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List:       gentoo-user
Subject:    RE: [gentoo-user]  Re: Ati or Nvida
From:       "Bob Young" <RKY () Sonic ! Net>
Date:       2008-06-19 3:44:36
Message-ID: C321963BFF154D418D6D9472A28994D0 () Cyor ! Lan
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-----Original Message-----
From: Enrico Weigelt [mailto:weigelt@metux.de] 
Sent: Wednesday, June 18, 2008 1:05 PM
To: gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org
Subject: Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Ati or Nvida


>Hi,
>
>
>I've made the big mistake of bying an notebook w/ geforce go 6100.
>
>The proprietary drivers *never* worked for me - the binary kernel
>modules crashed the whole kernel (complete lockup) after a several
>seconds (doesnt even need X to come up for that).
>

Somehow you later statements make me distrust your opening one...

> I've analyzed their module a bit and seen really bad things. 

Really...You've "analyzed" a closed source module. Care to share 
the details of how you performed this "analysis" ?

>Looks it's a hand-written bunch of assembler code with massive 
>code obfuscation, 
>

Uhhhh...perfectly good C/C++ code that's been even moderately 
Optimized by any reasonably sane compiler will look like that
when it's disassembled...now how was it you did this "analysis"
on a *closed source* module again...? 

>IMHO, if someone spends so much work into machine code obfuscation,
>he *really* has something to hide. 
>

It's closed source driver, neither you nor anybody else who hasn't 
seen the source code has any basis whatsoever to justify such an 
"opinion" without making themselves look like a total dimwit. 

> Not just some "intellectual
> property" (which is outdated alfter a few months).

Uhhh...if the intellectual property is so "outdated", why is it so 
difficult to duplicate? So far no one advocating open source, can 
manage to duplicate even the functionality of the 3D driver, much 
less the performance?


> Of course, opensource 3D support is (almost) not existing, 
> (2D works very fine), and NVidia repeatedly states that they
> will NOT do the slightest attempt to improve the situation. 
>

Why should they, their providing for Linux, the same thing they 
provide for Windows, i.e. a binary driver that drives their GPU
and performs quite well in the experience of a lot of users. From 
their point of view the situation doesn't need improving

>So I strongly suggest, NOT to buy NV cards.
>

You've never written graphics drivers have you?

>(BTW: a few month ago, I managed to stop a customer from buying
>several hundreds of NV cards - yes, consulting jobs sometimes
>make really fun this way ;-P)

Maybe that was the correct decision, maybe not, depends on the
circumstances. Regardless, your clients are not well served by your
uninformed bias.

-- 
Regards,
Bob Young



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