NVIDIA 396.18 beta driver is out with a new Vulkan SPIR-V compiler to reduce shader compilation time

I'm currently on 384.130... but this sounds like a reason to upgrade to the latest.

Can I get it for 32bit??? :P

Can I get it for 32bit??? :P

Get out :P

Excuse my confusion, is this new shader compiler for Vulkan only or also for OpenGL?

Excuse my confusion, is this new shader compiler for Vulkan only or also for OpenGL?

It's a new SPIR-V compiler, so I believe it'll be used for GL apps using the GL_ARB_gl_spirv extension to use SPIR-V shaders, but I don't think there's many (any?) using that right now since it's a recent extension.

According to the dxvk-users channel on Discord the new driver and compiler are not great. FPS are cut by half and rendering is terrible.

Yeah new driver has lots of issues, tesselation not working, bad performance, but shader compiles are a lot smoother and this driver also fixes the Sun glitch in GTA V with dxvk for me. but they need to work on it more.

anyway its just a beta driver, they can improve it and until then i can run their old compiler with:

export __GL_NextGenCompiler=0


edit: That info only involves vulkan with the new SPIR-V compiler, OpenGL is unaffected


Last edited by Xpander on 11 Apr 2018 at 8:26 am UTC

Also good to see that there is someone from nvidia in the DXVK issue tracker to pick up all these issues quickly.

According to the dxvk-users channel on Discord the new driver and compiler are not great. FPS are cut by half and rendering is terrible.

It would surprise me if Nvidia would try to improve their Vulkan support significantly. All the Nvidia Optimus graphics cards in laptops still don't have acceptable Xorg Linux drivers.

And I can't login to the Plasma Wayland session via a discrete GTX 1050 card when I use the proprietary Nvidia drivers. Nvidia made their own EGL API implementation when everyone else wanted to use GBM.

The EGL solution worked via the proprietary drivers on my Gnome Wayland and Nvidia Optimus 425M Arch Linux laptop. But after certain updates it suddenly stopped working and the Wayland login option disappeared when I use the proprietary driver. The Wayland option returns when I use Nouveau. But I never had these severe issues with Wayland on AMD graphics cards or Intel integrated graphics.

Nvidia could have optimized their Pascal architecture for low-level API's like Vulkan if they really wanted this. But they focused their architecture twenty times more on the proprietary DX11 API. Even when they knew that DX11 is a huge bottleneck and that it's more taxing on the CPU and GPU.

There is an open alternative for G-Sync but Nvidia keeps pushing their proprietary solution.

I can understand that Nvidia wants to work together with Microsoft on new technology but why almost every time a new proprietary solution for essential hardware and API's.

"NVIDIA collaborates with Microsoft to bring proprietary DX12 development and debugging to the next level"
"NVIDIA G-SYNC gives you more of what you want in a gaming experience."
"Introduction to NVIDIA proprietary RTX and Microsoft DirectX Ray Tracing"

Their neglect for any solution that's not proprietary is really striking. And I think that this work philosophy really counteract 'the best and cheapest experience for customers' and 'to produce high quality software faster and easier'.

Because of all these reasons, plus NVIDIA GPP, is the motive behind the fact that I'm so eager for AMD's GPUs releases and, even through they are sometimes more expensive and having less performance than NVIDIA's GPUs (at least here on Brazil...even considering that everything is expensive here), I really want to buy just AMD from now on.

I just cannot support NVIDIA anymore and, personally, it's a shame that I have only NVIDIA GPUs on the computers on my house (including my notebook, where I cannot remove or change the GPU unfortunately because the GPU it is welded on the motherboard (bad, bad Dell..)).


Last edited by fjorgemota on 11 Apr 2018 at 10:41 am UTC

The 390 driver that comes with Ubuntu is horrible. I can't stop the tearing no matter what i do.
It works with 340, but that is old. I think it does not even support Vulkan.

The 390 driver that comes with Ubuntu is horrible. I can't stop the tearing no matter what i do.
It works with 340, but that is old. I think it does not even support Vulkan.

Are you on a laptop or desktop?

If it is desktop , use ForceFullComposition option.

If it is a laptop , set up PrimeSync properly to eliminate all tearings.

The 390 driver that comes with Ubuntu is horrible. I can't stop the tearing no matter what i do.
It works with 340, but that is old. I think it does not even support Vulkan.

I've had no trouble at all with the 390 series. But you're not the first one to complain here so there must be something to it.

If tearing is your only problem, you could try enabling the Full Composition Pipeline in the Nvidia settings software. This does come with a small performance penalty, but totally worth it in my opinion.

EDIT: Leopard was quicker.


Last edited by tuubi on 11 Apr 2018 at 4:37 pm UTC

Most distributions have other sources to directly install from. What distro are you using?

As someone still fairly new to linux, is it best to use drivers from the Driver Manager or get them from nvidias website? What would be the disadvantages of using one from nvidia website (non-beta drivers) ? Would they be less stable or/and less reliable on a wider range of games? I do love to play a wide range of games so wouldn't want to upset that compatability

I'm currently on 384.11, and using an asus nvidia gtx 1060 3gb, does that sound about right or am I on out-dated drivers? It says recommended on driver manager

Stay away from Nvidia site installers.

Add this ppa.

https://launchpad.net/~graphics-drivers/+archive/ubuntu/ppa

Driver updates will be visible on your driver manager.

got tearing even with "full composition pipeline" but only in firefox as far as i can see, and if i load up nvidia settings and then exit,it fixes it for awhile. some sort of sync issue going on here. don't believe i had this issue with the driver that came as default with mint cinnamon, think it was version 340.

Most distributions have other sources to directly install from. What distro are you using?

Linux Mint 18.3, cinnamon

For Linux Mint you can add the graphics-drivers ppa to get newer drivers.

https://launchpad.net/~graphics-drivers/+archive/ubuntu/ppa


Last edited by Ehvis on 11 Apr 2018 at 5:53 pm UTC

Only one thing to say - this beta has a VERY BAD PERFORMANCE.

ran "phoronix-test-suite default-benchmark openarena xonotic tesseract gputest unigine-valley"

and the numbers are similar to the 390 release, they are worse..but not by much.

openarena 390 driver = 542.30 fps
openarena 396 driver = 538.33 fps

the rest of the test i won't bother posting since it used different resolutions sadly since last time i ran it :(


Last edited by frakswe on 11 Apr 2018 at 6:58 pm UTC

The 390 driver that comes with Ubuntu is horrible. I can't stop the tearing no matter what i do.
It works with 340, but that is old. I think it does not even support Vulkan.

I've had no trouble at all with the 390 series. But you're not the first one to complain here so there must be something to it.

If tearing is your only problem, you could try enabling the Full Composition Pipeline in the Nvidia settings software. This does come with a small performance penalty, but totally worth it in my opinion.

EDIT: Leopard was quicker.

Yeap. Have done that done this and nothing works.
I have a laptop and my gpu is k1000m.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYWer86A20s&t=9s
That is the guide i use to get rid of tearing, but with 390 it's not working. Works with all the other driver versions.

I think that Nvidia should open up their drivers if they can't manage to handle their proprietary ones...

Is there any way i can install 384? every time i put sudo apt install nvidia-384 it just installs the 390 driver.

The 390 driver that comes with Ubuntu is horrible. I can't stop the tearing no matter what i do.
It works with 340, but that is old. I think it does not even support Vulkan.

I've had no trouble at all with the 390 series. But you're not the first one to complain here so there must be something to it.

If tearing is your only problem, you could try enabling the Full Composition Pipeline in the Nvidia settings software. This does come with a small performance penalty, but totally worth it in my opinion.

EDIT: Leopard was quicker.

Yeap. Have done that done this and nothing works.
I have a laptop and my gpu is k1000m.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYWer86A20s&t=9s
That is the guide i use to get rid of tearing, but with 390 it's not working. Works with all the other driver versions.

I think that Nvidia should open up their drivers if they can't manage to handle their proprietary ones...

Is there any way i can install 384? every time i put sudo apt install nvidia-384 it just installs the 390 driver.

Because on a laptop , you have to configure PrimeSync.

I told you on my earlier message.

https://forum.linuxmint.net.tr/index.php?topic=8505.0

Just do this.

Change xed parts to your distros editor.

The 390 driver that comes with Ubuntu is horrible. I can't stop the tearing no matter what i do.
It works with 340, but that is old. I think it does not even support Vulkan.

I've had no trouble at all with the 390 series. But you're not the first one to complain here so there must be something to it.

If tearing is your only problem, you could try enabling the Full Composition Pipeline in the Nvidia settings software. This does come with a small performance penalty, but totally worth it in my opinion.

EDIT: Leopard was quicker.

Yeap. Have done that done this and nothing works.
I have a laptop and my gpu is k1000m.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYWer86A20s&t=9s
That is the guide i use to get rid of tearing, but with 390 it's not working. Works with all the other driver versions.

I think that Nvidia should open up their drivers if they can't manage to handle their proprietary ones...

Is there any way i can install 384? every time i put sudo apt install nvidia-384 it just installs the 390 driver.

Because on a laptop , you have to configure PrimeSync.

I told you on my earlier message.

https://forum.linuxmint.net.tr/index.php?topic=8505.0

Just do this.

Change xed parts to your distros editor.

Hmmmm... Prime is for dual graphics. I have Intel one disabled via bios.

I don't have Prime installed, because i have not needed it before with any other driver, because they all used to work.
I have used single gpu and it has worked and still works with older drivers.

Maybe my only option is to update 384 through Nvidias site, because i can't install it from drivers list or through terminal?

Thanks for trying to help though. Oh! BTW. 396 does not work also.
Damn Nvidia is really on a roll. Maybe i need to buy a cpu and a motherboard for my desktop so i can use my 7870 for my tv. :)