Graphics card with libre drivers, cooperating vendor?

jonaskoelker · 02-27-2006, 04:41 AM

Hi all.

I'm growing sick and tired of the missing libre drivers for my nvidia card--true, there are libre drivers, but playing supertux w. OpenGL, or playing planet penguin racer (formerly tuxracer)at all, is just impossible (as is playing glTron at non-stinking resolutions and detail levels). Also, the supertux developers plan to shaft me (and a lot of other people) in milestone 2 by moving to OpenGL-only. Meanwhile, I drool at the screenshots of VegaStrike, yet it's so slow I have to press C-M-F2 and kill -9 it.

So, instead of just complaining a lot, I figured I'd better do something about it.

So, what I want from you, my dear reader, is answers (questions asked in order of importance):

Which graphics cards have libre drivers?
Which of those are good enough to play VegaStrike? To play Planet Penguin Racer?
Which of those are produced by companies (or individuals) who cooperate with the free software community in creating the free driver? Note that cooperation can take many form--one form is not actively trying to stop us, another form is releasing the spec, a third form is actually writing code.

Thanks for your attention --Jonas

nx5000 · 02-27-2006, 05:41 AM

There is this :
http://wiki.duskglow.com/tiki-index....=Open-Graphics

I think there is still a lot of work to do for optimization and 3d/2d extended support. But its a very good idea.

http://kerneltrap.org/node/5743

jonaskoelker · 02-27-2006, 08:02 AM

Thanks, nx5000. However, what I actually wanted (sorry for not saying that up front) is a 90%-Right-Now solution, instead of a 100%-In-A-Few-Years solution. I heard that the free drivers for ATI cards are generally good enough--can anyone confirm this? Can anyone run vegastrike with ATI? (I use vegastrike as an example, because I think it requires just about everything I'll need for the forseeable future--at least it's slow enough to make me believe that

)

stimpsonjcat · 04-20-2006, 05:52 AM

Hi

I know this is an old thread but I'm in a similar situation now. I would like to run Xgl/Compiz but my video cards are too old (I've got an Ati Rage 128 and an Nvidia Geforce 32MB

).

Now I thought I'd buy a used graphics card (I'm willing to spend up to 40 USD), but have no clue which one to get. The Gentoo wiki has a list of supported video cards. The question is: which one will allow me to run Xgl with free/open source drivers?