Opinion: NVIDIA drivers are a BAD Thing [tm]

[Jonathan Gardner]

On Tuesday 18 May 2004 12:05 pm, alan wrote:
> Until a vendor that makes a fast 3d video card decides to open source
> drivers, we are pretty much stuck with the situation.  (Unless someone
> wants to reverse engineer the chipset.)
>
> I don't see it happening soon.
>

Apparently you've never heard of ATI. Their Linux drivers are all open 
source and it appears that they are actively cooperating with the community 
and trying to push X and Linux integration forward. While they aren't 
disclosing trade secrets they aren't at liberty to disclose, they are 
giving enough information legally that the developers can figure out those 
secrets or develop their own solutions.

I have been using ATI cards for several years, and as long as I use older 
hardware (7000 series nowadays), Linux works fabulously with them, even 3D 
acceleration. Today, you can buy ATI cards for cheap from Taiwanese and 
Chinese manufacturers. I think they pay ATI for the right to either make 
the chip themselves or to sell the card with their chipset on it. They sell 
well because frankly they are more than sufficient for business machines 
and my home linux network.

-- 
Jonathan Gardner
jgardner at jonathangardner.net