Valve: Games run FASTER on Linux than Windows

[froggyboy604]

Not only has Valve Software successfully ported the first-person shooter game Left 4 Dead 2 to Linux, but it actually runs faster on the open source OS than on Windows.

Using high-end hardware, a version of the game running on Ubuntu 12.04 renders at 315fps, Valve's Linux team reports. That's a 16 per cent improvement over the Windows version, which only clocks at 270.6fps on the same configuration.

In the long run, Newell says, he'd like to get all 2,500 games now available through Steam running on Linux. That's a tall order, but it may just be possible if it turns out that Microsoft's proprietary technologies make for an inferior gaming platform. ®

Source

Wow, a 16 percent improvement is great.

I think if the Linux version of Steam makes games which run at 15-30 FPS in Windows run at 60 FPS in Linux's Steam client then it can improve the gameplay for many people with older Linux computers with slower hardware, but still want to play some Windows games on Linux without slowdown.

 

[tetutato]

Lol this is because Linux has generally less stuff in the background right?

 

[froggyboy604]

Indeed, Linux has less things running in the background, and is a very minimal OS. plus, you get none of those sponsored trialware like Norton, McAfee, and third party software which comes pre-bundled with a lot of HP, Dell, and other PC brands.

I heard a lot of people complain that trial software from HP and other PC brands tends to slow down their PC.

I also heard OpenGL is speedier then Directx11.

 

[tetutato]

Indeed, Linux has less things running in the background, and is a very minimal OS. plus, you get none of those sponsored trialware like Norton, McAfee, and third party software which comes pre-bundled with a lot of HP, Dell, and other PC brands.

I heard a lot of people complain that trial software from HP and other PC brands tends to slow down their PC.

I also heard OpenGL is speedier then Directx11.

Yea the OpenGL part is what I found most interesting in the article... I wonder how it'll do for other games.

 

[wtl]

Lol this is because Linux has generally less stuff in the background right?

Sort of!

The real answer is a bit more complicated.

With Windows alone (not coutning any third party software), it's incredibly difficult to know what exactly is going on with your system. With the open source components of a GNU/Linux system, developers can more easily figure out what does what and create a system that does what users want and need without ruining features as users can just install components that they need as necessary. In the beginning this meant that the GNU/Linux system wasn't too user friendly, but over the years that hurdle has been crossed time and time again to the point where the only real hurdle to 'user friendliness' is baby duck syndrome and the solution to that would make it "work just like windows" which wouldn't be worth the effort.

That's not to say that Open Source software is always going to beat proprietary stuff in efficiency, but if it has the support from willing developers it has much more of a chance to be better.

which leads to the next point- OpenGL vs DirectX. Initially DirectX was significantly better than OpenGL, but because Microsoft based the Xbox 360 console around version 9, they haven't been able to improve DirectX too much without worrying about compatibility issues for their own hardware. Meanwhile OpenGL hasn't had to worry about that kind of thing, so it's gotten a lot better than DirectX. OpenGL is supported on pretty much everything except the Xbox 360 so it's a good library to work with for developers.

so yeah, it runs less stuff in the background, but it also runs better stuff. I'm sure Microsoft can compete, but it seems like right now they're very focused on tablets, and since they've always been king of this kind of thing I doubt they're too worried yet. A world where Microsoft doesn't have the best operating system for playing games is still pretty hard to imagine.

 

[tetutato]

A world where Microsoft doesn't have the best operating system for playing games is still pretty hard to imagine.

:o Free operating system for all would still be awesome.

 

[wtl]

Another thing to keep in mind is that until now, hardware developers didn't really like putting too much effort into GNU/Linux drivers. They probably still don't. There just hasn't been much in it for then, so the things people have been getting haven't been very good, making Windows the best platform for using hardware effectively. But with Valve working with GNU/Linux, and as they've stated themselves working with hardware vendors, I think there's a lot of hope for really good software for the kind of high end hardware used for gaming.

 

[froggyboy604]

Ubuntu and Linux Mint can play some Windows game with WineHQ , and have a few cool native Linux games like Torqs, Tux racer, etc.