Quake 4

Quake 4 is also another game with a native Linux port, making it easy for us to compare results with the Windows edition. Unlike UT2004, Quake 4 is a 32-bit binary. I wonder how the performance will compare to Windows in this case.

As observed in the graph above, the difference in performance isn't far apart. Nor is performance far from the Windows version of Quake 4. However, we again see the 8800GTX outperform the HD3870 Toxic. I'm suspecting this is an issue with the drivers, and not the actual card.

Nexuiz

Nexuiz is a popular open source first person shooter based on a modified (and very advanced) Quake 1 engine. Phoronix recently release a test suite, consisting of some of the benchmarks they commonly use when benchmarking hardware, and it's all automated through PHP scripts. I opted to run Nexuiz through their benchmark system.

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Once again, we see the HD3870 Toxic falling behind the 8800GTX in performance. It does, however, maintain a very respectable and smooth framerate.

Final Thoughts on Linux Performance

Given what performance gains we saw in Windows using the HD3870 Toxic, I feel it's safe to say that the lag the Toxic feels in Linux is a drive issue. Althought AMD has made numerous improvements to the driver, the driver hasn't yet reached a level of maturity where it can openly compete with nVidia's driver.

Regardless, the HD3870 Toxic doesn't fall far behind the 8800GTX in any of the benchmarks. Perhaps in a future version of the Catalyst drivers we'll another performance increase.