Firstly: I am a big AMD fan. If I can justify getting their products over Intel/Nvidia's then I will. I often defend the AMD option in PC hardware threads. If I could get a T-shirt with the AMD logo I would wear it.

But now AMD has let me down..

I bought an X1950 PRO 2 years ago. Later, AMD announced they were dramatically scaling up Linux support for their cards by funding the open-source driver and adding developers to the consumer driver. I was very happy as 3D performance finally improved to the point where games were playable in the closed driver. The open driver will never have enough 3D performance for games for reasons of cost, but AMD promised the binary driver would continue to improve.

Yesterday they deprecated my card. It was only 2.5 YEARS OLD but now it is supported by a legacy driver that will not be updated. On Windows this would not be a crisis: I could continue to use that driver on my Vista install for as long as I want and still play new games and new apps.

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=amd_r500_legacy

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=NzExOQ

On Linux, it's different. The OS updates every 6 months with a new "X Server" version (the graphics layer). Each new X Server requires a graphics driver update or it won't work. If you don't upgrade, you generally can't upgrade to newer versions of any application*. This isn't normally a problem as Linux is free, but because the binary driver is frozen and no one can edit it, it will not work with the next version of Ubuntu scheduled for April. That's ONE MONTH away.

Bottom line: I can no longer run new versions of 3D applications or games at reasonable speed on Linux beyond April. Thanks AMD.

If this keeps happening, Linux will never become an accepted gaming platform. You won't be able to keep a Linux system for new games without replacing the card whether you want to or not every time that happens.

*OK, you can, but you have to backport and compile it yourself, and then it still won't fully work. This requires serious programming knowledge I don't have. I might be able to get backports for a few revisions, but after 3 new versions (That's next April) no one will make them.

Lesson to be learned: don't game on linux.

I have Vista, of course, but i) I wish I didn't need it and ii) This is a barrier to widespread Linux adoption.

This is dumb.
The old drivers still work with the new kernels. At least they do with NVIDIA.
If you're gaming, a 2 year old video card is probably no good anyhow!

Maybe its the fault of Linux, if they didn't change the code-base so often it would be more worthwhile to support the cards for longer. See, it works both ways.

Shouldn't the thread title be more like "Linux let me down, as expected"? Or is that a contradiction of terms?

Seriously, every six months all the drivers go out of date? That's HIDEOUS.

no, this guy doesn't understand.

and neither do you.

this isn't the problem at all.  In fact, there is no problem.  His card will work fine for years to come. For example, a friend has my old computer with a NVIDIA G4 card, which uses the legacy drivers.  But he can still get 3D support and use desktop effcts and google earth games etc just fine.  And he's using Ubuntu 8.10. 

Don't say I don't understand.  Perhaps what YOU don't understand is that not all people are privy to the same information.  I don't use Linux, so I went by the information in the OP.  If that information is wrong, say that instead of that I "don't understand". 

So can you explain what Soleron has to do to get everything working properly after April?