EeePC 1000HE Gaming - Windows Vs GNU/Linux

Posted by volpejosesk@reddit | linux | View on Reddit | 70 comments

Linux's open-source graphics drivers are pawesome. But the legacy drivers still sucks and it's unfortunate how abandoned they are. I've tried to use Mesa Amber with no success, it compiles but OpenGL doesn't works (GLXFBConfigs error). I don't have a secondary drive to try it and didn't want to format. Mesa 25 fails to load i915 driver. Because of driver issues WineD3D cannot render Half Life in Direct3D mode. To make it fair for the benchmark, Windows also used OpenGL mode. In no way i intend to promote Windows. My aim is to spread awareness about the current state of legacy hardware on GNU/Linux and hope to get more attention to legacy drivers

Reply to Post

Reply

70 Comments

[-]

Evgenie3311@reddit

This video reminds me about my mom's laptop in 2013. White ASUS EeePC X101CH, which couldn't even handle some gold source games like Half-Life and Counter-Strike 1.6. I think I should've put windows xp on it instead of windows 7 starter as it was too weak.

Reply

[-]

commodore512@reddit

Oh god, Netbooks. They were good for Treating a cheap Laptop like it was a Windpws 98 era machine running XP. The early atom chips didn't have out of order execution. Really bad experience by 2009 standards when thy got popular. But they were good if you used forums in 2009 and just wanted a cheap machine to call your own, not so much for the popularity of video sharing sites like youtube. Though the late ones like the Nvidia Ion (and especially the Ion 2) and video accelerators like the Broadcom CrystalHD, you could play Blu-Rays on a crappy atom running Windows XP easy with those. I also don't blame wine and OS devs for games not running as well as XP on atoms. Though I think the world is ready Neo-Netbooks, ETA Prime just recently made a video on a Intel n100 laptop with a 2nd screen where the numpad would be. I think our computing needs have stabilized. The n100s run AVX2 and they have Quicksync, so they make a decent Jellyfin box, so a casual user that uses PowerDirector on Windows could have a imovie-like experience editing videos.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

What worries me is the drivers. It's the same drivers used in others Gen3 GMAs, and the GPU uses the same architecture of this generation though underclocked. If the drivers are broken, other legacy computers are broken aswell. This is also happening with other legacy drivers. Not long ago VIA GPU drivers were removed from the kernel.

Reply

[-]

commodore512@reddit

It's really hard getting by with underpowered hardware today unless you want to use it as a distraction-free device, I tried using Trisquel on a Core2 Quad with 8GB of expensive RAM, it used half of my CPU just to watch a video in MPV so I can see why it's neglected today. I think you're better off contacting a few driver engineers that like puzzles to solve and sending them netbooks and don't be too disappointed if they can't make it better, it would be like a side project and they may not see it as a puzzle worth solving, but if they're bored they and they get that sweet dopamine from solving puzzles, they might be interested.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

I hope to become a contributor and contribute with the legacy drivers soon

Reply

[-]

commodore512@reddit

Sounds challenging, it's wise to start with stepping stones. Due to the popularity of anime, Japanese is one of the most popular second language of the English speaking world once you put languages of bordering countries out of the equation and it's also one of the most commonly dropped languages due to it being so radically unfamiliar to English and even ignoring the Alphabets, yes plural, (three to be precise) this is talking about how English is a Germanic Proto-European Language with 60% of the Lexicon coming from Latin. Hell, even 5% of English comes from Ancient Greek, so Ancient Greek is way easier to learn than Japanese. (though Ancient Greek is lacking in video content) I studied Japanese for a job and I gave up on it once I realized there's nothing for me there anymore. Anyway, I don't think you want your first driver project to be video driver reverse engineering, a wise stepping stone would be working on serial port drivers. Especially TTY. there segmented displays that mount to a /dev/tty

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

OpenArena and Xonotic also has graphical glitches, so looking into it is the first thing i would do. Probably fixing them would fix Undertale. I doubt it would fix the performance issues though.

Reply

[-]

commodore512@reddit

Have you tried an era appropriate distro as a sanity check? Like a distro revision that was new 5 years after that netbook came out for a time of driver maturation, not driver decay. Also I heard some of the Atom's intel Graphics was a PowerVR chip and that can cause problems.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

Tried Debian 11 with Mesa 20.3.5 (pre-Gallium driver). \* Half-Life (native) does runs much better, close to Windows XP performance in OpenGL, with some few flickers. In Windows XP it's still better. I haven't tried using WineD3D. \* Undertale doesn't runs, it complains that couldn't create Direct3D canvas. \* OpenArena doesn't has the same visual glitch as when using Mesa 22. Textures and shaders works well, but polygons flickers. Performance is really awful (0 to 1 FPS). In Mesa 22, performance is much better (1 to 13 FPS) but weapons and players are pink. In Windows XP, the game is playable around 20 to 60 FPS. I've used the same settings in all (high textures, low lights, GL Extensions enabled and disabled (no difference), all disabled, 1024x600.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

Not yet. This is a GMA 950 based chip.

Reply

[-]

commodore512@reddit

How I feel about "Legacy Hardware" is what are they're using it for and if they're not using it as a hobby, can they get a better computer for free? I think modern tasks need at least somewhat modern feature sets, it doesn't need the latest AVX10, but modern websites are encrypted and they need AES acceleration and with the ubiquity of super heavy Javascript, they need AVX, I had a core 2 quad that didn't have any of that and it took half my CPU just to play a video in mpv and an Intel Atom is way slower, even if you had an Atom that uses the Nvidia Ion 2 Chipset and the open source drivers were just as good as the last binary drivers in Windows XP or Windows 7, it would still be slow with modern tasks especially with the lack of out of order execution. I feel hardware that old should only do legacy paradigms and scopes that they were designed for. That said I still rock hardware that's almost as old as an intel atom, but it supports AVX1 and AES and that's plenty fast for most modern games with a modern low power GPU.

Reply

[-]

commodore512@reddit

I'm also curious how well gentoo would run this on -march=native and -mtune=native and with the most minimalist DE with a version of Wine from 2012.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

I'll experiment Gentoo on that. It'll be my first time compiling Gentoo.

Reply

[-]

FrostyDiscipline7558@reddit

Is it a native Linux port of the game? If not, this doesn't belong here. Windows games, with Proton/Wine/Whatever or not, those aren't Linux issues or problems. Take it somewhere else. Remember, if you want to run a program on an operating system it wasn't designed for, expect problems, and the only people to complain to are the people that wrote the compat layer and the game producer... Not Linux forums, subreddits, and chat channels... because it was and never will be a Linux problem. Bye. Leave. Take your post with you when you exit the door.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

[https://odysee.com/@JoseskVolpe:c/windowswinelinux:4](https://odysee.com/@JoseskVolpe:c/windowswinelinux:4) This is where you say goodbye apologizing. Now go away and learn how Wine and OpenGL works, sucker.

Reply

[-]

FrostyDiscipline7558@reddit

Your initial video at the top of your post didn't show native Linux version, only Wine and Windows. So my initial statement stands. That you've added a native port in this link above is something new, and should be it's own Linux related post. This original post, however, did not include a Linux native option / part of the discussion, is therefore not Linux related, and should be deleted. My comment is not meaningless, you've just changed your question to try and run around the fact that you didn't originally meet the requirements of the rules for posting here. Nice try, though. Now delete this crap thread and go make a proper post with the Linux native part included.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

Lamo dude, cry harder. Yourself didn't bother to reason and didn't even read the video description, you didn't took the description into consideration to note the complaint is about the drivers. Your comment could be valid about not using the native version and could be constructive, but instead you tried to made it destructive, you attempted to do it disregard the results and the criticism on the current situtation of legacy drivers. You didn't bothered to ask how it would result with native applications, when OpenArena and Xonotic also has severe glitch and performance issues, which may be a hint where the drivers could improve since they are FOSS. Then the tests on native Half-Life just showed that you're nothing than an arrogant narcisist, and the Linux community needs less people like you.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

If it's issues are open driver related issues it literally is a Linux issue. The program is running on Wine but it's set to render on OpenGL, not WineD3D. You can run a Java applet and if it find difficulties to render because of OpenGL, it's OpenGL that's on faulty, not Java. Even 100% native softwares found issues to render on this machine because of faulty driver.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

Native Half-Life vs Wine and Windows: [https://odysee.com/@JoseskVolpe:c/windowswinelinux:4](https://odysee.com/@JoseskVolpe:c/windowswinelinux:4)

Reply

[-]

Plenty-Light755@reddit

Why are you running Half-Life with Wine when it has native version? Although I don't think it would fix performance issues since graphics driver is broken.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

There's almost no difference between Wine and native: [https://odysee.com/@JoseskVolpe:c/windowswinelinux:4](https://odysee.com/@JoseskVolpe:c/windowswinelinux:4)

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

I've used a CD version from my physical collection, which is Windows version.

Reply

[-]

Outrageous_Trade_303@reddit

windows xp???? lol!

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

Well it's a second generation Intel Atom, it barely supports Windows 7 x3 I did a dual-boot on this machine and i'm using Q4OS as the main system.

Reply

[-]

Outrageous_Trade_303@reddit

You should try ubuntu 10.04 if you want to compare with XP.

Reply

[-]

rdesktop7@reddit

That is about the era that win xp is. Not certain what the point of the comparison would be though

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

Is to show how the GPU should behave, in case of Half Life both are using the same graphics API. If i were to show only how these games behave on modern GNU/Linux, knowing it's a really weak machine, we could argue that the GPU is on faulty. I'm comparing the drivers. The XP driver got the planned performance of this GPU by Intel on that era, when Intel were kinda experimental on Linux. Still, i kinda doubt that older DRI Linux drivers behave that glitchy and i wish to try it on a older installation of Linux. I'm showing that the replacement drivers doesn't takes the full potential of these GPUs and other legacy drivers may have the same issues aswell. The comparison with XP is just to use the XP performance as a reference for this GPU. I also wanted to point the state of Mesa Amber itself. It was made to work with Mesa >=22, still it didn't worked after i compiled it. Linux is known to be really great to revive such old machines, and it really does. But when drivers gets to make weak hardware became even weaker, there's a problem.

Reply

[-]

rdesktop7@reddit

So, you are saying that code optimized for some hardware is better than some code not optimized for the hardware?

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

Both drivers were made to work with the same hardware.

Reply

[-]

Outrageous_Trade_303@reddit

The point is comparing apples with apples and not apples with cats

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

I agree and i intended to, but i didn't had a secondary drive and i didn't wanted to format. I intend to use this machine as a travel machine for awhile so i needed a modern OS and already customized this installation. Also i pinpointed that GNU/Linux is far better than Windows on legacy hardware, Windows 10 or 11 would never run on such machine, it amazed me that Telegram even runs really great on this machine (except for HD videos) after installing Linux on it. But as legacy drivers just gets removed and don't get proper replacement GNU/Linux (aswell BSDs) risks losing this potential. The goal to compare with Windows XP is to show that these drivers could do so much better. Whenever i get a second drive (and time) i'll try a older Linux install with the older drivers on it and compare. I'm pretty sure it's the replacement i915g driver that's causing these performance and graphical glitches issues.

Reply

[-]

Outrageous_Trade_303@reddit

>i needed a modern OS windows xp is not a modern os.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

>i'm using Q4OS as the main system.

Reply

[-]

Outrageous_Trade_303@reddit

Exactly! And you are comparing it with windows xp.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

Dude, i already explained you why i'm comparing it with Windows XP. Give 1 minute of your life to read.

Reply

[-]

Outrageous_Trade_303@reddit

What if compare apples with.... cats and I explained to you that this is what I have (ie I have an apple and a cat). Would you be ok with that?

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

I'll let this comment here for future readers to remember: don't feed the trolls I'm stopping here.

Reply

[-]

Outrageous_Trade_303@reddit

Good! I agree with you: let it here for eveyone to see.

Reply

[-]

FrostyDiscipline7558@reddit

Why, this post is off topic for this subreddit anyway. It does not belong here.

Reply

[-]

Outrageous_Trade_303@reddit

Well, OP doesn't want to delete it and they want everyone to see it. And I agree with that: let everyone see how stupid it is to compare apples with... cats :)

Reply

[-]

TommyYxofPloger@reddit

bro is into PPAP on cats lol [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ct6BUPvE2sM&list=RDCt6BUPvE2sM&start\_radio=1](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ct6BUPvE2sM&list=RDCt6BUPvE2sM&start_radio=1)

Reply

[-]

p-wing@reddit

I've been playing around with my 2009 netbook recently and couldn't get Q4OS to run on it, what other distros have you tried? I'm looking for any low-spec distro as well - my primary machine is from 2012 but the specs are still better than can be easily found retail, smartphones made PC iteration drop off a fucking cliff. I'm wanting to replace it but honestly have been saying that for six years, it's still plugging away with Win7 and dual boots.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

The other distro i've used was Antix, but i opted for Q4OS since i wanted to give Trinity a try (and i really enjoyed it). I basically just flashed it on a USB stick with Ventoy and booted it. There's also a 64-Bit version of this distro, so downloading the wrong version might be the reason you couldn't boot it. Could be silly but this netbook's CPU was wrongly listed as a 64-Bit CPU on some websites. Please inform your netbook model

Reply

[-]

Ezmiller_2@reddit

Slackware!

Reply

[-]

p-wing@reddit

It's an Acer Aspire One - I've got AntiX on both machines right now, it's so damn close to what I'm looking for but still a little unwieldy. Honestly, I just want that damn thing to run like a Chromebook, but it's only got 1gb RAM and struggled with WinXP and Win7. I've also played a lot with Slax and WattOS.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

Well i doubt you can make it run like a Chromebook since it's even lower-spec than any Chromebook x3 Still, it's so much better than being jailed to ChromeOS (unless you like it, of course). But hey, GNU/Linux is entirely customizable. You can try a different Display Manager and manage your renderer settings. It really improves a lot. For instance my last Core i3 laptop was weirdly running bad with XFCE and default XFWM, after changing to Compiz it ran really great. But i think the 1GB RAM is what's limiting you more, even more than the crappy Atom CPU. This EeePC i got was 1GB and after adding a extra giga, it became a lot better.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

¿What model did you got?

Reply

[-]

AgainstScumAndRats@reddit

Year of Linux Desktop 5688 AD

Reply

[-]

lazyboy76@reddit

This is so hilarious, seriously.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

Could be even older, Linux will run on it x3

Reply

[-]

Wonderful_Turnip8556@reddit

this video is kinda useless as he's using wine and not proton

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

Proton is not supported on i386 systems, and also Vulkan is required to benefit from DXVK. The best alternative would be Wine staging alongside Gallium Nine, but Gallium Nine isn't supported for this GPU either. So the best settings possible are to use Wine Staging + native OpenGL

Reply

[-]

S7relok@reddit

But...why playing of a thing equivalent to early pentium 4 in terms of power?

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

¿Because why not? x3 If it has a CPU it can game. Jokes aside this netbook was a friend's gift. I was already trying to get a damn small laptop (like these 8 inch chinese ones) to do my things before, then i got this one. The hardware is still too weak and the laptop is still too big but it works and fits. I was already not expecting to game but it was still fun to give it a try.

Reply

[-]

S7relok@reddit

I had some of these things (EEEpc, Acer Aspire One) in the 2010's and even for that days, these things were very weak. Barely sufficient to launch the original STALKER trilogy with the lowest settings and a few settings file modification.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

Yeah they were already really bad, which is why i didn't had much expectations with this EeePC. I expected to only use it to run lightweight legacy software on it, like old BIOS flasher softwares that's painful to run on Windows 11. But i got impressed with how far from my expectations it went and it became a very useful hardware for me. My friend became really happy that i saved it from taking dust for eternity.

Reply

[-]

S7relok@reddit

If you want a very small light gaming setup, my actual bet is micro PCs with N150 cpu and such. Very small form factor, not expensive, easily put in a bag, enough power to run light games at 1080 and emulating some consoles, GPU drivers supported and working. You need a screen somewhere to use it tho. I even saw some integrated in laptops when I was doing my research for these micro PC

Reply

[-]

EmuMoe@reddit

It was never that great on old atoms, but UT99 ran like charm even under Linux.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

I'm gona try that :3

Reply

[-]

e_t_@reddit

As I recall, those Atom chips use Intel GMA500 graphics chips. Intel licensed the IP from PowerVR rather than developing in-house. It uses a proprietary driver on Windows, for which there is no Linux version.

Reply

[-]

fliperama_@reddit

Yeah. When I found that out, a new linux home server with built-in power backup was born

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

This is an even older Atom with a GMA 950 based chip.

Reply

[-]

windswept_tree@reddit

Wow. I've got Q4OS on a mothballed 1000HE and browsing the web on it is an ordeal, even with the RAM maxed. It's good for MUDs though.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

Using Falkon it can browse the web quite great. But is still limited, some websites won't work right. Another alternative is TUI browsers like Lynx, but they're even more limited to the bloated web of today's. But surfing Tor or small FOSS websites goes really great. Avoid Chromium and Firefox since they require modern GPU capabilities. Use them only if you need specific compatibility with specific websites (and you have patience).

Reply

[-]

bunkbail@reddit

>Avoid Chromium and Firefox since they require modern GPU capabilities. avoid using my grandma's laptop

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

That works too lol

Reply

[-]

Sea-Load4845@reddit

Inised the Raspberry OS in my old LG netbook and it works fine. The UI isn't the best, but it's quick and fast for that kind of ancient hardware

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

¡Show it! :3

Reply

[-]

Affectionate_Rub_589@reddit

I always dual booted back in 2010 on my netbook because the games ran better on xp.

Reply

[-]

volpejosesk@reddit (OP)

Which is one of the reasons i choose Windows XP to compare. Not only because i have installed it to get rid of my VMs and have a real machine to use legacy software that depends on the damn NT kernel. Intel wasn't really a good driver provider for Linux back then, they were not bad either but their drivers were really experimental, their real planned performance was on Windows. Of course let's not forget that Windows had DirectX while Linux took really long to get Gallium. So i choose Windows XP to show the planned performance of this GPU and how badly optimized the replacement drivers are. I even choose Half Life to run on OpenGL to diregard the huge difference Direct3D was to OpenGL and make a fair comparison to the drivers. I still have to try the older DRI Linux drivers, and compare to the Gallium replacement driver, but i'll have to let that to another time.

Reply