Nvidia v.s. ATI mobile GPU?

I've been comparing laptops but I am curious about the experiences with those equipped with an ATI mobile GPU. I've read of problems/issues with them so I am hoping to get some feedback here.

In particular, I was curious about the ATI 3470 mobile GPU since that is a standard mobile GPU in the Lenovo T400 Thinkpad.

I am not too concerned about Nvidia mobile GPU laptops but is it much better than laptops with ATI? I really didn't want the aggravation if there is still a lot of trouble configuring or working with ATI. It's open source but I've read that most users install the binary drivers STILL because of less issues and apparently better battery life (binary drivers have better power-saving features?).

Should I stay with Nvidia? It's a problem with trying to select a notebook because most notebooks are not GPU-upgradeable as you well know. So, it would effect my selection options if ATI GPUs are a major hassle in Linux. I have only had Nvidia graphics cards in my desktops and they only have minor issues which is not much since I usually only play around with Compiz but I mostly use the graphics for basic video. I will watch movies etc.

What else? Maybe ATI is okay for just watching movies and doing the odd graphics application? I am not sure but the comparison of notebooks are like this?

Sony Vaio Z590CTO - Nvidia 9300M GS
Lenovo Thinkpad T400 - ATI 3470

Both will have Vista as the default OS but I was wondering what the Linux experience would be. Will the ATI on the Thinkpad be a major issue or are both laptops potentially good Linux machines?

Thanks for any input. Perhaps, you have ATI on your notebook and installed Linux?

I believe Nvidia right now is decent enough that it's not an issue to be concerned about or inquire so I suppose most of these questions regard ATI and the mobile variations in particular.

 

I'd say The ATi card is better in this case. Check the cards comparison topic in the graphics forum.

Movies do not require a good graphics card to watch. My friend can watch HD 1080p movies on an integrated GeForce Go 7150SE.

Never tried Linux as an actual OS (only in virtual machines) but for Vista, any graphics would do. My 2.5-year-old laptop with an Intel GMA 945 with only 128 MB shared VRAM could run all Vista graphics settings on max.

 

Take the Nvidia one, ATI Linux drivers are crappy.

 

I second that. I will be getting Nvidia next time because of that.

 

I've heard alot of Nvidia renaming its cards and selling them, can i get a confirmation? or sumthang?

 

It's true, since the 8 series.

8400M GS = 9300M GS
8600M GT = 9500M GS

The 9600M cards are based on the same GPU as the 8600M, but on a smaller die. I'm sure there are more, but that's what I remember at the moment without looking it up. The GT/GTS 100 series will have some 9 series parts carried over as well.

 

Since 8.04 the ATI drivers have worked perfectly OTB (at least I assume for "newer" GPUs, like mine). ATI has also released the source code needed to allow the construction of an open source driver so I can only expect compatibility to increase over time. Since you're looking at the 3xxx series (basically a spin off of the 2xxx series) I'd put money on drivers working on your GPU.

 

Actually, they are very much improved in my experience.
Now there's even Out of the box 3D with several cards in Ubuntu 8.10, I can play games such as OpenArena with better performance then it's Windows counterpart with the ATI free software drivers.

 

as the ati open source linux drivers take off, its going to become less of an issue.

still, nvidia still hires people to dedicate themselves to building a solid linux driver. i would still go with nvidia if your goal is linux these days. some day (maybe sooner than later) that recommendation would swing towards neutral, but not yet.

 

ATI does the same thing........

 

the ati drivers for the card in my studio worked out of the box with ubuntu 8.10 however there was video skipping when all of the desktop effects were turned on. I looked it up and apparently its a bug with the ati drivers. Other than that though, it worked seamlessly. Nvidias never installed that easy for me, however when they were installed they just worked flawlessly.

 

Right. Also, the problem is I cannot try any of these laptops. In Canada, the HPs don't have as many configuration options as Lenovo and Sony. The Sony stores don't have the Vaio Z on display. I am mainly going by here and the notebook specs/hardware I want have about 80% of what I am looking for and usually some feature missing. I thought I might lessen some of the issues by going with a Nvidia GPU laptop but if ATI can be dealt with (in Linux), I maintain more options.

I am sure my top laptop choices are good Linux machines so the GPU is the main issue to worry about maybe?

 

I've never had an issue with any of my GPU's.

 

I have the Radeon HD 3470 running in my Vaio SR21M under openSuSe 11.1 with the latest version of the ATI proprietary fglrx driver.
The bottom line is: it's usable if you are not trying to run Compiz. If you want full functionality, now, you need to go with Nvidia (have
installed Linux on a bunch of desktops with Nvidia cards and none of these ever gave me any trouble).

Regarding ATI, there seems to be some nasty bug in the fglrx driver that makes it currently impossible to use the HD 3470's hardware
acceleration of Composite features, which Compiz requires to run smoothly (you can run it without hardware acceleration, though).

Other than that, 3D graphics with the HD 3470 and the fglrx driver works ok under Linux. I have played several games with it.

A final warning: if you go with the HD 3470 stay away from the open-source "radeonhd" driver. It presently does an awful job with
respect to power-saving, and it doesn't support 3D for the HD 3470 card.