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Platoali <platoali <at> gmail.com> writes: |
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> Although all tests have been run on windows. It seems that Ati have |
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> better hardware and it is also going to be more open source friendly |
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> in near future. I'm planning to use this workstation for 3 or 4 years |
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> or even more. So I'm thinking to risk a little and bet on AMD , and |
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> hope that they deserve my hard earned money. but I'm not sure yet. I |
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> need to do a little more search about AMD plans, and current |
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> development status of ATI driver. |
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One thing I'd like to point out, from what I've read. Many people think that |
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AMD/ATI can just release sources. Most of the time, due to the fact that other |
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companies license software and resell their(ati) hardware designs, so AMD/ATI |
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is legally bound not to release those sources directly. So that is why they |
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publish documentation (whenever possible) about the specifics of the |
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graphics hardware. |
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I for one, as a firmware engineer, believe that AMD/ATI have turned a |
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"significant corner" in their attitude and subsequent plans to position |
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their company to be very attractive to the open source community. I also |
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believe that it make take some more months to see the fruit of these efforts |
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and some years for this fruit to become widespread. (Things always take |
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a while with technology and lawyers). But, these are my opinions, not, in |
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any way actually connect to AMD/ATI. |
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(over simplified VLSI perspective): |
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There is something larger at work here, imho. That is that the GPU |
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/cellprocessor /microprocessor are merging onto the same substrate, |
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for a variety of reasons. The GPU/Cell is a wonderfully powerful processor |
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for searching and sorting and parallel algorithms of all sorts. As such |
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many technical efforts are underway to utilize the GPU/Cell processor |
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as a companion to the CPU. At some point, all of the proprietary-ness |
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of GPU/Cell processor will become obsolete, and Intel is at a particular |
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"sweet spot" since they are the commander of the smallest (fastest) physics |
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at this point in time. |
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In a few years the entire territorial madness that surrounds |
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GPU/Cell processors may just be a bad memory. Hard to predict, |
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but, my money is on AMD/ATI. |
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http://lwn.net/Articles/260676/ |
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Here's an interesting link. |
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http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=fosdem_08_bridgman&num=1 |
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-- |
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