.14.7) with ESMTP id r48A42NR064467 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA bits=256 verify=FAIL) for ; Wed, 8 May 2013 12:04:04 +0200 (CEST) (envelope-from ml@netfence.it) Received: from alamar.ventu (alamar.ventu [10.1.2.18]) by soth.ventu (8.14.7/8.14.5) with ESMTP id r48A3n3k080586 for ; Wed, 8 May 2013 12:03:49 +0200 (CEST) (envelope-from ml@netfence.it) Message-ID: <518A2305.8090405@netfence.it> Date: Wed, 08 May 2013 12:03:49 +0200 From: Andrea Venturoli User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; FreeBSD i386; rv:17.0) Gecko/20130507 Thunderbird/17.0.5 MIME-Version: 1.0 To: freebsd-x11@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Status of ATI video acceleration support + freebsd port code References: <23361.1367959126@server1.tristatelogic.com> In-Reply-To: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Scanned-By: MIMEDefang 2.73 X-Scanned-By: MIMEDefang 2.73 on 10.1.2.13 X-Greylist: Sender succeeded SMTP AUTH, not delayed by milter-greylist-4.4.3 (ns2.biolchim.it [192.168.2.203]); Wed, 08 May 2013 12:04:04 +0200 (CEST) X-BeenThere: freebsd-x11@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14 Precedence: list List-Id: X11 on FreeBSD -- maintaining and support List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Wed, 08 May 2013 10:04:11 -0000 On 05/08/13 11:45, Tom Evans wrote: > Nvidia cards are fully supported; the only feature currently not > present in the proprietary driver is Optimus. > > Yes, it is a proprietary and closed source driver, but more > importantly, it just works. X works, DRI works, 2D acceleration works, > xv works, opengl works, xrandr works, vdpau (video offload) works. > Save yourself pain and time and just go with nvidia. I agree with you with only one caveat... Right now I'm buying ATI, but I've had nVidia cards in the past. The problem with closed source drivers is upgrades: at one point my Linux distribution (FreeBSD would probably be even worse) moved to a new X.Org; when porting their driver to the new X.Org, nVidia decided to drop that support for that card. So I was faced with either: _ stop upgrading everything and stay with an old system (probably with security holes); _ spend some money to change my old, but working, graphic card (and possibly other components if you don't find a newer match); _ move to VESA drive with no acceleration. While I'm not saying this wouldn't have happened with an OS driver, I still think it's less frequent. Just my 2c. bye av.