Help picking a video card and other related gear
Robert Noland
rnoland at FreeBSD.org
Sat Apr 11 12:55:15 PDT 2009
On Fri, 2009-04-10 at 21:26 +0100, Dieter wrote:
> > > I'm currently running 1280x1024 on 21" and I need more desktop.
> > > So I put together some minimum video things:
> > >=20
> > > Requirements...
> > > 1) Freebsd, amd64 [for zfs and the future of things], xorg
> > > 2) DVI-I or DVI-D dual-link card for those 30" 2560x1600 displays
>
> That's for 60 Hz. If you think you might want a 120 Hz display instead
> of 60 Hz, dual link is only good for 1920x1200.
>
> > > 3) Well supported, _open_source_, in the tree, video card drivers:
> > > o I don't want to rely on the card vendor to release binary blobs.
> > > o I don't want to end up with a useless video card when
> > > xorg9/freebsd10 come around.
> >
> > So, for video you want an ATI/AMD card. r500 and below will get you all
> > the features today. r600+ will get you EXA and Xv acceleration today,
> > with 3d rumored to be coming soon.
>
> Do they actually have Xv running *correctly* yet? I've been reading about
> various bugs for ages.
Seems to be working good here...
> If you want XvMC the only option currently seems to be to find something
> supported by the openchrome driver. If you find something let us know.
Not true, the Intel driver also supports it. I don't believe that the
radeon driver does currently, but XvMC is only useful for mpeg2 content,
which limits it somewhat.
> > > 3) A second connector off the same card for feeding a smaller
> > > secondary monitor at the same time.
> > > 4) Some sort of power save mode... LCD off, card idle, etc.
>
> I think the ATI FLOSS gang might be working on power save mode
> stuff about now?
>
> > > I'm still shopping for motherboard and chipset. I don't think I'll
> > > find 2560x1600 dvi dual link on an integrated chipset? Thinking
> > > maybe AMD 790GX and AMD SB750 if FreeBSD likes it.
>
> If these have the UVD or UVD2, they aren't documented yet, and might
> never be. :-( Video decoding isn't a priority in ATI FLOSS land. :-(
>
> > > I might as well go HTPC and stick an HDTV OTA ATSC / QAM tuner in
> > > there. And I'll eventually need to capture NTSC audio/video from
> > > dying analog sources somehow. VOIP/webcam, mplayer, dvd upscaling,
> > > etc. That's all 2D and largely CPU based afaik.
>
> Recent GPUs can offload most of the video decode duties, but this
> hasn't been documented and FLOSS code hasn't been implemented yet.
> (Unless you can find something in the Chrome family you like.)
Not sure about that actually... VIA has released docs, but we don't have
drm support at this point as I still don't have VIA hardware to work on.
> For tuners there is the HDHomerun. Ethernet so it doesn't need
> a device driver or a slot. But it is digital only, no analog.
> Jason's cx88 driver (in ports) supports several cx88 based cards,
> both digital and analog. http://corona.homeunix.net/cx88wiki
>
> > > CPU will likely be...
> > > amd: phenom x3 8450e, athlon x2 5050e or 5600+
>
> If it were me I'd look at Phenom II at least x2, maybe x3 or x4
> depending on pricing. Decoding HD video in real time without
> GPU assist needs a lot of CPU.
>
> The best source of info on the state of ATI FLOSS I've found is
> http://www.phoronix.com/ The gang there is mostly penguins,
> but I'm assuming that anything that goes into x.org should
> work on BSD?
Mostly... I'm actually ahead of the penguins on ATI support right now.
At least as far as having code pushed and in mainline trees.
robert.
> If you're into completely documented hardware, the OGD1 price
> is now down to $750, but the software isn't done yet, and it
> is intended as a development card, not as a production graphics
> card.
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--
Robert Noland <rnoland at FreeBSD.org>
FreeBSD
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