[tudstudent]

Okay, why this topic may be clear.

I am building a server which, for the time being, also is my HTPC. In this case I need to choose the right GPU.

Aware of the fact that only Nvidia has vdpau I would say take Nvidia, but this driver is closed source and there will be no alternative (open source).

Recently Ati had released a new driver with opengl 2 and 3 support. There is also a group developers working on opens source implementation of this driver. At this moment it is only closed source, but this can change in the near future.

It is also said that nvidia's support under linux isn't as good as ati's.

So you all understand my dilemma.

Btw the server I am talking about is a dual quad core opteron (2352).

[elupus]

If you don't need HW acceleration, it doesn't really matter what you choose, aslong as it has some oompf opengl wise.

[tudstudent]

But if I need HW acceleration, then both still can be choosen.
Nvidia with nvpau and ati with opengl2/3 or not?

[prae5]

Okay, why this topic may be clear.

It is also said that nvidia's support under linux isn't as good as ati's.

I'm not sure where you get that from - nvidia support for linux is infinitely better than ati's.

nvidia would be my choice without any hesitation.

[tudstudent]

I'm not sure where you get that from - nvidia support for linux is infinitely better than ati's.

nvidia would be my choice without any hesitation.

Okay, I have read something more about nvidia and AMD. For example nvidia is supporting xserver 1.7 and amd is doing so next month. An other example is the support of opengl 4 from probably next month. All in the closed source driver.

But what would you recommend on vdpau or opengl, why?

I have tried opengl in xbmc and wasn't tooo excited about it. It isn't a hardware accelerator like vdpau...

[spiff]

vdpau is the most mature.

we recently added va-api support, which can be used on amd hw using the va-api xvba backend.

in general, amd hw is more strict on which files it can hw decode, in particular it does not support l5.1 h264 streams, only the 4.1 ones (i.e. bluray).

[tudstudent]

vdpau is the most mature.

we recently added va-api support, which can be used on amd hw using the va-api xvba backend.

in general, amd hw is more strict on which files it can hw decode, in particular it does not support l5.1 h264 streams, only the 4.1 ones (i.e. bluray).

Nice answer, so technically the ATI cards do what them is told but there is not much space which can be used as extras, in contrary to nvidia which has vdpau and can do this.

So I need to start looking at a nvidia card.