updating drivers - why is it so hard?

In my adventure in trying to update my X3100 drivers to get Compiz (or any 3D desktop running) I've finally given up. After following the this guide to use the Gutsy drivers it would crash my xorg, boot me into the terminal and I would be forced to reconfigure.

I can probably try installing these drivers but the directions are very iffy and not very clear, at least to me.

Another thing I think I might be doing wrong is not uninstalling the i820 drivers under the repositories but I'm not exactly sure which ones to unmark. Most people would just say uninstall and thats it, but they don't really say what packets to unmark. Plus they don't mention it in the start of the guide, if anything they should stress that part since its important.


I have a little rant to go along with this, I really can't understand why they can't make the drivers easily available like packages when installing regular programs. Having to go in a alpha/beta version just to get the correct driver is pretty lame also. Sure its for "unnecessary" stuff like Compiz/Fusion/Beryl but I think that gives Linux a jump ahead of Vista and OSX.

Anyways, I just think Linux needs to work a lot on their drivers, it's a pain in the butt.

 

Well, for my nvidia drivers I couldn't figure out how to install them manually if my life depended on it hahaah; so I found Envy. Google for it It's very handy, and allows you to choose which version of ATI or nVidia drivers you want to install. Hope it helps!

I'm a linux newbie, so I can't give any more insight...:S

 

It's because the kernel changes so much. The drivers are integrated with the kernel, so a driver for 2.6.20 has no guarantee of working with 2.6.22, and quite often doesn't. In general, installing drivers in Linux is "harder" than under Windows because of the nature of the system. But, the drivers fail more elegantly (a display driver bug won't take down the system with a BSOD for example), and are more easily removed and installed on the fly, so you don't have to shut down a running system to upgrade a driver for almost anything.

Now, for the drivers in your link, they should work. The problem is that you want to use brand-new hardware with beta software. That takes more expertise with a system in general, no matter what Microsoft has you believing. OSX doesn't have X3100 drivers, btw. It doesn't support X3100 based cards.

Please realize that Linux is NOT a commercial product, and it is supported and built primarily by volunteers and hackers. If you want something you can just turn the key and go with, use Windows, and cross your fingers. If you buy brand new hardware, you have to expect Linux to lag behind a bit in support because it doesn't have a lot of money or manufacturer support behind it.

 

I find it weird that some drivers are kernel specific, it is a new chipset but I don't think its that different from the previous one. Maybe its Intel thats slow on the development of the driver? Since it seems that a lot of graphic card manufacturers have to develop their Linux driver.

As for other OSs, I've been trying to get away from Windows and try out other things. I was surprised though, how easy it was to install drivers and stuff in the Thinkvantage updater, all you had to do was pick what you wanted to be installed.

I'm going to try to uninstall the default Intel drivers tonight and modify my xorg file again, just hope I don't need to reconfigure it again. If I do get it running then I just hope it wont be blurry, some posts have me worried about that. Then I also have my wifi card to try to get to work, I don't know how that will go.

 

You probably will have to reconfigure it. The problem is that the hardware is newly supported in bleeding-edge, beta software, and there are very few distros that ship with that, or provide it. You have to use the pre-release versions of software to get all your hardware running. The alternative is to wait for something like Ubuntu 7.10 to come out, which should have support built in for all that hardware.