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IMO Linux still has pretty poor graphics drivers, and the whole Wayland thing is in a weird spot right now too. My primary use my my PC is a work machine, for w

IMO Linux still has pretty poor graphics drivers, and the whole Wayland thing is in a weird spot right now too. My primary use my my PC is a work machine, for which Linux is very well suited. I also game on my PC. For that, I have tried limiting my self to native Linux games, Wine, directed assigned graphics with a windows VM, and plain old dual booting. In the end I keep end up dual booting. Gaming graphics cards don't work well under Linux. However, I've had great luck with low end workstation graphics cards, especially those running the new AMDGPU driver. If you are an expert, there has never been a better time to move to Linux. If you are a novice, there still hasn't been a better time, but its also still not for everyone.

nimbius 6y ago
not to get too offtopic but performance in Linux for Vulkan routinely beats native windows video performance. https://www.protondb.com/ https://www.protondb.com/ https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=dota2-mac-vulkan&num=2 https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=dota2-ma... at present there are about 6500 working games in Linux that take advantage of advanced 3d graphics. These include the latest Doom, Fallout 76, and Borderlands 3. Im currently running a Radeon RX 470 and playing everything from Aragami to P.A.M.E.L.A. and Wolfenstein New Colossus at 60fps or higher.
- Skunkleton 6y ago
  Yeah, performance certainly has come a long way. The bigger issues these days are stability and compatibility. Both nouveau and nVidia proprietary are pretty crashy (and not just for me). nVidia proprietary isn't great with wayland. Catalyst is pretty bad. AMDGPU is great, but I haven't really pushed it beyond a low end workstation card. Intel is fine, but intel doesn't offer high end graphics.
RMPR 6y ago
> the whole Wayland thing is in a weird spot right now too You can still use X though, speaking from experience Nvidia drivers don't work at all on Wayland. Furthermore this is a great resource which will certainly be useful to OP https://www.forbes.com/sites/jasonevangelho/2019/03/15/linux-gaming-usability-and-performance-across-9-distros-introduction/#585d2ba74cf3 https://www.forbes.com/sites/jasonevangelho/2019/03/15/linux...
- Skunkleton 6y ago
  I actually bought a second graphics card for use with linux because I was sick of deciding between slow (nouveau) and crashy (nv proprietary). I have a WX2100 and it has been completely rock solid. I can't use X11 without some as-yet-to-be-discovered workaround because it won't give up on using my nvidia card, even though I have that card attached to vfio-pci. Wayland is solid though.
inshadows 6y ago
> IMO Linux still has pretty poor graphics drivers The situation is like this: https://preview.redd.it/79011affulj11.png?width=800&format=png&auto=webp&s=bbcdd3770ac8d01f373506f2e656a9d7f1541423 https://preview.redd.it/79011affulj11.png?width=800&format=p... nVidia: I've been gaming on nVidia proprietary drivers without any issues. Though most demanding games were CS:GO and The Talos Principle. AMD: At work I'm on workstation with some 2 years old Radeon and AMDGPU drivers (mainline). No issues so far. Intel: I'm using it on my laptop. No issues so far. What poor graphics drivers do you have in mind?
- Skunkleton 6y ago
  I mean you linked the meme? That pretty well sums things up. Like I said in my original comment, workstation graphics cards tend to do great, as do older graphics cards.
  - inshadows 6y ago
    I've used mix of old and new graphics cards and I have never experienced issues with drivers related to how recent the graphics card was. The few issues I had were always with the driver itself. And I've never used workstation-grade graphics card, always consumer ones.
AsyncAwait 6y ago
> IMO Linux still has pretty poor graphics drivers. IMO Intel is generally very well supported with the open-source kernel driver and amdgpu is getting there. This feels like a trope that always gets repeated but never updated, kind of like "you need CLI to use Linux". > the whole Wayland thing is in a weird spot right now too The whole Wayland thing is already much smoother for many than X11 ever was and it actually takes security seriously. I am running GNOME on Wayland full time since 2018 and by this point there's nothing I miss from X11, any specifics?
- Skunkleton 6y ago
  > there's nothing I miss from X11, any specifics? There are plenty of applications that still depend on Xwayland, and the nvidia proprietary can't accelerate these. There are some other weird stability issues related to the nvidia driver as of mid last year at least. Wayland is missing a bunch of features from X, which bothers some people. I personally miss network transparency from X. That said, I do run wayland full time, and have for a few years now. I just can't recommend it without reservations. I can't comment on catalyst, or AMDGPU on current generation AMD gaming graphics cards. What I can say is that you can pretty much blindly assume that whatever gpu you want to buy will work well under Windows. > IMO Intel is generally very well supported I would add AMDGPU to that list as well. Still, AMDGPU is new, and Intel doesn't offer a high end graphics card. nVidia proprietary causes problems, such as those it causes for wayland. I am very happy with my AMDGPU compatible WX2100 for linux, but it is certainly not a good gaming GPU.
  - AsyncAwait 6y ago
    Sure, nvidia is problematic, hence Linuses now famous rant, but that's to be expected, they don't cooperate at all. I understand it may be the only option for high-end gaming, but in that case one probably doesn't have switchable graphics, which causes the most issues, so X/Xwayland is the one compromise one has to make. This however does not mean that Linux graphics is a mess in general. I have both Intel and amdgpu machines that work out of the box, no problem. And this does not ever gets asked in relation to macOS, because everyone "knows" nvidia just wasn't a thing there in recent years. So perhaps we should assume nvidia just isn't a thing as well, unless you're willing to put up with crap? So does Linux and Linux on the desktop work for everybody? No. Does it work as good for a high-end gaming machine as Windows? No. Does Windows work as the most productive fronend/backend/systems OS for programming out there? No. Does Linux? Yeah. So while they both have their strengths and weaknesses, Linux works perfectly well for a lot of use-cases, the graphics driver situation included. As for Wayland not being network-transparent, the fact that it worked in X in the way it did was in fact a massive hack and a security hole and while sometimes convenient, I personally didn't need GUI over SSH almost ever, apart from playing around, so I'd take a proper security architecture, like Wayland has, over network transparency. This is also not a feature supported by Windows/macOS, so not really a point against Linux in my book. The early complaints, like screenshots etc. re Wayland were all resolved some time ago too.
Nursie 6y ago
> Gaming graphics cards don't work well under Linux They work fine, haven't had a problem with them for years, using nvidia cards. Most distros just ship the proprietary drivers now, and those just work. There just aren't masses of native games. That said, Steam now has a built in version of wine called "Proton" that's worth checking out.

nimbius 6y ago

not to get too offtopic but performance in Linux for Vulkan routinely beats native windows video performance. https://www.protondb.com/ https://www.protondb.com/ https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=dota2-mac-vulkan&num=2 https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=dota2-ma... at present there are about 6500 working games in Linux that take advantage of advanced 3d graphics. These include the latest Doom, Fallout 76, and Borderlands 3. Im currently running a Radeon RX 470 and playing everything from Aragami to P.A.M.E.L.A. and Wolfenstein New Colossus at 60fps or higher.

Skunkleton 6y ago
Yeah, performance certainly has come a long way. The bigger issues these days are stability and compatibility. Both nouveau and nVidia proprietary are pretty crashy (and not just for me). nVidia proprietary isn't great with wayland. Catalyst is pretty bad. AMDGPU is great, but I haven't really pushed it beyond a low end workstation card. Intel is fine, but intel doesn't offer high end graphics.

RMPR 6y ago

> the whole Wayland thing is in a weird spot right now too You can still use X though, speaking from experience Nvidia drivers don't work at all on Wayland. Furthermore this is a great resource which will certainly be useful to OP https://www.forbes.com/sites/jasonevangelho/2019/03/15/linux-gaming-usability-and-performance-across-9-distros-introduction/#585d2ba74cf3 https://www.forbes.com/sites/jasonevangelho/2019/03/15/linux...

Skunkleton 6y ago
I actually bought a second graphics card for use with linux because I was sick of deciding between slow (nouveau) and crashy (nv proprietary). I have a WX2100 and it has been completely rock solid. I can't use X11 without some as-yet-to-be-discovered workaround because it won't give up on using my nvidia card, even though I have that card attached to vfio-pci. Wayland is solid though.

inshadows 6y ago

> IMO Linux still has pretty poor graphics drivers The situation is like this: https://preview.redd.it/79011affulj11.png?width=800&format=png&auto=webp&s=bbcdd3770ac8d01f373506f2e656a9d7f1541423 https://preview.redd.it/79011affulj11.png?width=800&format=p... nVidia: I've been gaming on nVidia proprietary drivers without any issues. Though most demanding games were CS:GO and The Talos Principle. AMD: At work I'm on workstation with some 2 years old Radeon and AMDGPU drivers (mainline). No issues so far. Intel: I'm using it on my laptop. No issues so far. What poor graphics drivers do you have in mind?

Skunkleton 6y ago
I mean you linked the meme? That pretty well sums things up. Like I said in my original comment, workstation graphics cards tend to do great, as do older graphics cards.
- inshadows 6y ago
  I've used mix of old and new graphics cards and I have never experienced issues with drivers related to how recent the graphics card was. The few issues I had were always with the driver itself. And I've never used workstation-grade graphics card, always consumer ones.

AsyncAwait 6y ago

> IMO Linux still has pretty poor graphics drivers. IMO Intel is generally very well supported with the open-source kernel driver and amdgpu is getting there. This feels like a trope that always gets repeated but never updated, kind of like "you need CLI to use Linux". > the whole Wayland thing is in a weird spot right now too The whole Wayland thing is already much smoother for many than X11 ever was and it actually takes security seriously. I am running GNOME on Wayland full time since 2018 and by this point there's nothing I miss from X11, any specifics?

Skunkleton 6y ago
> there's nothing I miss from X11, any specifics? There are plenty of applications that still depend on Xwayland, and the nvidia proprietary can't accelerate these. There are some other weird stability issues related to the nvidia driver as of mid last year at least. Wayland is missing a bunch of features from X, which bothers some people. I personally miss network transparency from X. That said, I do run wayland full time, and have for a few years now. I just can't recommend it without reservations. I can't comment on catalyst, or AMDGPU on current generation AMD gaming graphics cards. What I can say is that you can pretty much blindly assume that whatever gpu you want to buy will work well under Windows. > IMO Intel is generally very well supported I would add AMDGPU to that list as well. Still, AMDGPU is new, and Intel doesn't offer a high end graphics card. nVidia proprietary causes problems, such as those it causes for wayland. I am very happy with my AMDGPU compatible WX2100 for linux, but it is certainly not a good gaming GPU.
- AsyncAwait 6y ago
  Sure, nvidia is problematic, hence Linuses now famous rant, but that's to be expected, they don't cooperate at all. I understand it may be the only option for high-end gaming, but in that case one probably doesn't have switchable graphics, which causes the most issues, so X/Xwayland is the one compromise one has to make. This however does not mean that Linux graphics is a mess in general. I have both Intel and amdgpu machines that work out of the box, no problem. And this does not ever gets asked in relation to macOS, because everyone "knows" nvidia just wasn't a thing there in recent years. So perhaps we should assume nvidia just isn't a thing as well, unless you're willing to put up with crap? So does Linux and Linux on the desktop work for everybody? No. Does it work as good for a high-end gaming machine as Windows? No. Does Windows work as the most productive fronend/backend/systems OS for programming out there? No. Does Linux? Yeah. So while they both have their strengths and weaknesses, Linux works perfectly well for a lot of use-cases, the graphics driver situation included. As for Wayland not being network-transparent, the fact that it worked in X in the way it did was in fact a massive hack and a security hole and while sometimes convenient, I personally didn't need GUI over SSH almost ever, apart from playing around, so I'd take a proper security architecture, like Wayland has, over network transparency. This is also not a feature supported by Windows/macOS, so not really a point against Linux in my book. The early complaints, like screenshots etc. re Wayland were all resolved some time ago too.

Nursie 6y ago

> Gaming graphics cards don't work well under Linux They work fine, haven't had a problem with them for years, using nvidia cards. Most distros just ship the proprietary drivers now, and those just work. There just aren't masses of native games. That said, Steam now has a built in version of wine called "Proton" that's worth checking out.