so my old GPU died a few days ago and I was thinking which brand of GPU to get next. AMD or Nvidia? I’ve heard Nvidia drivers are very annoying with Linux but I’ve never had an AMD GPU before. Which would be better? I’ll sometimee switch to Windows to play specific games as well.
AMD all the way. Few weeks ago I finally made a switch from Nvida for the first time. I have no problems in gaming. All games that I play run same as on windows.
a question i have: I use pop!_OS and I installed it using the Nvidia ISO, will there be a problem if I switch to an AMD GPU?
I don’t think there will be any issues. On that note, use open source AMD drivers. You dont need proprietary one from their site.
No. That ISO just installs the drivers by default. You can just uninstall them. Or leave them. They won’t break anything, although they will slow down your updates because they are huge.
I’ve decided to buy AMD but which one do I buy? I found a few used RX 6600 and RX 5700. Some of them have XT after them, and I don’t know what that means.
That all depends on what games you play. Do you want to play new AAA games or retro? Indie? What is your budget? XT is stronger version of regular 6600.
I guess spider-man miles morales would be the newest game I would play. I usually play older games.
For spider man recommended gpu is RX 580. I would suggest you, of course if you can afford, to go for RX 7700 xt or 7800 xt. You will be more future proof.
isn’t the RX 580 significantly worse than RX 6600?
I’ll probably go for 6600, I found one for very cheap
Just chipping in to say I have a 3060 and I’m scared of every update breaking my drivers again - just don’t get a Nvidia, don’t do it to yourself
I have a 3080 ti and haven’t had any issues yet, worst that happens is I would just load the previous driver from the cache in recovery mode. That said, I want to get back to amd, I just don’t have the money for it
Short answer: AMD
Long answer: AMD used to be very bad, NVIDIA has always been the same, i.e. if you’re willing to use proprietary drivers it works, but it has some hiccups. A while back AMD open source their drivers so the game turned around, nowadays they’re very easy and compatible from what I’ve heard. I’ve used NVIDIA for over a decade, but my next card Winn be AMD for sure.
PS: if you’re still in doubt, the latest Linux kernel purposefully broke the NVIDIA proprietary driver because NVIDIA has been copyright infringing the Linux kernel by using functions that are considered so integral to the kernel that if you have to use them you work should be considered derivative and be bounded by GPL licence.
A while back AMD open source their drivers
No, they abandoned their proprietary driver and joined development of existing mesa driver. Basically as if Nvidia joined nouveau.
if you’re willing to use proprietary drivers it works, but it has some hiccups.
Pre-Pascal GPUs aren’t supported by closed source driver, so your only option there is nouveau.
He’s asking to buy a new one, so old cards not working is not really an issue. But are you sure about the Turing line (i.e. 20 series)? I thought the Maxwell (i.e. 7 series) was the oldest you can use on the proprietary drivers. In fact up until recently I had a 1080 that I used with the proprietary drivers.
Oops. Pre-Pascal? The one after Maxwell.
Also Maxwell AFAIK only 750, 700-780 except 750 are Kepler.
AMD, easily. Its literally plug and play. You can even pick some second hand options for cheap that are still solid for gaming such as the vega 56/64 and the RX 5700XT (which is I use). Intel isn’t bad so long as you’re not playing the newest stuff, my Arc a750 is solid in games like Fallout 4 and Elden Ring. Starfield is complete mess on it. Another thing with Intel is you’ll need a distro with a 6+ kernel to get the most out of it.
AMD is generally better
AMD is better on Linux most of the time. Running a AMD card day one is not hassle free.
That being said if you pick a up to date distro all 7000 and 6000 series should work fine now. They are already in the kernel and mesa for a while. You may want to update you kernel and mesa sometimes to get better performance and stability.
But in my experience nvidia is fine on Linux. (I only used older cards gtx 970 and a rtx 2060) especially when you have just one monitor or all monitors on the same refresh rate. It’s not on par with windows but will work with the Nvidia drivers.
So I would say if you a simple setup Nvidia is fine and AMD is better. It all depends on the best deal you can get. If ray tracing is not that important AMD is new the best value. If you more on a budget second AMD Rx 5700 XT are pretty cheap here and there are some good deals on Nvidia 30 series cards.
As far I have read intel cards can be a pain on Linux. So I would not recommend it for now.
STOP recommending Intel Arc for Linux, people. Do any of you saying that even own one?
This sums up my feelings on Nvidia.
This better be angry Torvalds
Edit: It was
It’s a very heartfelt, genuine, and relatable moment.
AMD. I’d get the rx 6800 xt
I know which NOT to buy
I have never had issues with AMD for my graphics cards, been running team red with Linux for almost a decade now. Even switching distros no issues. But, I don’t buy new hardware, I always grab last gen, so bugs are usually worked out by the time I get my hands on it.
For gaming and desktop use, I’ve had a flawless experience using AMD cards and a decent time with NVIDIA. The only reason I’m with NVIDIA now is for the AI capabilities (don’t bother trying to run stuff using AMD’s ROCm - it’s near impossible to install).
PyTorch actually works pretty well on Arch with opencl-amd and opencl-amd-dev (the official packages didn’t work for me). I’m extremely happy with my new Radeon.
I’m mostly a newbie to Linux, I’ve been using it as a main gaming rig for several months and only Nobara. I hear often that AMD is hassle free, but I’m using Nvidia and honestly I’ve had no roadblocks. I started with a 2080ti and have since moved to a 4080, no hassles. There is a built in updater and it automatically downloads the newest driver packages. They are always a version or so behind the latest Windows set but meh. Switching on gSync was as simple as toggling VRR for my 144hz monitor.
The one thing that I needed to look up was getting ray tracing running. There was additional stuff I needed to add in Steam (copy paste from the post I found), and then RTX was up and running.
Like I say, I definitely don’t know better than the people saying AMD is a smart choice, but I don’t think people necessarily need to worry that their Nvidia system is a roadblock to switching to Linux.
Thanks for this. I just shot a 3060ti since the 6700xt was similar in all things but ray tracing and dlss (I tried to go team red but I ultimately couldn’t). The comments made me very anxious that it wouldn’t work on linux.
AMD used to be a hassle, but now the Mesa support is very good. It’s probably better than Nvidia.
I had a gtx1060 when I started using linux, then upgraded to 2060 then again to 2080, they all worked fine without any major problem (except that file system checking at boot sometimes and wayland). Last year I upgraded to RX6800 and man everything just works, no more filesystem checks at boot, Wayland is mu way to go now.
If I have a nvidia card now I would just use, but if I’m buying a new/used gpu it will definitely be AMD.
Literally Intel or AMD. You may pick Intel dGPU as well.
Intel dGPU
That’s not the best idea. Performances are not even close of what they are on Windows
Also there’s an idle power draw issue which can sometimes be fixed on windows but not on linuxThat’s not the best idea. Performances are not even close of what they are on Windows
Personal experience or rumors? First link I found says it’s slightly(4%) better than on windows.
Also there’s an idle power draw issue which can sometimes be fixed on windows but not on linux
Can you share how to fix it? What to write in which registers?
Upd: just set scaling governor to powersave, lol
Your link is for an iGPU
Here for Intel Arc
From January but it hasn’t improved all that much
The fix for power consumption is changing a setting for ASPM in motherboard (if it supports it) and pluging the monitor in the motherboard directly. It worked for me on windows but not on linux (no workaround AFAIK) This means 40W idling instead of 1W
You need CONFIG_PCIEASPM in kernel for ASPM support
