With the recently introduced NVIDIA 555 Linux driver stable series their open-source GPU kernel driver modules are in great shape across consumer and professional graphics products. Over the past two years the support has evolved so much that NVIDIA is now promoting their open-source kernel driver usage and with the NVIDIA 560 Linux driver beta posted this week they are defaulting to using their open-source kernel driver modules in place of the proprietary option — on the Turing and newer GPUs supported by the open-source code. Here is a fresh look at the impact.
The NVIDIA open-source kernel driver modules shipped by their driver installer and also available via their GitHub repository are in great shape. With the R555 series the support and performance is basically at parity of their open-source kernel modules compared to their proprietary kernel drivers. The proprietary kernel drivers will continue to be available from the NVIDIA installer package for supporting pre-Turing GPUs and those wanting to opt for it with existing generations but moving forward new NVIDIA GPUs are just being enabled along their open-source driver. It’s with Blackwell and all future products only being enabled by the open kernel modules.
