Tips on speeding up Nouveau?

intok · 07-05-2012, 02:10 PM

Hi, I'm running Mint13 i686 with 3.5 kernel, Nouveau, Mesa and Xorg from the Ubuntu "Xorg-Edgers" PPA. I'm new to all this stuff with the OSS drivers and would like to see what I can do to speed up the few games that are currently marginal with Nouveau.

The GPU I'm using is a Geforce 8800GTS G80.

What settings can be changed to get blood from a stone? Has overclocking been implemented yet? Currently I haven't found how to even check what speed the GPU is running at.

Caution, I'm not as smart as you think I am...

TobiSGD · 07-05-2012, 02:31 PM

The nouveau driver at this time has serious problems when it comes to running the GPU at the correct clockspeed (so called reclock-feature). Most of the times nouveau underclocks the chips.
It is as simple as that: If you want to have the best performance use the proprietary driver.

intok · 07-05-2012, 08:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TobiSGD

If you want to have the best performance use the proprietary driver.

Everyone keeps saying that and my reply is always no. No blobs near my kernel.

That said I'm happy with the games it manages to run, I'm only looking to remove any slowdowns in heavy gameplay areas, even increasing the framerate by 2 would be desirable as I'm not going for maximum possible speed, only what I can get from Nouveau, if it's not running the GPU at it's normal operating frequencies then how do I make it do so? Heat isn't an issue for me or my GPU, since the 8800GTS can reach the same speeds found on the 8800 Ultra as it's the same core nad the same quality of VRam: http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards....=475&card2=515

TobiSGD · 07-05-2012, 09:12 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by intok

Everyone keeps saying that and my reply is always no. No blobs near my kernel.

Well, it is your choice.

Quote:

if it's not running the GPU at it's normal operating frequencies then how do I make it do so?

Have a look at this article: http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?pag...king_one&num=1

Quote:

the 8800GTS can reach the same speeds found on the 8800 Ultra as it's the same core nad the same quality of VRam: http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards....=475&card2=515

This is overclocking. That means: It may be possible that your particular chip may run at 8800 Ultra speed, it may also be possible that it fails when you overclock 20MHz, there is no guarantee.
Regarding the RAM, which quality your RAM actually has is in no way dependent on the GPU, it is dependent on which RAM your specific card manufacturer has chosen to use. In the link you gave you will also see that the 8800 Ultra uses significantly more power, which means that it also needs a better heatsink. Are you sure that your heatsink can handle this?
But anyways, it is your hardware, do what you want.

intok · 07-06-2012, 02:33 AM

Yes, I know all about overclocking, been overclocking since my first 286SX. I've reached those levels when I used to run XP on this card, so I know it's capable of it. The cooling is a Thermalright HR-01, which can run this card fanless under heavy load if need be.

So yeah, I'm not afraid of a little heat.