Hi All,
I was wondering if anyone has had much experience with Tumbleweed breaking the intel HD Drivers. I’m deciding between Tumbleweed and Leap, and while I would like updated packages, I am not willing to sacrifice system stability when it comes to graphics. Additionally, I have a fingerprint reader which I would like to use. Would Tumbleweed potentially break that driver as well? Thank you!
-sheich
When I first started using TW on my (I can’t recall offhand what older generation) Intel graphics based laptop, there were issues. I’m not certain where the problem lay in the stack (in the kernal drm driver, X driver, or in Mesa driver). But it got resolved in future updates and the system works well now. That said, I see a whack of complaints about Intel based graphics not working properly with this or that, so YMMV.
For comparison sake, my Radeon based TW system has, on a couple of occasions, seen regressions introduced into the graphics stack. Its frustrating when things are working great only to get bamboozled by an “update”. Fortunately, future updates also brought about restorative corrections.
The point is, it cuts both ways, and that stuff happens (its inevitable unfortunately when dealing with complicated systems such as graphics).
Another point at large is the overall stability of TW. For the most part it has been very good. But there have been a number of times where things have not gone too smoothly or without the introduction of a new set of problems (whether talking about other drivers, the desktop itself, or some paticular application). Only you can figure out what is stable enough for your everyday needs.
Additionally, I have a fingerprint reader which I would like to use. Would Tumbleweed potentially break that driver as well? Thank you!
I have no idea.
Hi sceich, I’ve been using Tumbleweed for nearly a year on an old GM965 and a HD4600 Intel chips with no noticeable problem related to graphics. Now both are on Leap just because I don’t really need “the cutting edge” of TW and everyday life is easier on a “stable” version.
I didn’t experience showstoppers with TW, but occasional glitches or regressions that lasted a few days to a few weeks before an update fixed them: you must have the time to find out, debug or just wait. If you can’t afford this, choose Leap unless you have one of the newest CPUs that require kernel 4.3 or 4.4 to work properly.
You might also install both Tumbleweed and an “emergency” release on a secondary partition (something that you already tested on your HW, e.g.) for those hard days when you meet a regression and have no time to debug; BTW, remember that updates on TW cannot be reversed, generally speaking, since older packages are wiped out of the repos.
WRT Fingerprint, AFAIK support is minimal both ways, the last time I had one working satisfactorily was with OpenSUSE 11.3 maybe…