From: Forge <wy...@ic...> - 2001-03-14 02:26:02
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> On Tue, 13 Mar 2001 ga...@op... wrote: > > > On Tue, 13 Mar 2001, Forge wrote: > > > > > Nvidia, even in the newest 0.9-6 driver, chokes and dies on many SMP > > > systems, and even more often on 440BX SMP systems. I'd totally disregard it. > > > > An understatement. The NVdriver kernel module is about 700K, i.e. most > > of the driver is in the kernel. Thus, when using a TNT2 card, the > > Nvidia module would take the entire kernel out cold. No remote > > telnet...no Alt-SysRq...instead a five minute wait on boot up for > > e2fsck to check my 20Gb and 40Gb drives...and occasionally having to > > run e2fsck manually on those drives. Very frustrating. And I've heard > > Nvidia developers quoted as saying that stability is not as important > > to them as performance. The drivers do perform well...provided you > > don't include the five minutes to reboot and check filesystems in your > > FPS calculation. > > I've been using them for going on a year now (0.91 through 0.96) and this > has never happened to me. I've used them on a TNT (STB Velocity) which I > no longer own, a TN2 which I currently use, and a GeForce2 which I also > currently use. The #nvidia channel on openprojects.net has a bunch of > very helpful folks (and a very helpful bot, I must say); if you have the > slightest problem they can probably solve it right away. > > I've had console corruption with the Nvidia drivers, but I've also had > that with my Radeon a few times here -- and I've locked up my system with > my Voodoo3 before (XFree86 3.3.x + GLIDE). I'm not a big Nvidia fan, but > it really isn't as bad as everyone makes it out to be. I can't speak for everyone in the thread, but I was only referring to SMP systems, specifically 440BX based SMP systems. These have always been very problematic with the NV binary-only drivers. I personally am running an Athlon UP system, and 0.9-6 has been incredibly stable and fast once I fixed the bios repost bug. I'm planning on an Athlon SMP system soon, though, so I'm both hoping NV's binaries are stable on the newer EV6 SMP systems, and planning on a Radeon 2 as my next upgrade, just in case. > > In contrast, I've had only a few X server lock ups w/ the voodoo 5, and > > not even that in the last few months. > > I have a Voodoo3 and it's been great, plus it supports the older games > under Linux. I haven't had any lockups on 0.9-6 at all (knock on wood), zero console corruption (text, vesa, and now rivafb), and even though I'm a gamer at heart, I haven't found any games that won't run with NV's philosophically inferior and practically superior drivers, at least once patched to current. Both DRI and NV have big positives and minor negatives, but one of NV's big negatives is it's SMP flakiness, and SMP is a serious goal for me. > -- > It won't be long before the CPU is a card in a slot on your ATX videoboard Jeez I hope not. :) > Craig Kelley -- kel...@is... > http://www.isu.edu/~kellcrai finger in...@in... for PGP block > > > > _______________________________________________ > Dri-users mailing list > Dri...@li... > http://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/dri-users > |