Yet Another Fix Coming for Older AMD GPUs on Linux – Thanks to Valve Developer(www.phoronix.com)

42 pointsby Bender8 hours ago3 comments

hinkley2 hours ago
I don’t think I ever could have predicted any time earlier than the past few years that Valve would be the one to cook Microsoft’s goose. I know this story isn’t about Windows, but this is a bit like finding cougar paw prints outside your cabin in the morning. The trouble hasn’t found you yet but it’s there, and it’s getting close.
Valve fixing Linux issues feels like pawprints.
- DiabloD32 hours ago
  Not really. Microsoft doesn't support GPUs on Windows, the vendor does.
  This is a story about a 10 year old GPU that would not be supported on today's AMD drivers either and the AMDGPU driver was never designed for pre-Polaris hardware, which it is.
  The bug also does not exhibit itself on normal compliant x86 machines, only Macintels.
throwa3562622 hours ago
Valve is 1% the size of AMD.
Just think about that for a second.
unixhero3 hours ago
Which is why I never buy ATI cards ever again.
- DiabloD32 hours ago
  Good, they were bought out in 2006 and no longer exist.
  I assume you mean AMD, and I also assume you didn't actually read the article.
  The AMDGPU driver was never designed for cards before Polaris (GCN 1.4). The specific card in question, a R9 M380, was released in early 2015, and in 3 months, will be 10 years old.
  The bug listed only exhibits itself on Macs, which requires a custom firmware to cope with the oddities in how Macintels boot and function, and pre-Polaris cards especially on a Mac are not well tested on AMDGPU. The bug does not happen on real x86 machines.
  At no point can AMD be blamed for any of this, but Apple most certainly can (refusal to ship a compliant UEFI firmware, and instead shipping the nightmare that Macintels used during their existence).