Which GPU would *you* choose?

[pocock]

They already made some contributions at the kernel level.

Does anybody know if AMD provides any prototype boards to the X developers or if there is any way to explore that with them?

[MauryG5]

I was now reading information on the Polaris MPC talks about but they are cards in any case old as a conception. They have the manufacturing process still at 14 nM among other things. Even if they give less problems, they are still old cards compared to the Navi so I personally always prefer the Navi. Or sooner or later they will have to solve those small bugs and then to me the 5700 XT is fine, the fault in our case is the Kernel that from version 5.7.X unfortunately has taken steps backwards as regards the reading of Navi 10/14. They are the ones who have to search for the bug and fix it ... We hope they do it as soon as possible because it is a long time now that we have been moving forward with this bug ...

[pocock]

I built backports of all the necessary components for Big Navi (llvm, mesa) on Debian buster.  The kernel requires gcc-9 or greater but I hope to have that sorted out too.

In theory, this means I can just plug the card in and it may work

Online shops are starting to list it for ordering on Wednesday.

Here are the latest specs in a useful comparison table

Key things that jumped out at me:

• yes, the AV1 codec hardware support is apparently included, this will allow playback at 4K even if we don't have optimized media stacks on POWER
• the 16GB RAM will be good for multi-monitor or multi-seat, this is a priority for me and one of the main reasons I'm putting some time into testing it
• the XT card appears to offer 30% higher pixel fill rate, probably worth the extra $70 for anybody with multiple monitors/users
• the biggest sacrifice with the XT is the extra half slot it consumes.  Not an issue if you have Talos II Lite or a PCIe 4 riser kit for vertical mounting.

I couldn't find details about idle power usage.  Personally, my GPU is almost always idle, I don't do gaming.  I'm hoping that it shuts off the fans when idle as with some of the predecessors.

[MPC7500]

FWIW, there is absolutely no problem to playback 4K on Navi14

[Hasturtium]

At this point - assuming I build a Power9 machine in the next few months - which GPU is more likely to behave itself with a contemporary install of Ubuntu? A Radeon FirePro W7000 (GCN 1.0), or an XFX Radeon R9 390 (GCN 1.1)? And is amdgpu likely to work if I force it with kernel parameters? And while I'm at it, how is Navi support at this point?

These are things I wonder before hearing that Intel's Arc is coming early next year... Here's hoping they manage solid OSS drivers like they have for their IGPs so far, and that they'll work on non-x86 architectures in due time.

[MPC7500]

I assume you already have these GCN1.0 GPUs? They should work. Just try them out.

Price-wise, all GPUs are bad at the moment. The best is still a GCN4.0 RX550.

Navi is more or less well supported since kernel 5.6.13.

RDNA GPUs are not supported at the moment.

Here you can find a good overview:
https://wiki.raptorcs.com/wiki/POWER9_Hardware_Compatibility_List/PCIe_Devices#AMD