nVidia 8000/9000 Series Performance Issues

[erickghint]

Originally Posted by OVERKILL8

Install nvclock, then run nvclock -f -F auto

.

Sadly, Nvclock doesn't support the 9 series cards, as of yet.

[xorbe]

So it's been months and months now...

Nobody has ever described what the 8/9 series hardware lost that enabled the 6/7 series to be so much faster. Is it really a driver problem, or did the hardware lose something critical that X needs that can't readily be cured via the driver software?

[panproteus]

I start losing hope that the drivers will be fixed in the nearest future. This reminds me the last time I used ATI card (about 3-4 years ago). There were countless issues with performance and stability on Linux, that I quickly regreted my purchase. Soon I bought a fresh Nvidia and blacklisted ATI for good. Since then I did not even consider buying another Radeon.

I can stick to some brand as long as it is reliable and I know that I can count on it. Now the things are changing dramatically. AMD after freeing Radeon drivers' source code and improving Linux support is giving better option than Nvidia with bugged 8x00/9x00 which I have the least pleasure to use in my Linux boxes. It has been 8 months since I bought 8x00 cards, being assured that the fix is on its way, and still working with GUI brings physical pain to my eyes. I know - I already bought the card, the money was spent, but I will not spend a single penny on another one (especially now when AMD option is getting better). Not when credibility is fading away...

Seriously, are the Nvidia decision makers, aware of the seriousness of the issue? They might not be even aware that such issue exists. Shouldn't someone show them that neglecting Linux userbase can lead to Nvidia losing it's commodity graphics market share? Even if this would be 1, 2 or 3 % (which does not look seriously), they should be aware of this and at least try to prevent it. Words spread fast and it is hard to undo them. Unfortunately for large corporations some things are noticed long after the turning point is reached.

I do not want to tell anyone not to use Nvidia products or to use it's competition's. I REALLY would like to use GeForces in the future. But if I will - this also depends on the decisions the vendor will take.

SO NVIDIA DECISION MAKERS: PLEASE, ALLOCATE MORE RESOURCES IN SOLVING LINUX PERFORMANCE ISSUES ON 8x00/9x00. FOR OUR SATISFACTION. FOR YOUR FURTHER PROFITS. THIS IS REALY P1 FOR LARGE PART OF LINUX USERBASE.

[txf]

Originally Posted by xorbe

So it's been months and months now...

Nobody has ever described what the 8/9 series hardware lost that enabled the 6/7 series to be so much faster. Is it really a driver problem, or did the hardware lose something critical that X needs that can't readily be cured via the driver software?

Apparently it has lost dedicated 2d acceleration hardware (according to some). As a result all 2d operations are fed into the 3d engine (which should be more than capable...more so even). However drivers need to be written in a way to take advantage of this. The lack of dedicated 2d tho isn't an excuse as the radeon 2000 series seems to have pretty good 2d acceleration on open drivers (dunno about fglx...some say it's good too).

many complain about the cumbersome nature of x and acceleration..but the truth is that nvidia pretty much rips out all these apparently dodgy aspects and implements it's own. In many cases its better and in others not so much...

[xsolarwindx]

Originally Posted by panproteus

I start losing hope that the drivers will be fixed in the nearest future. This reminds me the last time I used ATI card (about 3-4 years ago). There were countless issues with performance and stability on Linux, that I quickly regreted my purchase. Soon I bought a fresh Nvidia and blacklisted ATI for good. Since then I did not even consider buying another Radeon.

I can stick to some brand as long as it is reliable and I know that I can count on it. Now the things are changing dramatically. AMD after freeing Radeon drivers' source code and improving Linux support is giving better option than Nvidia with bugged 8x00/9x00 which I have the least pleasure to use in my Linux boxes. It has been 8 months since I bought 8x00 cards, being assured that the fix is on its way, and still working with GUI brings physical pain to my eyes. I know - I already bought the card, the money was spent, but I will not spend a single penny on another one (especially now when AMD option is getting better). Not when credibility is fading away...

Seriously, are the Nvidia decision makers, aware of the seriousness of the issue? They might not be even aware that such issue exists. Shouldn't someone show them that neglecting Linux userbase can lead to Nvidia losing it's commodity graphics market share? Even if this would be 1, 2 or 3 % (which does not look seriously), they should be aware of this and at least try to prevent it. Words spread fast and it is hard to undo them. Unfortunately for large corporations some things are noticed long after the turning point is reached.

I do not want to tell anyone not to use Nvidia products or to use it's competition's. I REALLY would like to use GeForces in the future. But if I will - this also depends on the decisions the vendor will take.

SO NVIDIA DECISION MAKERS: PLEASE, ALLOCATE MORE RESOURCES IN SOLVING LINUX PERFORMANCE ISSUES ON 8x00/9x00. FOR OUR SATISFACTION. FOR YOUR FURTHER PROFITS. THIS IS REALY P1 FOR LARGE PART OF LINUX USERBASE.

Exactly. I already have and will recommend ATI products to even my windows friends. Since they all trust me with this "computery business", they took it seriously when I said don't buy nvidia and even told THEIR friends. So far, this resulted in the purchase of 6 high performance ATI cards. It just keeps on rolling like that unless nVidia picks up pace. Word of mouth is the best possible advertisement. If people start hearing bad things about nVidia products, people will switch to ATI products and it's not only the Linux users that nVidia will lose.

[xsolarwindx]

Update: I just installed Linux Minut (just to try out the distro). It's an awesome distro, but I could immediately notice the lag in the GUI after coming from using windows for the past month (since the time I had owned my card). This is very disappointing.

[OVERKILL8]

Originally Posted by erickghint

Sadly, Nvclock doesn't support the 9 series cards, as of yet.

Technically my card isn't officially supported either, which is why I have to use the force option. I take it even that won't work?

[xsolarwindx]

Originally Posted by OVERKILL8

Technically my card isn't officially supported either, which is why I have to use the force option. I take it even that won't work?

Probably not.

[erickghint]

Originally Posted by OVERKILL8

Technically my card isn't officially supported either, which is why I have to use the force option. I take it even that won't work?

Not that I've been able to work out. As a cheap fix, I installed 2 more 120mm in my case. In Linux I'm getting an idle temp of around 53*c. That's about 7* cooler than previously. It's honestly not something that I think I should have had to do, but I guess it's not all bad. My cpu is idling at around 33-35*c now... so I'm happy about that. Only complaint I have now is the noise... heh.

[xsolarwindx]

Originally Posted by erickghint

Not that I've been able to work out. As a cheap fix, I installed 2 more 120mm in my case. In Linux I'm getting an idle temp of around 53*c. That's about 7* cooler than previously. It's honestly not something that I think I should have had to do, but I guess it's not all bad. My cpu is idling at around 33-35*c now... so I'm happy about that. Only complaint I have now is the noise... heh.

I'd trade your noise and heat for my poor 2D performance. Deal?

[storg]

Originally Posted by xsolarwindx

Thanks, I'll try that. But its funny how X's inefficient way works so well with ATI, isn't it? Also, why is KDE4 all-round performance SO HORRIBLE?

No the funny part is the older (my 7800GTX goes like a rocket, my 8800GTS is awful) cards are fine.

I for one won't be buying anymore of this brand until its sorted, period!

[Fackamato]

Just upgraded to the latest beta drivers meant for the GT200 series, and I have a lot of 2D improvement on my 64-bit Ubuntu 8.04 (installed the drivers manually), with a 8600M GT. Used to have ~15s with 100 in gtkperf, now it's down to 7.xx! Firefox feels faster too. (note: I'm using initialpixmap=2 and glyphcache=1)