Turion recommendation ( ATI / nVidia )?

[VanDan]

Greetings.

I'm going to buy a Turion soon. I'm not interested in a Pentium M.

My question is mainly about video cards. I'd like to use a Radeon, and I'd like to use the DRI drivers. I've been following the DRI mailing lists and seen that people are starting to get the later 'Express' Radeons working. What I'm worried about is that all the Radeons I've seen in Turion notebooks share RAM with the mainboard. I'd like to do some gaming on this ( even though it's for work ). I'd also like to get xcompmgr with the new EXA working - I've got it going on my Powerbook, but it doesn't have enough video RAM to be useable ( open a couple of windows and it grinds to a halt ... close some windows and everything is quick as lightning again ). So I need lots of dedicated RAM.

I *have*, though, seen some Turions with nVidia cards that have their own dedicated RAM. What is support for these like - specifically, can I do swsup2 ( software suspend ) with nVidia's drivers? How is their performance with xcompmgr? I haven't used an nVidia for almost 10 years Are there any other gotchas with the nVidia? Like I say, I'd like to use a Radeon, but if I can't find one with dedicated RAM, then I'll take an nVidia.

Also, if people have any other words of warning, etc ... feel free.

[Ma3oxuct]

I think that you cannot go wrong with nvidia. Thier new 1.0.8xxx drivers are really good. The fact that the nvidia card, notebooks that you have looked at have dedicated ram is a very very large bonus. The new Nvidia-drivers however are still being worked on. I would not be surprised if they fixed all outstanding issues by the middle of January. Just browse the Nvidia forums to get a sense of what works and what will work thier thier new drivers: http://www.nvnews.net/vbulletin/forumdisplay.php?f=14 . If you can get DRI working with ati, then I bow down to you, as I have never accomplished the feat.

[Aynjell]

I've done it twice: with a 9250 and an IGP 320M. The 320M, even though being a hack-up of a 7000 series card, and under an athlon-xp half the speed of hte CPU over the 9250, performed better.

On a more related note, XGI is releasing an 8300 mobility... if they release their drivers as insinuated, waiting for that may very well be worthwhile.
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CPU: 3800+ X2 (2.5Ghz)
GPU: eVGA 7600GT (640/1700)
MOBO: DFI SLI-DR (Surprisingly good!)
RAM: 2 x OCZ Gold 1024 DDR500 3-4-3-7 (2048)
HDD: Western Digital Raptor

[sneakerski]

Can you find any 6100/410 notebooks? Or are you talking dedicated geforce? If you can find an nvidia notebook, they're generally the easiest to work with. ATI however, has honestly improved since the dark ages of before. Most turion notebooks are RS480 based (ATI Xpress 200, aka stripped x300) and as such you'll be using ATI drivers. If you can find something based on nvidia, and it fits your tastes, go for it. But chances are you're gonna get "stuck" with ati (or worse, via/sis).
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Athlon 64 X2 @ 2ghz on an Asus nForce 4 w/ 1gig
Radeon X850 using OSS Radeon drivers

[VanDan]

No-one has commented yet on:

- compositing performance of nVidia cards with nVidia's drivers
- availability of ATI card with dedicated RAM

Anyone know about these?

[Aynjell]

nVidia's latest drivers make composite considerably more pleasant. As a side note, composite and xinerama still do not get along. (not in any GPU vendors hands, but it does affect my ability to accurately assess the drivers, I've tried them, they work, but I refuse to give up my second monitor)
_________________
CPU: 3800+ X2 (2.5Ghz)
GPU: eVGA 7600GT (640/1700)
MOBO: DFI SLI-DR (Surprisingly good!)
RAM: 2 x OCZ Gold 1024 DDR500 3-4-3-7 (2048)
HDD: Western Digital Raptor

[VanDan]

Yeah that's what I thought. Interesting. Maybe I should get an nVidia-based notebook and finally throw in the towel on having a purely open-source desktop.

Do you know about render acceleration? e17 has an xrender engine that works beautifully with the EXA drivers for my Radeon, but it's horrible on my work system ( i945 ).

[crosfider]

for example
acer aspire 5022 have ati x700 video card with dedicated RAM
I use this notebooke with gentoo and it work properly.
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The same shit again.
RTFM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!