Curious about the G80-based cards

[jclinton]

So, I just read NVIDIA rethinks the GPU with the new GeForce 8800 and aside from being quite impressed with the cleverness of NVIDIA engineers, there are a few questions it has raised.

Based on my understanding of the new SP architecture in these chips, the "GPU-ness" of the 8800's Windows drivers is actually implemented in some kind of software-only virtual machine which runs on the G80. That sounds like a huge software engineering undertaking. Are we talking years, not months, before a Linux version of this software-based GPU is available for inclusion in the drivers? Bottom line, no G80's on Linux for a while?

Also, it seems to me that, if your GPU "specialness" is implemented as a software SP program, that pretty much kills any chance of there ever being any 3D-capable open source version of the NVIDIA drivers. Not really looking for a response, just pontificating ...

[netllama]

G80 is supported in the 1.0-9742 driver which was released today.

[zbiggy]

Originally Posted by netllama

G80 is supported in the 1.0-9742 driver which was released today.

Nvidia speeds up Linux support. Linux driver out of the box. Impossible. Incredible. Very well.
I hope x.org 7.2 which is coming soon will be supported too.

[AaronP]

I don't think there are any changes in X.org 7.2 that break the existing drivers. There's one currently slated for X.org 7.3 that will though. I'm hoping to get a fix for that into the next release.

[zbiggy]

Originally Posted by AaronP

I don't think there are any changes in X.org 7.2 that break the existing drivers. There's one currently slated for X.org 7.3 that will though. I'm hoping to get a fix for that into the next release.

Everybody always wishes me a nice day. Nobody told me this nice day is today.

[Skrot]

Originally Posted by zbiggy

Everybody always wishes me a nice day. Nobody told me this nice day is today.

Indeed, I'm very pleased with the current NVIDIA linux driver situation.

Very much thanks to you linux people at NVIDIA!