> That said, my understanding is that you are committed to Linux, you still get a more robust OpenGL implementation (ATI used to be buggy as sin) and better sha

> That said, my understanding is that you are committed to Linux, you still get a more robust OpenGL implementation (ATI used to be buggy as sin) and better shader performance with Nvidia hardware/software. That's probably true, if your use case requires the absolute best GPU performance. For me, though, the Intel and AMD open source drivers have gotten good enough that the marginal improvements possible with proprietary drivers simply aren't worth the hassle. At least with AMD you are free to choose between Mesa and Catalyst, and can be assured of a decent experience either way. If you opt for nVidia hardware you're effectively locked in to their proprietary driver if you want to use even half of your GPU's capabilities. It helps that Intel and AMD and all the non-PC Mesa drivers share common infrastructure, so improvements to one driver tend to enhance the entire ecosystem—except nVidia. As you noted, the situation is changing rapidly; I think it won't be much longer before nVidia's proprietary drivers forfeit whatever performance advantage they have left to the combined efforts of the open source community.