Is nVidia Really That Bad On Linux?
142In this video I cover my thoughts and experience of running nVidia hardware on Linux for gaming, recording, streaming, and rendering.
Summary of Video
* I have been using Linux for almost five years with a nVidia GTX 1080, connected to a pair of 1080p 60Hz monitors, and now a single 1440p 165Hz monitor with a RTX 3060ti.
* I primarily use my GPU for two things, gaming, recording, streaming and rendering content for my YouTube channel.
* Most Linux desktop environments such as Gnome and KDE Plasma will not support V-Sync when a full screen application is launched, but this can be resolved by enabling Force Composition Pipeline.
* My experience of gaming on Linux has been positive with solid performance for most of the games in my game library, with the exception of games that utilise EAC or BattlEye anti-cheat and the DirectX12 graphic API.
* Gnome is a great solid experience with nVidia hardware, animations are fluid, all my software works correctly, no latency, stuttering when opening applications, and even Wayland through XWayland allows me to play games.
* KDE Plasma historically was a train wreck, as applications frequently stutter when opening them and maximising windows, and dragging a window from one monitor to another causes the window to get stuck between the two displays.
* Plasma, nVidia and Wayland, is a poor experience.
* I use NVENC for playing a game at 1080p 60fps and encoding at upscaled 1440p 60fps.
In conclusion, using Gnome with nVidia hardware on Linux has been relatively painless for me, and the only sticking point is the lack of screen tearing prevention out of the box.
#nvidia #linux #wayland