Give AMD Some Love

I recently went through several methods to try out SteamOS.  When it came to video issues, some of my test hardware still exhibited the same issues. I found either AMD or Intel was quite acceptable for a CPU but Nvidia preferred  for the graphics card. Having recently acquired a low profile ATI 6670 (who would have thought those massive cards could shrink that small!), I decided to revisit my Steam gaming options apart my my more powerful desktop.

Soapbox Stand: OpenGL vs. Direct3D

http://www.opengl.org

Yea, yea, yea, I know what you are thinking, “here we go again..”  Bear with me though, as after reading an interesting perspective from a real developer over Rage3D (see source link), things may not be as they seem today.  Technical jargon aside, he has a good point.  Read on to find out. 

How To Session: Installing your Nvidia Or ATI Card

Many times, especially in the ubuntu forums, there are tons of individuals who download the Nvidia or ATI (Tougher) driver ang even get as far was compiling the kernel for the driver, only to encounter issues.  I suggest not even messing with that driver. ATI really does dislike Linux, and you might as well not mess with the NVIDiA driver as well. Ask many on the web and youll get the same answer. You should use the widely acclaimed EnvyNG app. What is amazing about this app is it automattically installs the current stable driver, along with any dependencies needed, avoiding any headache to you and you system.

Installing EnvyNG , which is a fantastic program to install your ATI / or Nvidia driver automatically, is easy. This will also, in addition to the graphics driver, a repository addition , so your normal system updates will include the latest driver , when the EnvyNG developer decides to code the latest stable driver. The developed tends not to code , or push the Beta drivers, which are the latest on nvidia’s webside (do not know about ATI).  The developer will compile the latest stable driver and push that though you system updates.

Install EnvyNG by doing:

Gnome : sudo apt-get install envyng-gtk
KDE : sudo apt-get install envyng-qt

This can be also done via Synaptics Package manager under,System > Administration > Synaptics. From here check your /etc/X11/xorg.conf file and make sure your driver, under device I believe a sub-entry for your video card should have a driver such as “ati” or “nvidia.”

-Nano