heatlesssun
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10 Reasons Linux Gamers Might Want to Pass On the NVIDIA RTX Series
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heatlesssun
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So you must be a Windows activist because you prefer Windows?
It's not a matter of preferring Windows. When it comes to gaming Windows is clearly superior if for no other reason than compatibility.
Welcome to the inaccuracies of Wikipedia. If Wine translates Windows system calls to POSIX compliant system calls, how the hell is it emulating anything?
heatlesssun
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Just countering your point about being a Windows activist simply because one want to play games on their PC.
heatlesssun
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He keeps trying to launch Linux games on his Microsoft Surface.
Actually I can do this as I have a Linux partition on my Surface Pro 3. You guys think everyone else is stupid or something I guess.
Quite possibly the oddest thing I've ever heard. I prefer beer, I must be a beer activist also because I'm not conforming to spirits.
heatlesssun
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Look up the definition of emulation. It makes perfect sense in this case. Emulation != VM for instance.
https://wiki.winehq.org/FAQ#Is_Wine_an_emulator.3F_There_seems_to_be_disagreement
I think I have already posted this link... but here is the quote from the people that develop wine.
" However, Wine is a compatibility layer - it runs Windows applications in much the same way Windows does. There is no inherent loss of speed due to "emulation" when using Wine, nor is there a need to open Wine before running your application. "
"Wine can be thought of as a Windows emulator in much the same way that Windows Vista can be thought of as a Windows XP emulator"
Get it wine is not some program that is running and translating on the fly... its a windows api library >.< You don't have to launch wine first or something. When its on your system software that uses windows api flags... call the wine libraries, just like windows would call the right .DLL data when a developer uses a windows api flag.
No, no, no.
UAE = Emulation as UAE is emulating physical hardware. In this instance the hardware is identical, they're all x86/64 based PC's, so nothing is being emulated at all.
Yes, we get it. What Steam is doing by making it quite easy and simple to take games originally made for Windows and make them run under Linux with few issues and little or no performance penalties scares the shit out of you. Why does this scare you? Because your argument over and over has always been about Windows' entrenchment. Windows was entrenched in the desktop space decades ago and because of that most software was written for Windows. Steam is taking that and turning it on its head with regards to gaming.
You simply can't stand to have this happen because it means Windows isn't the "only choice" anymore. It's especially scary because once Steam is successful it's likely you're going to see it with other game storefronts. It won't happen overnight but the chance of it happening is very likely. Once that happens with games, what's going to happen with other software? Thousands of games previously not working or marginally working on Linux will now work quite well on Linux. That sounds like one hell of a "killer app" which people such as yourself have been saying over and over that Linux is missing.
heatlesssun
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Wine programs run under the Linux kernel like native Linux apps. So yeah, there is real time translation going on. Not sure why some of you want to make this difficult.
heatlesssun
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LOL! Scared because after five years Valve threw in the towel on native Linux and added Windows compatibility tech to Linux that'll never be as good as Windows? A thriving NATIVE Linux gaming ecosystem would be far scarier if such a thing meant a damned thing to me. If the future of PC gaming is Linux I'll just install it and be on my way. I don't give a shit. There's just a lot of BS coming from the Linux crowd on this and that's were the debate is.
You still don't get it.
Yes, you do give a shit. If you didn't, you wouldn't be posting in this and practically every other Linux and Windows thread like a madman.
Unless... you want to finally admit to being a shill?
Either way, your responses and statements are flat out fear of Windows losing a large part of the entrenchment it has built over the years.
And yet the number of hardcore gamers using Windows 10 is likely far higher than the number of gamers using Linux. I'm guessing 1-3% of gamers are "hardcore" (personally Im counting people with 144hz monitors or those goofy rts macro mouses with 200 buttons as hardcore - and even then I doubt there are as many gamers on linux.)
Red Falcon
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This is true, and the performance hit is minor to nil with doing this, assuming the coding isn't totally broken or poorly optimized.
Years ago, long before Folding@Home had a native Linux application, I used WINE with the Folding@Home GPU2 program in order to processor the workloads on my then GTX480 under Ubuntu 10.04LTS.
The biggest performance hit I saw was around 1-2% (based on the PPD rating) when comparing GPU2 on WINE under Linux compared to natively running under Windows 7 at the time with the same hardware and same-era GPU drivers.
I'm sure WINE compatibility has improved greatly since then, and I know for a fact that Linux has definitely improved since the 2.6.XX kernel that I used then.
Where has Valve thrown in the towel on native Linux gaming? If anything it's the exact opposite.
Red Falcon
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The scariest part of this, is that there is a potential that Linux gaming is the true future of gaming... turns out it wasn't GNU/Linux, though, but Droid/Linux.
Let's hope that possible future stays in the next episode of The Twilight Zone...
Because you still don't get it.
No there is no translation going on. Real time or otherwise.
You do get that windows software doesn't actually talk to the windows kernel right ? Neither does Linux software. In windows sure drivers do... but software does not.
Software talks to APIs. it talks to frameworks. Unless its programmed 100% in assembler and even then its likely going to be talking to the user space controller software.
Wine is an Open source implementation of "windows api" which is a collection of _flags that software developers can call to do things like define options under "File" or "Edit" or if the software should go full screen... or draw a standards "windows api" software frame.
Yes the wine developers have "white roomed" the windows api... as MS hasn't open sourced it. However they have published all the _flags developers can use... so figuring out how it works isn't rocket science... its just lots of work. If you ever watched Halt and Catch Fire... think of how they are telling the story of Compaq white rooming the IBM bios. They don't have a manual but they can look at the outputs and figure out what the actual calls are. Again its not actually hard to do just really time consuming.
So translation is NOT happening.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_API
Its simply running the software... and when the software calls one of the windows API libraries (dlls) it uses the wine version.
heatlesssun
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This might be a Linux thread but did any Linux folks here actually pre-order any of these parts? I did. Two 2080 Tis and the NVLink. So I think this thread is silly when a super niche group of folks that are never going to buy that kind of hardware get incensed with a super niche group of folks over top line Windows/PC gaming hardware. At least the Windows folks will buy some of it.
See, he's doing it again! Gaming is all about Heatlesssun, if people don't follow his lead they're activists!
Did anyone in this thread ever argue that Windows was not going to be the only option for 'hardcore gamers'? Because I know I definitely didn't.
Red Falcon
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I'm going to do this with a new build, and it will most definitely be running both Linux and Windows - might not be a bad idea to wait a bit longer for drivers to mature on the *NIX side of things, even if TPU and/or ray tracing support never emerge for it.
Those last two are going to take time to develop anyways, especially since that functionality is first-gen, but it was like this with GPU PhysX on G80 as well back in 2006/2007 (after NVIDIA acquired Ageia and their subsequent hardware-shader physics driver & software technologies), and that took a few years to mature into something feasible as well, but it has to start somewhere.
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Red Falcon
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Nah, it's just the kind of gaming that heatlesssun does basically requires his system to be running Windows in order for full-functionality and the ability to run/play those said games.
If I were doing what he was doing, specifically, I would be running Windows as well, and in some cases, I kind of have to since the functionality isn't quite there in Linux yet - it isn't good or bad, it just is what it is.
I'm not a developer, so unless I develop my own software tools to make that happen (not likely) then I'm going to either have to wait for support, or just simply use Windows for the functionality that is currently lacking in Linux at this point in time.
Doesn't mean that same functionality won't be there in the near future, though, and I think that is a great stride that is being made, especially for end-users like us.
I can like your statement. Truth is truth. Yes high end top end SLI competing VR headsets on my desk type users are an extreme niche. Yes at the moment Linux isn't very different. The difference. imo. Linux has big money and lots of brain power pushing it forward, making it the most widely used OS in the world hands down. No not on the desktop... but all that work being done has made Linux what it is. The desktop is the only platform (if that is the right term) where windows is really the biggest marketshare OS.
I think I'm saying Linux has the potential to grow... super high end gamers not so much.
heatlesssun
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This is a thread about a pre-ordering a top line gaming GPU that apparently no person in this thread gaming on Linux pre-ordered. So what else are we going to talk about?
heatlesssun
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Bingo, exactly and all the rest. If you think Windows 10 updates are bad, try to make this shit work under Linux.
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heatlesssun
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Except that it is because otherwise how do Win32 calls get mapped to native Linux? Yes, it matches closely how it would work with native Linux code but the reason why folks like you scream about Vulkan is because those calls map closely between OSes. Throw DX in there and you need another layer in DXVK.
In any case, Win32 apps aren't native Linux apps otherwise you could load a Win32 app on Linux and need nothing for it run perfectly.
But wasn't the point of the article... reasons why Linux gamers may want to hold off ? lol Sort of the point.
heatlesssun
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"I am a Linux gamer that didn't pre-order an RTX 20x0 part. The end." Puts us in the same spot to find another subject to discuss.
Because wine IS WIN32.
Get it.
Think of it this way hopefully this one will get through...
If I write a Java program.
... on a windows system the compiled java program will CALL your installed Java libraries.
... on a Linux system the compiled software will do the same thing... it will call the Java libraries. I have installed.
It doesn't matter which system I run it on... its going to run. And its not emulation or translation in either case.
Wine is an white roomed version of WIN32.
Fire up the software in windows that makes win32 system calls... and the relevant .dll files libraries get called up and run.
Fire up the same software in Linux that makes win32 system calls... and the relevant libraries get called up.
The only difference is the ones being called in Linux are not shipped by MS... they are white roomed versions. Its much like the IBM bios of old... the version used by compaq and the rest was "compatible" because it recognized all the calls the software was making to it and acted in the exact same way. IT wasn't the IBM bios but it was.
heatlesssun
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But the Linux kernel isn't.
WTF does that have to do with anything. User space software isn't talking to the kernel.
EDIT ... to be clear. Windows API software isn't talking to the windows kernel either. Your point isn't valid. win32 api doesn't talk to hardware, it talks to the windows user space manager. Which is exactly what wine is doing... its providing a win32 api and like any other framework or API its talking to the software user space scheduler.
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heatlesssun
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Well of course it does for things like I/O, graphics, sound, etc. I have no idea why you and others are so hung up on the concept of a translation layer which clearly isn't necessary for native code.
But if all developers have to do is to write Win32 code and run across Windows, Linux, etc., sweet.
Under Windows, the only application that communicates directly with the kernel is 'malware', everything else communicates with the kernel via system DLL's. If software communicated directly with the kernel than your idea of backwards compatibility every time a new variant of the NT kernel is released would be almost impossible. Wine implements it's own version of these system DLL's to communicate with the Linux kernel.
There is no 'emulation', technically speaking there is no more translating on the fly than there is under Windows itself. Effectively it's no different to software running under Windows 2000 and software running under Windows 10.
What's that got to do specifically with the OS? I know that personally I wouldn't have bought an RTX card if I was running Windows. There is no specific relationship between Nvidia GPU choice and operating system, I cannot think of a modern Nvidia GPU Linux does not support and I see absoultely no reason whatsoever why the RTX series will be any different.
Good for him, sadly for Heatlesssun, his uses of a PC do not in any way reflect everyone, even in the Hard forums.
Again your wrong my friend. Your windows software IS NOT talking to your i/o or your graphics cards or your sound card or your mouse directly. It just isn't.
User space and HAL are NOT the same thing.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_space
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/drivers/debugger/user-space-and-system-space
"Windows gives each user-mode application a block of virtual addresses. This is known as the user space of that application. The other large block of addresses, known as system space or kernel space, cannot be directly accessed by the application."
Linux and Windows are not completely alien to each other. They both have a hardware abstraction layer or a kernel space, and a user space "land". Windows does not allow software to touch its kernel, neither does Linux. (not to confuse you more but yes... windows isn't very good at keeping software from doing it anyway, its why malware is a massive issue in windows. Linux has things like Selinux and proper MAC implementations. I know I'm always harping on Linux being more secure for you... perhaps if you get this point you may understand a little better some of the fundamental reasons.
)No matter what you believe your game is NOT talking to your hardware. It is always talking to an abstraction layer.. a frame work of some kind. Even things like your rift. The software is not talking to it directly. There is an API which software developers use... they invoke flags. Which go to a user space scheduler and routes resources as needed... software will call specific APIs libraries and frameworks, by defining them. (if you have programmed in C you know this... you have to define a library you intend to invoke) That API Framework whatever the case is... will send info to the HAL which contains the kernel and in windows case specific hardware drivers. Its what allows you to unplug a Logitech mouse, plug a razor mouse and just continue on. Your software doesn't care... its just recieving the generalized input calls its expecting.
heatlesssun
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Completely missing the point. A Win32 program under Wine has to map Win32 calls to POSIX.
Of course there is emulation in that Win32 looks like native Linux at runtime.
A lot. For instance, there's a hell of lot more Windows folks out there. Secondly, whatever RTX brings to the table will come to Linux next year maybe? Maybe it just works in Wine and DXVK since there's "no translation". LOL!
Expert Linux users don't represent many gamers either.
heatlesssun
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All I am saying is that clearly Wine is a translation layer because otherwise it wouldn't be needed, you could just run Win32 apps on Linux without it. Critical parts of apps that need high performance may not talk directly to the hardware but it generally has to be done natively for best results. Otherwise it wouldn't matter, DX12 would be no different than Vulkan.
Honestly little of this matters for most gamers. If Windows compatibility tech is needed to run a game under Linux most would be better off with Windows anyway.