Open source Linux driver supports 3D acceleration with all GeForce GPUs

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Tux iconThe Nouveau driver in the current Linux 3.8 development branch has recently acquired everything that’s necessary to support the 3D acceleration features of any GeForce graphics hardware. Together with a current version of libdrm and the Nouveau 3D driver in Mesa 3D 9.0, this allows Linux applications to use 3D acceleration even with the most recent GeForce graphics cards.

The Nouveau drivers in stable Linux kernel versions already support the acceleration features of all GeForce chips; however, with some current mid-range and high-end cards, the features could previously only be used after making manual adjustments. This is due to acceleration only being available with the firmware from NVIDIA’s proprietary graphics driver for the GF119 Fermi graphics core (for example used in GeForce GT 520, 520M, 520MX and 610M cards) that is part of the NVC0 family. The same applies for Kepler chips in the NVE0 family (for example used in GeForce GTX 670, 670M, 680, 680M, 690 cards). This firmware can’t simply be obtained from the driver archive or downloaded from the internet; instead…Read more at The H