On Sun, September 14, 2014 10:40 pm, Chris wrote: > On 09/15/2014 04:02 AM, Valeri Galtsev wrote: >> I myself am using ATI usually (even after they were bought out by >> AMD). > > I used to use ATI. Accidentally, the last computers I bought had a > NVIDIA card. I heard Linux support of both boards would be similar. Not quite so. Example: ATI card, 2 monitors with _different_ resolution, CentOS 6. Nouveau video driver (which in fact is wrapper using open source drivers) works perfectly: no need for sysadmin to gig into X11 manual configuration. The same: 2 monitors with _different_ resolution; NVIDIA card. No way! As open source driver can not handle this in nvidia case (details about how video RAM is laid out was never disclosed by NVIDIA). So you are stuck with proprietary binary NVIDIA driver in this case. More knowledgeable people will correct me. This situation (two monitors with different resolution) is quite often for me: when graduate students leave the Department, students who are still here can use their monitors as second monitor... Thanks. Valeri > > When I bought a new notebook, I tested it with a live linux CD at the > shop. I didn't want to compare all hardware components with internet > lists and search for drivers. Graphics worked, WIFI also out of the box! > > My desktop is a Dell machine. Linux support is flawless. Later I read in > a computer magazine, that there are Dell machines where you hardly get > the right drivers. That's why I wouldn't order a machine by mail-order > anymore. Linux isn't supported by Dell, they "recommend" Windows, at > least in Germany. > >> Usually Dell workstations (Desktops actually) have ATI card as one >> of choices. These cards are good ones, with discrete video memory >> (to the contrary to some video chips with "shared" memory, and yes, >> there are ATI videochips like with shared memory found in some >> laptops). > > Oh, shared memory! That's a good aspect. > These ones always sets me off: video chips with fake non existent video memory; fake RAID card that are not capable to do even modulus 2 sum... Valeri ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Valeri Galtsev Sr System Administrator Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics University of Chicago Phone: 773-702-4247 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++