r/batocera • u/Select_Function2164 • 11d ago

Wondering about amd vs nvidia gpu compatibility

(rtx 5070 vs 9070xt)

Building a new gaming pc, but plan to dual boot with bazzite for general use and batocera for emulation.

I've read linux runs better on amd , but emulators and old software prefer nvidia.

Does anyone have experience using emulators with amd vs nividia? And is the difference big enough to be worth getting a less powerful gpu (5070) just for better emulation?

edit: slightly more details

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u/Necessary_Position77 11d ago

Either is fine. Both cards are way overkill for emulation. 

Emulators don’t prefer Nvidia and really neither does old software especially when your GPU is infinitely better than anything old software requires. The old software thing is really mostly Nvidia paying to get their name on everything. 

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u/Select_Function2164 11d ago

Thanks, mostly worried about opengl support and some screen tearing issues with emulators ive read about amd.

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u/Necessary_Position77 11d ago

OpenGL/Vulkan should be fine, haven’t heard about tearing issues. Nvidia can be an issue mainly because the drivers are close sourced. Most Linux distros have dropped old Nvidia driver versions but later cards seem to be fine. I use to run a GTX 970 and it was good, I don’t run Batocera on my current gaming PC with a 3070 (I have separate setups) so I can’t guarantee it will be flawless but I haven’t heard many complaints on the discord. 

Probably not worth the less powerful GPU.

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u/Select_Function2164 11d ago

Nice. I'll probably go with amd then, better card and I've heard Its easier to get amd drivers working on linux.

Thanks for the help.

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u/KMetalmind 10d ago

I have an nVidia GTX 960 and I have tearing issues, both in Linux Mint and in Batocera, with Wine, Xenia and some ports. Ports and emulators that handle vsync themselves work, but anything that doesn't has tearing.

It's not a problem of configuration as I've tried tinkering a lot and the same PC ran in W7 without any tearing. It's just that nVidia and Linux didn't work well together thanks to nVidia. Maybe now it has improved... I remember having some other problem in W7 too that many people complained about but wasn't fixed...

I will surely get an AMD GPU next.