[PD] pd on gericom masterpiece 2440

[chris clepper]

>so,
>
>would a nvidia card be better/safer choice for a linux-notebook?

for drivers the answer is yes.  nvidia has the best linux driver 
support right now.  the geforce4 in the laptops is equivalent to a 
geforce4MX not a Ti model so they don't have any of the advanced 
hardware shaders.  the ati 9000 has hardware shaders.

GEM is not using the hardware shaders yet...  but i have an ati 9000 
in my laptop (g4 titanium) so the possibility is there to write some 
stuff.  however, it is probably best to wait until openGL 2.0 and 
it's unified HSL (hardware shader language) is available in final 
form.  perhaps by this time next year most of GEM's image processing 
can be done fully on a chip like the ati 9000.  the geforce4mx will 
never be able to do this sort of processing (it's actually closer to 
a geforce2mx than geforce4 ti).

so your choice is basically between compatibility and driver support 
today, and the possibility of high performance processing in the 
future.  if you must go linux then nvidia is probably the safe 
choice, but the ati chip will be better in the long run in windows 
and possibly linux depending on the driver support.  all driver 
issues being equal i would choose the ati 9000 over the nvidia 
geforce4mx without hesitation.

oh and 3.7kg+42mm thick with a desktop P4 doesn't sound like a very 
nice portable device.  hot, heavy, and battery hungry ;)

cgc

>i was also thinking on one of those toshiba satellites with gforce4...
>but the design of gericoms masterpiece is much cooler...
>(i just love those round edges :)
>
>cheers
>-andre
>
>